Raju Alluri

The game of Cricket is as unpredictable as weather. A good example is the final day’s play of the third test, where WIndies had to go for a rush hour declaration. Delaying the declaration might leave not enough time for WIndies to win. Preempting the declaration would mean that India gets a gettable target.

The day was filled with interesting moments, when the game tilted away and towards India. However, at no point, WIndies looked like it is going to win.

The India team managed a good total, given that its first four batsmen got a 50 each. This is the kind of batting a team would like to see, when it has to come out from the follow-on situation a day ago. Hope they continue this spree in 4th test.

Didn’t get a clue about what the WIndies thinktank’s game plan is, on day 3 of the test 3. Just before lunch, they spent 14 overs scoring a mere 21 runs, where as they did make that many runs in just one over after lunch. Here is the state of the match in the pre-lunch session:

• Drinks: West Indies – 515/5 in 148.0 overs (S Chanderpaul 65, MN Samuels 60)
• Lunch: West Indies – 536/5 in 162.0 overs (S Chanderpaul 76, MN Samuels 69)

Both batsmen scored 60+, 515 runs on the board, and what would you do? Just play for lunch? Do they think the extra 45 runs they got by wasting all the critical time would matter?

Just one session of time wasted on the second day of the first test made India face the agony of coming so close to win, but not win. After all the good performance they have put in, hope WIndies don’t go thru such agony in this test.

Keeping the result aside, here are a couple of thoughts. First: Lara, undoubtedly a great player, is always criticised for being a fan of records, not results. With this strange strategy today, is he going to give more evidences for such criticism? Second: The test match version of cricket is said to be loosing its charm because of its slow pace. If a team that is in command is going to play so defensive as WIndies, probably that loss of charm is being fasttracked. Let us see how many spectators can be spotted in the stands on day 4 and 5.

Coming back to the match, Laxman, the lone player who couldn’t make his mark yet in the series, looked vulnerable, but stayed put. Building partnerships with Dravid is part of his track record, hope he continues with that record. With a WIndies loss practically out of equation, India should be happy just with a draw.

Well, the day’s matches didn’t disappoint at all! There is continuous action in the middle, in fact, more action in the form of extra time for the second tie, that saw both Genmany and Argentina to quarter finals of FIFA WC 2006. The Swedish goal keeper did an excellent job, otherwise we would have seen a much bigger margin for Germany, which held the ball for a grasping 61% of the total time. The first 10 minutes of the Argentina-Mexico tie saw 2 goals scored, and it took another 90+ minutes for Argentina to score the decider. However, the action in the middle was gripping all the time!

Good start for the second round! Hope the rest of the Cup goes like this!

Well, Ghana made it to the round of 16 in the FIFA WC 2006! Impressrive run by these underdogs! Really enjoyed watching one of their earlier matches in the league. Waiting to watch a replay of their today’s match against USA.