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| APARTHEID AGAIN ? |
| Saturday, July 26, 2008 |
When the South African cricket team was banned from playing cricket in the late 1960s, it had exposed the worst effect of racism to be practised in sport. The beauty of sport is that it cuts across all barriers--linguistic, regional, colour, caste. But in this case, even sport could not play the leveller in front of heavy racism in the form of Apartheid. Ever since the South African cricket team were granted the right to play international cricket in 1992, Protean racism had long become defunct as far as cricket was concerned and we now see a Dale Steyn rubbing shoulders with a Makhaya Ntini.
Cricket has had its fair share of racism with players resorting to racist abuses with one another on the field creating an ugly picture of the gentleman's game. But the administrators of the game have been wary enough not to let such incidents go overboard to the extent of damaging the spirit of the game.
The recent form of racism is being practised by an Indian. Now do not conjure up mental pictures of a Punjabi bowler abusing a Queensland allrounder by referring to the latter's most primitive ancestors for that issue has been resolved long back. This time it is Lalit Modi, the vice-president of the BCCI and the commissioner of the Indian Premier League (IPL) at the helm. The issue here is IPL's Indian rival, the rebel Indian Cricket League (ICL).
The BCCI-ICL tussle began ever since Subash Chandra approached the latter for recognition of his league. He was given the cold shoulder but Subash went on to create the league and brought in players like Lara, Cairns, Harvey, Astle etc in its ranks. The BCCI tried every attempt possible to thwart it including bringing lesser known grounds and stadia under its control. But the ICL managed to get hold of the Panchkula stadium in Chandigarh. At this moment, the BCCI realised it had had enough and decided to take on the ICL by forming the IPL. At the end of a hugely successful IPL, most ICL players are left ruing over taking the hasty decision of not waiting a bit longer.
The BCCI recently issued a notice to Piyush Chawla and VVS Laxman to not play for their English counties as they had ICL players in their ranks. This move is described as nothing less than apartheid by Harsha Bhogle in his latest Indian Express column. It would not be a surprise if the BCCI declared, one day, that Kapil Dev never played for India, given the absurdity of such a move. If the BCCI is seriously thinking of grooming youngsters like Chawla, there cannot be a better method than allow them to take part in county competitions and thereby get a feel of the conditions in other countries.
In the past, the Indian cricket's administrators have issued warnings to selectors and players to refrain from commenting on the board's matters. The BCCI would do well to realise that by indulging in such prohibitory acts, it is the game which stands to lose out in the long run.
This has nothing to do with cricket leagues. Delhi cricketer Akash Chopra is authoring a book on the life of a typical Indian cricketer in which he attempts to portray the hurdles an Indian cricketer faces at the domestic level before he enters the international arena. He also attempts to dispel the popular public opinion of cricketers as pin-up boys. The book will be launched in October.Labels: BCCI, cricket, ICL, IPL |
Property of Sheks @ 12:40 am   |
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| BCCI--Board of Cash and Confusion of India |
| Monday, June 23, 2008 |
The forthcoming cricket Champions League is presently embroiled in the controversy of whether to allow teams, featuring ICL players, to participate. The BCCI vice-president, Lalit Modi, made it clear that teams with ICL players would be disqualified. The top two league teams from India, South Africa, Australia and England are slated to participate and Modi's statement is bound to affect England the most, since 15 out of their 18 county teams feature ICL players. And the top two county teams would definitely not be from the exceptional three teams, it is believed.
The BCCI president stepped in, a couple of days ago, and unleashed his 'Pawar'-play. He stated that counties with ICL players would be allowed to play but added a caveat that the BCCI would form the core of the decision making. If this is the case,then England may, very well, be a non-participant since the only thing that England is worried about is ICL players in its county teams and the only decision the BCCI must take now is keep ICL players out.
The whole irony of this issue is that the competition will be held by the England Cricket Board (ECB) and that Cricket Australia (CA) will be framing the tournament rules and fixtures. And here we have a cash-rich cricket board wresting its muscle power, in the name of deciding its own rules, on the other three hapless, submissive cricket boards.
The only sensible thing the ECB can do is to boycott the tournament. But who would take such a drastic step when there are a million dollars at stake? The ECB is yet to arrive at a decision on this while the BCCI has already decided to invite Pakistani teams for the event in case the ECB refuses to comply with its demand of keeping away ICL players.
The other side, the ugly face, of cricket!Labels: cricket, ICL, IPL |
| Property of Sheks @ 12:01 pm |
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| THE AFTER-EFFECT |
| Friday, May 09, 2008 |
Vijay Mallya, the owner of the Bangalore Royal Challengers team, dismissed Charu Sharma from his post of the team-CEO after the team lost five out of their seven matches in the ongoing Indian Premier League. To improve the state of affairs, Brijesh Patel, the secretary of the Karnataka State Cricket Association was given the CEO's post and imagine what happened next :
The Royal Challengers extended their losing streak to six.Labels: humour, IPL |
| Property of Sheks @ 11:49 am |
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| PROBLEMS (BAN)GALORE |
| Wednesday, May 07, 2008 |
Potholed roads, traffic moving at snail's pace, clogged traffic intersections, high rate of crime; as if all this is not enough, more problems have begun to plague Bangalore, not the city but its IPL cricket team, the Royal Challengers. Latest in line is the ouster of its CEO, Charu Sharma. Apparently Vijay Mallya is not happy with the state of affairs with the BRC and feels that the chink is in the armour of the management and has shown the door to Sharma. Reading the full story reveals that the team management feels Charu cannot go out and bat and has appointed the Karnataka State Cricket Association(KSCA) president Brijesh Patel in his place. Now do they expect 55-year old Patel to go out to the centre and win matches for the Royal Challengers?
Siddhartha Vaidyanathan, assistant editor of Cricinfo, feels that the problem is in the team and not in the management. The general feeling about the BRC is that it is full of Test players. But one cannot ignore the presence of T20-capable players either. Sample this:Cameron White, Virat Kohli, Mark Boucher, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Praveen Kumar, Zaheer Khan and of course, Ross Taylor. After the loss in the inaugural match against Kolkata, Dravid dropped Cameron White from the side. Chanderpaul has been used for only two matches so far. Dravid needs to do some wise thinking on his part, if he wants to avoid such costly mistakes in the second leg of the round-robin.
The current positions of the eight teams bears some connection with their names. The Royals are riding high with the Kings in tow. Delhi's daredevilry has resulted in the Super Kings to be relegated to the lowest position in the top 4. The Knightriders have not had a smooth ride after the first two games. The Chargers, so far, have been used by four teams to recharge their motivation levels. Like the developing country, India, the Mumbai team is still in the development phase. The Royal Challengers, in their games so far, begin well only to lose momentum later. A probable reason could be that they down a few glasses of raw Royal Challenge (i.e without mixing) before each match.Labels: humour, IPL |
| Property of Sheks @ 10:29 am |
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| The Chlormint incident |
| Monday, May 05, 2008 |
While watching the Chennai vs Rajasthan IPL match yesterday, I came across a spectator who had probably found out the real reason for Harbhajan slapping Sreesanth and tried to make his discovery public. Fortunately cameras captured it and unfortunately it was on air for a mere 3 seconds only.
Sreesanth: Bhajji bhaiya, log Chlormint kyon khaate hein? Harbhajan: Slap! Labels: humour, IPL |
| Property of Sheks @ 2:00 pm |
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| PURE CRICKET |
| Tuesday, April 29, 2008 |
** A double century with this post after more than three years of blogging. Should have achieved this landmark about six months ago but better late than never.
** Mukul Kesavan, renowned writer who authored the book on cricket, "Men in White", (he contributes to a Cricinfo blog by the same name), is not happy with the Indian Premier League and goes to the extent of comparing it with trash in this article. Somwehere in the article he expresses his hatred for Twenty20 cricket stating that bowlers are cast as "extras" or in other words, are redundant.
** If Mukul had watched the inaugural match of the IPL between Bangalore and Kolkata, he may not have made such a statement. Or maybe he would have, given the fact that he hates T20. Any die-hard fan of cricket would acknowledge the Kolkata bowlers' efforts to bowl out the Royal Challengers for a paltry 82. But then, Mukul could challenge this by saying that the Bangalore team was full of Test players who are unsuited for T20. In that case, I would suggest him to watch the Kolkata vs Chennai IPL match in which bowlers of the Chennai team succeeded in their efforts to not give away too many runs to the Knightriders. While it is generally believed that T20 is a batsman's game, I am of the view that it has got something in it for the bowlers too. Any experienced, talented bowler will realise that he has only four overs to produce his best. Taking wickets may not be all that necessary but not conceding too many runs is. It gives him an opportunity to innovate, come up with new ways to fox the batsman and he can then apply these strategies to 50-over matches. I hear someone saying IPL + T20 = death of FOI(fifty over internationals) but I can ignore him/her for the ICC has already planned to conduct an FOI World Cup in 2011 and that too in the Indian subcontinent and I am sure it will be much better than FOI WC 2007 which turned out to be a dampener.
** Another piece of garbage in Mukul's IPL trash can is what he calls razzmatazz provided by Bollywood stars and cheerleaders. Fans like me find the entertainment from the cricketers more fascinating than that by Bollywood stars, one of whom has termed himself the 12th man of the Kolkata team. Somewhere near the end of the post, Mukul compares IPL with the EPL i.e cricket with football. He says that teams in the EPL have a century old legacy attached to them and since the IPL does not have one, it will fail because of narrow geographical base. He must realise that this is only the inaugural series and down the line we might have teams like Ahmedabad Avalanches, Madurai Machans, Cochin Kuttichaathaans etc. Whether the IPL will fail or not, we will know after this inaugural tournament and what comes after that. With one whole month of T20 action, it is too early to say.
** Meanwhile the Indian Cricket League(ICL) is charting out plans to have an all-England team on the lines of its all-Pakistani team, the Lahore Badshahs. There are plans to have South African, Australian and West Indian sides as well.
** The ICL has applied to the ICC seeking recognition. The IPL has requested the ICC to provide it a window i.e include it in the international cricketing calendar. Not to be done in by the success of its neighbour, the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) plans to launch its own premier league. The ECB has collaborated with millionaire Allan Stanford, resulting in a Stanford-ECB T20 league. Cricket Australia (CA), who was a victim of the Kerry Packer circus of the late 1970s, is planning its own T20 league.
** Elsewhere in TamilNadu, the trailor and music of KamalHassan's upcoming movie 'Dasaavathaaram' are working wonders. Listening to the music resulted in Malcolm Speed quitting his post of ICC president and watching the trailor frustrated Harbhajan Singh so much that he slapped his Indian team mate Sreesanth and was slapped in return with a rest-of-IPL ban.Labels: cricket, ICL, IPL |
| Property of Sheks @ 12:39 pm |
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| SHEKY'S CRICKET ZONE |
| Thursday, March 06, 2008 |
The Indian cricket team has finally won an ODI series after six years,defeating ODI world champions Australia. Most of the new players have proved themselves in their very first ODI tournament overseas. But there is a flip side to this.While Ishant Sharma and Praveen Kumar have been tipped to be the future spearheads,the selectors will now find it challenging to accommodate the likes of Zaheer Khan and R P Singh into the side. Going into a game with four pace bowlers cannot be considered a viable option due to the presence of Piyush Chawla,India's new full-time leg spinner after Anil Kumble. Given that he is able to turn the ball,it is important that he be given sufficient chances so that he can be groomed into someone like Kumble. The best thing the selectors could do is to create a pool of ten fast bowlers from which they could pick the best performers. This might help avoid creating a problem of plenty.
The Indian Cricket League,which was expected to meander in oblivion, while the IPL auction was going on,seems to be growing strong with players like Damien Martyn, Jason Gillespie and Mike Kasprowicz signing up for the T20 grand championship scheduled to begin on March 9. Edelweiss Capital has offered to sponsor Rs.20 crore for the ICL, resolving, to some extent, the problem of sponsorship.However it has to do something innovative, apart from signing in retired overseas players, to live up to its goal of changing the face of Indian cricket.
Two new teams have come up in the ICL. They are the Ahmedabad Rockets and Lahore Badshahs. The former will be captained by Damien Martyn while the latter by Inzamam-ul-Haq, who captained the ICL's Hyderabad Heroes in its last tournament. Hyderabad Heroes will in turn be led by Chris Harris. The first non-Indian team has been created supposedly because of the large number of Pakistani players signing up. However Shabbir Ahmed will continue to play for the Chennai Superstars.
Given the huge number of New Zealanders in the ICL, it would not be surprising if another non-Indian team, say "Wellington Wizards" or "Auckland Fighters" were formed. Picture this:Nathan Astle,Chris Cairns,Craig McMillan,Hamish Marshall,Shane Bond,Daryl Tuffey,Adam Parore,Chris Harris,Andre Adams--most of them phenomenal cricketers. The reason for switching to the ICL is because of the insufficient remuneration and the unstable contracts with the national side. This reminds one of the Australian team of the 1970s most of the players of which signed up with Kerry Packer for his World Series.
With the ICL Grand T20 on March 9 and the second edition of the IPL auction on March 11, there definitely is cricket happening everywhere.Labels: cricket, ICL, IPL |
| Property of Sheks @ 11:38 am |
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Name: Sheks
Home: Madras, TamilNadu, India
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