Tuesday 23 December 2008

Mohali Test...Day 5

1052: What do you do when fog delaying start of play becomes a ritual? Tendulkar works on a doosra (No big deal, I too work on a Doosra anyway), Laxman realises he can send down decent medium pace stuff, Botham fools around, Harmison comes off a self-imposed exile to make a rare pubilc appearance and Anderson proves his dexterity and tries left-arm spin.

1157: The imposter out there in Gambhir's garb is trying to inherit the slur from Mudassar Nazar. Mudassar took 557 minutes to score his century against England. Luckily, however, Gambhir won't have as much time at his disposal.

1307: Lunch down their throat, Yuvraj and Gambhir walk out to bat again! Dhoni in no mood to declare. Flintoff can't believe it and asks the batsmen if they are serious. So Mudassar need not lose all hopes.

1522: I'm straining my eyes to see if Dravid is marshalling the field at the fag end of the match. Didn't Dhoni have that sort of farewell for Ganguly? Remember, Dravid too scored a Bradmanesque duck here. To my disappointment, I see Amit Mishra setting field. Nay, Kumble has just left, way too premature for Mishra.

1953: A convert KP sung 'pie-chucker' Yuvraj's praise in the press conference. "One of the cleanest strikers of the ball, his sixes leave me dumbfounded," he gushed. But then pie-chucker? "Come on, little bit of fun and banter doesn't do any harm," he said. Dhoni said he would love to have some more pie-chuckers. MSD also thanked the Poms for returning for the series to prove India is safe post-Mumbai mayhem.

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

Som,

Gambhir missed the feat of redoing Mudassar Nazar. However, this might the slowest ninety-seven runs ever made as he took five-and-half-hours to reach that.

Poshin_david said...

What a boring match (yawn).
Did you see Dhoni bowl?

Som said...

Anonymous, for the first time, Dhoni didn't sound convincing when he said i). Was important to give Yuvi-Gauti chance to complete 100; ii). Was not sure of fog's return. Asking them to chase 325 in 65 overs would have been risky had match started on time, giving them 90 overs instead. Anyway, you don't criticise a captain just after he won you a series. Well done Mahi.

Som said...

CPD, that injected some excitement in an otherwise dull proceeding. I saw MSD bowling against England in a Faridabad ODI. But first time saw Laxman behind stumps. Dhoni said teammates pushed him to bowl.

Anonymous said...

Why did not MSD declare in first 20 mins of the day s play ? He did a RD again as he did in Oval!!

PI said...

i love this ringside view of things. pity gambhir didn't get there inspite of all the laboured..well..labour :P

Anonymous said...

Sam, are we getting too ambitous? But then MSD led us to think that way.

Anonymous said...

P.I. Coming so close only to throw it away, Gambhir must be kicking himself. More so after Dhoni went to the town saying the delayed declaration only to allow Yuvi and Gauti complete centuries.

Anonymous said...

bad declaration...could have been earlier...we were remembering the famous Nasser Hussain & Fleming declaration...now those were some good captains...

Anonymous said...

UTP, I would not have minded it from any other captain. But coming frm MSD, it's little surprising to see him approaching a safety-first approach. I'm fine with it but MSD has raised our expectations.

Anonymous said...

Sorry guys... but I think people are getting over ambitious here. MSD did a good job to win two consecutive test series against good teams. Declaring late he made sure that the match doesnt go to the POMS.

However, his real test will be winning test series overseas. I feel that he will do good.

Anonymous said...

Anonymous, can't really criticises MSD and he is perfectly entitled to a safety-first approach if if ensures series victory. Only thing that surprises is how come he, of all people, didn't sniff a win this time? I think he caught cold and hence coud not sniff it:)

Anonymous said...

som,
Got to blame it to Mohali weather then??

Anonymous said...

Anonymous, exactly so.

Anonymous said...

I don't know to some extent I think the weather factor could have been dealt with. Surely Bindra could have let Modi that play wouldn't start any earlier than 10:30 given the winter mornings? The trouble is this late into the year Eden Gardens is just as bad a choice if floodlights aren't used since play will always end early. Tough ground selection choice, but if you were going to choose Mohali you might as well have chosen Bengaluru, didn't England specifically ask for both matches to be hosted in the South anyway?
A good series anyway, I honestly did not England to be that competitive.

Anonymous said...

Achettup, Bangalore...oops.. Bengaluru.. was sounded out indeed but KSTA threw their hands up and said they can't do it at such a short notice. Otherwise, England too preferred it. Fog is never an issue in Eden Gardens because wniter is not harsh there. But the mere thought of Dalmiya and his safaru suit scared the Bindras and Modis to their bone and hence Mohali again.

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Som said...

Abdul, welcome.