Crucket

India 392/4 off 50.  NZ’s required run rate = 7.86. That’s insane!

Good luck boys, but I see some major embarrassment coming up. I can’t watch. I’m going out to the movies.

I’ve wondered, does the umpire communicate with the scorers? Does the umpire ever have to correct the scorers when they get the manner of dismissal wrong in cases where, say, the batsman might have been out caught, lbw or even stumped?

I got thinking about this because of something I noticed in the reports on last night’s ODI on TV3 regarding Sehwag’s dismissal. The early report talked about an “unlucky Sehwag”, which I take to refer to him being given out caught when he hadn’t hit the ball, as recorded in the scoreboard: c McGlashan b Butler. (Cracker of a ball by Butler, incidentally.) A later report however had Butler “trapping Sehwag in front”. Could that have been the umpire’s actual call?

As if we weren’t struggling enough, but 4 wickets in 5 balls…

I’d love to see a representation of what each of those wickets did to the D-L target.

In conjunction with Sportsfreak, Crucket is offering two of its readers a give-away.

That’s right; free stuff, and it’s legal.

We have two complimentary passes to the game at the National Stadium this Friday (March 6) to watch New Zealand take on India in that rather quaint form of the game known as a one day international.

The only problem is that we really have no idea who to give them to. So if you can come up with a good idea for how we can give them away, they’re all yours.

It can be anything: a rant on the state of the game, jokes, a haiku, or a thesis on which place in the batting order Brendan McCullum should be.

Judges’ decision is final, but obviously gratuitous cheap shots at the BCCI are welcome.

Travel, accommodation, and a full bottle of Tui to throw in the air not included.

Big thanks to the Freak for supplying the prize.

Love this image from the Herald, from an article extolling the strengths of our exciting top four, McCullum, Ryder, Guptill and Taylor, showing them all flourishing their blades.

The Indians of course have brought along debatably the best ODI top order currently in service. (That would be a fiery debate however.)

Let’s see how the two top four compare head to head.

Not entirely flattering to the New Zealanders in terms of ranking, with an average of about 50 compared to an average of about 12 for the Indians. However, the stats don’t look vastly different (except maybe the rather unfair comparison between McCullum and Tendulkar). Based on these averages, we’d expect the Indians to score about 150 from about 29 overs. Whereas the New Zealanders will score 160 off about 31 (admittedly rather skewed by Guptill’s stats). Pretty much dead even.

Indian have an extremely good middle order in Dhoni alone, but NZ have Vettori and Mills in their bowling line up. You’ve got to expect this to be a close run series. I’m picking 3-2 to New Zealand.

So the compromise solution cooked up by NZC to allow six Indian players to participate in the State Championship ahead of the test series without them having to play with or against the NZ ICL players looks like it has satisfied everyone. The BCCI is happy because none of its players have to play with the radioactive ICL players, the NZCPA is happy because none of its ICL players are being pushed aside and NZC is happy because the BCCI is not upset and the Indians should give the Championship a bit of a boost.

Really though, this is no victory for the BCCI. They are coming out of this and the masters match with egg all over their faces. There will be few cricket followers either outside or inside India who would think that the actions of the BCCI are anything other than childish. And they have achieved nothing for that.

The purpose of the BCCI’s position is to drive ICL players out of other countries’ domestic competitions by forcing those other countries to choose between their ICL players or India. Quarantining the ICL players from the BCCI players is just a means to that end, not an end in itself. So if all they have achieved is to avoid contact with ICL players without having them excluded, then they have failed.

If the BCCI really had the courage of their conviction they would refuse to allow their players to be involved in competitions involving ICL players. That is, no Indian players in the State Championship if any ICL players play for any team.

Apparently the Indians have been training in Wellington for tomorrow’s match in Napier. The Mission Estate Winery Concert had filled up all the hotels.

“Is it a conspiracy? Or is it just an accident, designed to give New Zealand a significant advantage?” Or perhaps there is a less suspicious explanation.

Could Heath Mills be the toughest man in cricket? I haven’t really heard of anyone else standing up to the BCCI, so I am really interested in what comes of Heath Mills insistence that the ICL players will not be forced to step aside to accommodate the Indian test players looking for a bit of practice by playing in the State Championship.

The situation is as follows: as part of the agreement to add more international matches to the tour, and thereby dropping the only scheduled warm up match, six of the Indian players, those selected for the tests but not for the limited over matches, would be allowed to play a game in the State Championship for one of the New Zealand domestic teams. However, the precedent set by withdrawing Tendulkar and Karthik from the exhibition 20-20 in Wellington has raised the problem of the fact that Canterbury, Northern Districts and Auckland all have ICL players who may play in the games that the Indians are supposed to be playing in, risking spreading their ICL cooties to the pure, innocent Indians, either as team mates or opposition. If the ICL players play, then the BCCI must withdraw their players, who will then miss their only decent warm up opportunity.

Obviously the BCCI would prefer that the ICL players be dropped (and the changing rooms fumigated). And not doubt NZC will prefer that option too. But the NZ Cricket Players’ Association is insisting, quite reasonably, that India should not be allowed to dictate who gets selected for NZ domestic teams.

No doubt there will be some contractual procedure for NZC to withdraw the ICL players, to satisfy the BCCI, and probably get the NZCPA to all in line as well. However, it is quite delicious to see the BCCI cause so much trouble for themselves by their own childishness.

Paul Ford blogs very infrequently over at Cricinfo (and merely infrequently at Stuff), and in his latest Cricinfo post he has deconstructed Mark Richardson’s article. It’s a nice read and I wish I had gone straight to this rather than trawl through the comments in Richardson’s article looking for a decent rebuttal.

However, I couldn’t help but trawl the comment of Ford’s post. Not much going on there, so I wouldn’t recommend it. Though I did find this piece of verbiage which, even allowing for English being the poster’s second language, is quite unique:

Am I missing something here! You guys have a strange way of welcoming visitors (read India). You humiliate a visiting sports person because his Shoes were “Dirty?!!!!!?”. A “humble” former player-turned-writer forgets to mention that the pitches were deemed very Bad for Cricket by several pundits. His “critique” forgets to observe His “humble” mate never faced a Bond in unfamiliar conditions on his way to getting 48 runs before he was out everytime!! Everyone forgets that 15 oC is At Least 20 oC less than what is faced anywhere in India – the limiting definition of “unfamiliar conditions”! All this, while there Are no complaints from the visitors about the pitches last time!! I quite don’t understand this attitude! Do you guys want to do an Oz? Or is it because you are the latest to suffer the monitory inferiority complex – or just now got a chance to exhibit it?! Or is it because you are self-guilty of having hosted a bad series last time. Or is it because you want to spice up a no-entertainer of a series? Or is it because you never wanted to host us, but are doing it only for the money? Or is it because you really want some free money without playing – but are ashamed of getting (begging for) it from India? Or is it because you guys are afraid of winning and so finding ways of covering your “posteriors” a prioi?! If it is any one of the above reasons, or any other, there is always a single different way of addressing your fears and recentments or goals. In India we call it honest front door entry with civility. Especially, since cricket is no Rugby! The story of Swan and Fox is as stupid and irrelevant as it gets. A Swan only has vessels that suite its eating habits. It takes money, resources, a while and more than a few visits by the Fox, for the Swan to be able to serve on anything other than is naturally available to it! With Money and resources, the Swan has consistently been serving more Fox-favoring vessels over the years! Well, the Fox is yet to design ONE Swan-favoring vessel!! It is quite not clear what is it that is pricking you guys?! God bless you guys to cool down! Or may be Dhoni can help you guys. But ask him Nicely!

Dhoni has led his team to two defeats in the 20-20s, the second by a whisker, but apparently he’s not that bummed – certainly less than devastated. I guess he properly understands the value of 20-20s.