Arm Ball

And their best bowler in the warm up game is not going to play the most important game of the CT. Not because he is a lowly bowler on talent, but because his captain doesnt put that trust in him.

This is South Africa and there is place for just one spinner. And that spinenr is going to be Harbhajan Singh who is fresh from a 5-for.

RP Singh had a fabulous T20 world cup in 2007. How far he goes this time is not very sure as he is not seeming to be in good form. He was clobbered for 66 runs in 8 overs by Neil Broom.

Ishant Sharma has been on and off. Praveen Kumar well I am not sure if he would be playing. Ashish Nehra seems to be the best bet to rely on right now.

Zaheer Khan seems to be missed big time in this tournament. A country where he has been tremendously successful except the match on 3/23/03 against Australia, the biggest match of his career.

Possible bowling line up looks like : Nehra, Ishant, Harbhajan and RP.

Batting more or less looks settled. Tendulkar, Gambhir to open with Dravid at 3, Yuvraj at 4, MS at 5, Raina at 6. 7th spot seems to be in a bit of doubt. I would rather give the benefit of doubt to Yusuf Pathan in the first game and then may be try Nayar in the game against dummy Bangladesh…..

If the bowlers do their job half decent, the Indians would be good to live up to their reputation as the best ODI team in last 2 years. They have now won 6 trophies on trot. No other team can boast of the same record.

Toss comes in. And we are chasing. Yes. Way to go. Ojha and Irfan go out. Jadeja and RP come in. Good choices. India makes sensible choices. Spin + pace. England get in Ryan Sidebottom in and Adil Rashid, the spinner goes out..

Lord’s is already blue with Indians and English supporters. Time for Anthems. Its proud to stand to Indian national anthem. Great to see likes of DK, Irfan, Zaheer, Yusuf sing along with the likes of Bhajji, MS, Gambhir and Yuvraj.

There. Diff between Indians and English supporters. Every Englishman sung national anthem despite camera focussed on them. And Indians. They jumped and waved when focus shifted to them even when Jan gan man was played.

Asoka Desilva is the one umpire along with Aussie Steve Davis. We all know how much DeSilva loves India. First ball. Swing off the off stump. Bopsie on strike. 2nd ball, played back.

Hussain says 160 is winning total. Not quite. Wide ball and good take by MS. First runs on the board for England. Good run. First runs off the bat. Virender Sehwag is a crucial man in Indian line up. He is the next batting great. He has to feature in every crucial game.

Not to forget Zaheer is playing against his favorite opposition England. 1st over gone. England 3/0.

RP next. 2 dot balls. Great ball. Wright shuffled too much. Leg slip for Wright. Sachin there. Sachinnnnnnnnnnnnnn. Chance for out. Catch out. India draw first blood. Yousuf gets it. Short ball. Wright goes for it. and India get the first wicket

KP comes in. Get in Yuvraj. Pie-chucker. Remember KP is injured. Bonding seems great between the team much in contrary to what ass media reports.

2 gone England 4 for 1. Typical English start. Bad ball, first boundary. 8 for 1 in 2.1 Bopara bats like Sachin ? :O. Hussein all right ? Zaheer pitching in leg side. Bad ball again. KP off the block with a boundary. Strike rate of 400. Mis fiekding. Poor stuff. Yuvraj there. Supposedly best. Hussein warns about the backlash if either of the team goes out today.

15 for 1 in 3. Rp comes in for 4th over. Short ball. One more. 17 for 1 in 3.2
Bad ball again. 4 more. 21 for 1 in 4 overs. Appeal of the last ball. Not given. Ishant comes in the attack and rightly so. We need a Indian commentator in the box. Bishop and Hussein too anti-Indian.

Bad start to Ishant. Four. Too much of misfielding happening here. India needs a wicket here. Gambhir dis time. Six to end the over. 34 for 1 in 5.

Last over of Power plays. Bumble in the commentary box. Four. Great stuff from KP. England running away. No imagination from Indian bowlers. Dhoni tsands up to the stumps. Good fielding from Raina. End of restrictions. 40 for 1 in six.

Will we see Yuvraj come in? Apt time for him to come on right now. Stop KP before he opens out. He comes. But goes for a 4. Bopara. KXIP team mates. 6 off 3 balls. KP avoiding Yuvraj. Pie chucker. There he comes. 7 off 5. Four. 11 off the over.

51 for 1 in 7. Bhajji on to match on. Match on to Videocon. 4 off 4 balls. Flighted delivery. Good fielding by Mr Useless. 56 for 1 in 8. Good start. India needs to get a wkt here. Ishant has been a let down. Yusuf Pathan, Raina and Useless should get few overs. IPL experience.

3 off 2 balls. KP now. He s got better of Yuvraj. 4 off 1. 5 off 2. 4 off 3 balls this over. 5 off 4. Mr Useless does it again. Misfield. 9 off 5. Another misfield. 10 off the over.

65 in 9.

Harbhajan for 2nd over. 10th of the innings. 2 off 3 balls. Great stuff from Bhajji. he is a surd from Punjab. Smart street. 3 off 4. Was it a chance ? 3 off 5. Wickets man wickets. Wrong one. 71 for 1 in 10.

Jadeja comes in. Sachinnnnnnnnnnnnn. Last time they showed Sachin a wkt fell. What about this time ? 2 off 2 balls. Left arm spinner from RR. Shane Warne find. 3 off 3. England have got their runs off leg side mostly. Thats it. Bowled him. Bopara trying to make the room, a faster one. Bopara bowled. 2 for 74. Shilpa Shetty’s Dimmy comes in. 75 for 2 in 11.

Ishant Sharma back. 1 oof 2 balls. KP on strike. Bad throw. 2 off 3. 3 off 4. Jadeja everywhere. 5 off 5. Good running. 7 off the over. Next one to go out would be Ishant Sharma. 20 off his 2. So now 40 of 84 runs have come in 4 overs. Take that away and score then reads 44 in 8.

Wide ball. Dimmy faces his own team mate. 3 off the 3 balls including one wide and a dot ball. First six of the game. 10 off 5. Thats out. Big wicket. Huge wicket. Wooo hooo. 92 for 3 in 13.

sharma for 3rd over. Colly next. 1st run off the over on the 3rd ball. 39 more to go. Nah. Its Owais Shah who is in. 2 off 4 balls. Good bowling. 4 off the over. 3/96 in 14.

Jadeja for the 15th over. My blog named by Ian Chappell. Arm Ball. 33 more. Good bowling. 1 off4. 2 off 5. 100 for England in 15 overs. 8 off last 2.

RP has 1, Zaks has 2, Bhajji has 2. Jadeja has 1. Ishant iin for his last. 3 off 2.
4 off 3. Ishant is a poor bowler in this format. he proves it again. 8 off 4. Zaks walks off to him. 32 off 3.5 overs. assholle. 36 off 4 overs. Take them off and the score would be 77 in 12.

Jadeja for his last over. MS slow in whipping off the bells. Wide. Four. 7 off 3. off 4. 8 off 5. Good end. And a brilliant spell. 26 off 4 with 2 wkts.

Bhajji on. 17 balls to go. Gone. End of Shah. Collingwood comes in. Jadeja everywhere. Bhajji too good for Colly. 5 wides. Bad stuff.

Bad stuff continues. 135 for 4 in 18.1. 6 off 2 balls. Wide ball. Ridiculous.Switch hit and gone lbw. James Foster next man. 140 for 5. Direct hit would have taken Foster. 142 for 5. 1 more to go and 5/143.

Bhajji to bowl last. Why not RP ? Good over this. Bhajji gets Foster. And now bowled. 3 off the hatrrick ball. 4 wides. Yuvraj Singh misfields. Mind games. 7 for 153. 20 extra runs off fumbles.

India needs 154 to win and stay alive.

Good over. 2 off the first one for Ireland.

Zaheer bowling the 2nd over. Swing again. Wide ball. Trying hard to hit the ball for boundary, timing not right for Bray. Zaheer Khan would have pleasent memories of Nottingham Test, the one India won in 2007. Jelly beans. Yusuf Pathan in slips. Amazing. This ball came inside the left hander. Thats it. Bowled. Confidence. Bowler’s delight.

1/4 in 2 overs.

Pathan back for 2nd over. Still no boundary. Pathan speeds below 130 . Miss again. Skipper on strike. He opens. Indian skipper comes on 3rd. He is trashed. 2 to end the over.

1/9 in 3.0

Zaheer takes his 2nd. And Yusuf grabs one in the slip. Skipper gone. Usual slippers for India in ODIs are either Sehwag (DK’ed), Gambhir or Raina. None of the last two standing today in the silips. Perhaps Sehwag would return to India through Chennai flight

Good pouch by YP. Stil no boundary. 11 for 2 in 21 balls. First boundary there. Ishant couldnt stop. Oh boy. YP on roll. Zaks on fire. Poor shot. Ireland in trouble. Pakistan should meet MS before their super 8 game against Ireland to avoid 2007 repeat (very rare though).

3/18 in 4.0

Ishant begins with a 4. 6 off the over.

3/24 in 5.0

Another bowling change ? Yes its YS bowling. More slow options for MS though — Bhajji, Ojha P, Raina and Sharma R.

Great to hear Anil’s voice. The great man is now in commentary team and he would be joined in by hhis ex-captain, who is also India’s greatest skipper — supposed quota selection from Bengal. ROTFL.

Power plays are gone. 4 from the 6th over. 3/28 in 6.

Another bowling change and another wicket. Ojha Naman this time. Oops No. Pragyan Ojha this time. MS’s luck (??) continues. Aircel ads on the TV. A network from TN for mobiles endorsed by MS, the TN IPL team skipper. Did i ever write on Arm Ball that I wanted CSK to win but I also wanted AK to excel. He did.

Does Ojha chuck ? May be yes if he gets some success against Australia .Bad throw. Run out chance missed. CSK player missed the chance. Raina . Ojha not happy. He is tossing the ball up.

4/30 in 7.

Bhajji in the attack. His spin partner in the commentary box. Wkts needed for this supposed loud mouthed sardaar. Nope, not my opinion. Reverse sweep. 3 off the over.

4/34 in 8.

First boundary in many overs. Ojha needs a wkt.

11 from the over. 4/45 in 9. Half way mark. AirCell ad again. Mind itttttt!!!

Slow phase of he game. Runs and wkts have dried up. There you go. First wkt for HS. Confidence booster for him.

50 up for Ireeland. Did Ishant tour 2007 to England ? I dont think so. 11 gone. 5 for 54. 40 balls to go. 42 to get for 100.

5 for 65 in 12.

Pretty tight bowling from Indians. 4 more to go and Ireland are just 5 for 69. Ojha for last over. No boundaries

Simple dismissal. Ojha gets 6th of the tournament. Highest wicket taker now. Ridiculous running from Batter. Appeal for run out. Could be out. Yes he is. 7th gone.

7 for 73 in 15.

First four in long time. Irfan back in the attack. Runs aplenty here, Pathan sucks for the speed. Four to end the over. 7/88 in 16.

Zaheer takes his 4th. 4th time an Indian bowler takes a 4for in T20I Ireland all set to get a 100. Can Zaks get a 5- for ? No. 17 gone. 8 / 97. Mis field from Zaheer. 8/100. Bhajji not happy. In the air. 2 more. Another boundary. 8/107. Tough luck for this boundary. Triple nelson. End of innings. 8/112 in 18.

Tinkering with the batting order was another factor that led to the doom. Their best 2 players have to be coming at 1 and 2. Its obvious that the 2 openers they had were the best in the history of the game. Had they persisted with them the story wud have been different. Besides Bravo was on and off.

Zaheer and Bhajji’s indifferent form didnt help either. And that bothers me. India’s chances in T20 defence lies on this 2 bowlers. Over emphasis on youth of Mumbai led them to dooms. Rahane, Takwale, Nayar and others failed miserably to perform and then there were many players like Kyle Mills left out without a single game.

Not to mention that the team choked when it came to the crunch games. Barking and scoffing at opposition teams / umps didnt help too (bloggers).

MUmbai Indians became 2nd team to be knocked out of the tourney. A team which had 2 of India’s main bowlers for T20 defence and they failed to deliver. I wont read much into the performance but then they would need to pull up their socks in World T20.

My take on semifinalists:

1) Delhi
2) Chennai
3) Deccan
4) Rajasthan

Right now Bangalore are hanging at # 4. Some more upsets today would see them go at the top of the table. That won’t be a surprise though, now that Rahul is back too, the team should fancy itself for a semi-final spot. Today’s game is a bit of fancy ride for Chennai. If they win this, they go at the top of the table with 9 points and Bangalore drop to 5. If Deccans win then they maintain their top spot and nothing changes in the standings. The top 4 spots are too crowded and too tight to be in the comfort zone for anybody to sit and relax. Mumbai Indians are suffering for their lack of decisive punch. Harbhajan is out of form and Zaheer is hot and cold. They can’t just win on basis of 3 players – Tendulkar, Duminy and Malinga. At least 4 or 5 players need to fire and one of them big time. Who else than their best batsman. Time is running out for Mumbai Indians. Also need for them to throw out the likes of Takwale, Raje and Kulkarni who at best are liabilities and don’t inspire winning confidence in the team. They have 2 more days to recuperate and go back to the drawing board to reformulate their strategies. And for that Tendulkar will need to drop his anchor role and assume the prima donna role of savage harvester of runs as he is in the international circuit.