10 July 2009

Getting off the mark......

.... opening your account with that nudge down to fine-leg or guiding one down to third man to get your first runs must be one hell of a cathartic experience. I realize that now as this is my attempt to open my account on Island Express. Well! my credentials are modest.The closest I have been to a live cricket match is when the Cricinfo's ball-by-ball commentator decided to publish a quaint little piece of trivia I mailed back. Evidently my cricket expertise, just like 99% of the cricket experts in the country does not go beyond the "couch-potato"-esque . However, the love for the game has only grown exponentially since I chanced upon the grainy pictures of Doordarsan showing men in white clothes playing for India some time in the late '80s.
This is probably the worst time to make a post about cricket. Ashes 09 is turning out to be as interesting as this and the Sky Sports commentary team is sleep-talking through it. Mercurial Pakistan are living up to their name in the Emerald Isle gifting 18 wickets to Sri-Lankan bowlers whose names don't start with M, which is only marginally better than getting timed out. West Indies is playing Bangladesh with a team comprising of local school-children and the first five ticket holders to arrive at the ground yesterday. And with the most popular team on the planet in hibernation mode for the next couple of months with their slumber to be disturbed only by the odd IndiaTV or AajTak reporter trying to hook them up with a Bollywood starlet, there is something amiss in international cricket at the moment.

I don't know how many of you feel this way, but is there a dearth of genius International Cricket at this moment as compared to say 8-10 years back ? Have we found replacements for the Akrams, the Laras, the Waughs, the Ambroses, the Walshes? We have a Federer in Tennis, a Cristiano Ronaldo in football, a Bolt in Athletics, a Lebron in Basketball, a Woods in Golf , all of whom are taking their sport to the next level. Does cricket have someone like that? I will try to answer that in the next post.