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Plays of the day from the second ODI between Bangladesh and West Indies in Khulna

Mohammad Isam in Khulna02-Dec-2012The statue
Darren Sammy stood motionless with his left hand out for about five seconds after dropping Mushfiqur Rahim off his own bowling, when the Bangladesh captain was on 8. The normally jovial Sammy was deadpan after his mistake.The battle
The duel between Chris Gayle and offspinner Sohag Gazi is one of the highlights of West Indies’ tour. And for the first time, Gayle resisted attacking the rookie bowler. He was on strike at the start of Gazi’s second over and he either defended or left deliveries alone to play out a maiden.The send-off
Gayle’s missile of a straight hit in the sixth over crashed into the ankle of the bowler, Mashrafe Mortaza. Four runs were saved but Mortaza needed treatment. In his next over, Mortaza had Gayle edging a slog to Mushfiqur, but the send-off was with a wince that was a reminder of the blow from the over before.The catch
In the 32nd over, Tamim completed Bangladesh’s victory with his second impressive catch in two games. As Sunil Narine tried to chip the ball over his head, Tamim jumped at cover, stretched out his hands, and the ball settled in his grab. In the previous game, he had back-pedalled to take a catch at long-on to remove Gayle.

From Hariharan Sriram, India
As he has done quite often in his career Kumble brought alive a boring final day in a Test match at Kotla today

Cricinfo25-Feb-2013Hariharan Sriram, India
As he has done quite often in his career Kumble brought alive a boring final day in a Test match at Kotla today. However unlike in the past, this did not cause discomfort and nervousness amongst the opposition batsmen.Many are the batsmen who have been at the receiving end of Jumbo’s super fast flippers and spitting leg breaks and though his form had dipped quite a bit of late, there will be lots of them who will be more than relieved to hear that the warrior had hung up his sword.Many are the special memories that he leaves us to cherish. The first of those came in the Hero Cup final when he picked up 6 for 12 against the Windies when a couple of wickets came thanks to yorkers which until then, even the Indian pacers couldn’t bowl accurately.It was yet again against the Windies that he would produce a sight never before seen and possibly never again seen scenes as he bounded in with his broken jaw to try and secure a wicket for India.His performance against in Australia was perhaps something which he enjoyed quite a bit himself. His celebration after taking out Ponting in Melbourne after he had worked him out is one of those rare occasions when he’s let his emotions be so visible on the cricket field.And so were his reactions after getting to his maiden century at the Oval. But perhaps the moments which defined all that Kumble stood for came during the course of that much discussed Sydney Test this year.Even as the rest of the Indian batsmen got out or gave their wickets away, he stood their at one end determined to fight it out till the end. With his limited technique he defied the Aussies, focussed on playing out every ball and taking India closer to safety. However as fate would have it, with just five minutes to go three wickets fell in one over leading to the defeat. How much it would have hurt the man is for anybody to guess.And then with the whole Indian and Australian press waiting for his sound bytes after the most controversial Test of our times, he kept his cool and came up with one single statement which said more than a five minute speech would have.Determination, commitment, composure and dignity are words which cannot be strung together to define any other sportsman better than him. Not many Indian cricketers have left the game on their own terms, but then the timing of Kumble’s departure has been spot on, much like his deliveries.Never once has he given less than 100% on the field and the moment he’s recognized that there were factors beyond his control which would not allow him to do so, he’s stepped down. Memory doesn’t serve up any names of Indians who have retired as captains and he definitely deserves to have done so.There are two kinds of great players. There are those whose very presence lights up the arena and then there are those whose absence speaks more about their contributions. India have been lucky enough to have one of each kind play in the same era.It is only fitting that he should have been carried on the shoulders of his team mates on his farewell lap, on the ground which has been lucky enough to witness the great man at his best, time and again. Goodbye Jumbo, and thanks for all the wickets.

Shifting him from the top of the order may not result in a directly proportional increase in his yield of runs

Mohan Cudali Shridhar25-Feb-2013Age inevitably slows down hand-eye co-ordination; high-risk batting and consistency are mutually exclusive on testing pitches; proactive decision making with the future kept in mind is the need of the hour. These are some of the many rather sound arguments being made in favour of Virender Sehwag dropping down the batting order in Test cricket. Pragmatic as it may sound, is it the most productive decision for the Indian team and for Sehwag himself? I’m not convinced it is. There are a few reasons why Sehwag partnering Gambhir at the top of the order remains the best option for India.Firstly, a move down the order is not directly proportional to a fertile yield of runs in Sehwag’s case. The swinging ball did trouble him in England but he did enter that series with one shoulder and one eye. Over the course of his career, Sehwag hasn’t displayed a significant vulnerability against the new swinging red ball. He either compensates for the swing with his superhuman hand-eye coordination or compels the bowlers to stray from the fourth stump line.As a matter of fact, he relishes the hard new ball coming on to his bat. Hence, protecting him from the swinging ball is not a dire necessity. In other words, if Sehwag bats at 4 or 5, it’d be unwise to expect his average to suddenly skyrocket.Secondly, it’s not very often that Sehwag gets dismissed for ducks or scores below 10 – 15. When he comes off, he has an impressive conversion rate. But, even when he doesn’t he often gets quickfire 30s and 40s. The value of these knocks is perennially downgraded and the thing most remembered in such innings is his atrocious modes of dismissals. But, the fact that he consistently propels his team to starts of 60/1 – 70/1 goes unheralded. Home and away, a decent platform for the No. 3 batsman to walk in will never be a meager contribution.The crucial aspect here is that he provides such starts in innings that are regarded as failures. How often do we get to see a batsman who makes a vital contribution to the team in failure? Conversely, a quickfire 30 from a No. 4 batsman fails to have nearly the same kind of effect as it does when it comes at the top. Assuming that Sehwag will bat at No.4 the same way he does at No.1, his bursts of strokeplay will cease to have the same value they currently possess.On a contemplative note, does Sehwag really intend to be a middle-order batsman? “It’s tough opening the innings after fielding for a day”. These were his words when once interviewed after a tiring day of Test cricket. Fitness has never been Sehwag’s forte. The generous waistline and leisurely running between the wickets indicate a general disregard to the importance of fitness. The question however is – Does Sehwag want to be a middle-order batsman because he believes he will find more success there or does he want to demote himself down the order because he thinks it’ll be more comfortable? I suspect that the latter is the answer and the latter is just not good enough a reason for the balance of the team to be altered.Finally, is there a better replacement available? Murali Vijay came, Murali Vijay went. Abhinav Mukund arrived, Abhinav Mukund faded away. Neither managed to leave a lasting impression. Ajinkya Rahane is waiting in the wings. To his credit, he does have an enviable domestic record to back him. But neither is he as battle hardened in the shorter formats as Virat Kohli nor has he grabbed international opportunities as desperately as Cheteshwar Pujara. Moreover, he’s been batting No. 3 for Mumbai in the previous few Ranji seasons. The current “wait and watch” approach the team management is using with Rahane seems appropriate, not unjust.Rahane aside, there is not a single opener knocking on the selector’s doors. So, is there really a better alternative? Be it the following eight Tests against England and Australia or be it South Africa 2013, Sehwag in my opinion should continue opening the innings for as long as he continues to play Test cricket.

From Ashok Sridharan, United Arab Emirates

Cricinfo25-Feb-2013
Vinod Kambli: the Archie Jackson to Tendulkar’s Bradman?•Getty ImagesI was checking in at the Mumbai airport recently when I saw a familiar face at the neighbouring counter. At first I thought I recognised him, but I wasn’t so sure since no one else was. He quietly checked in and started walking towards the security check when I mustered the courage to walk up to the man and talk to him. As it happened, my eyes weren’t deceiving me. It was indeed Vinod Kambli. The man with two double-centuries and a Test average of over 50, the man who played his last Test at the tender age of 23 was standing right before my eyes!He was delighted hear me recount that match in Sharjah eons ago when he took Shane Warne to the cleaners and still more so when I asked him for his autograph. It was in many ways a poignant moment. Here was a man no one around seemed to know or recognise (or perhaps care to acknowledge) and yet, this very same person could have been one of the all-time greats.There was a time when he was bracketed along with Sachin Tendulkar as one of the most promising young players in world cricket. For the pre-teen boy that I was back then, the flamboyant and self-assured Kambli was far more attractive to watch than the more sober Tendulkar. Today, nearly two decades later, Sachin Tendulkar is widely acknowledged as one of the all-time greats.Vinod Kambli is a name that is no more than a footnote- the Archie Jackson to Tendulkar’s Bradman. Kambli was a man with extraordinary talent who never quite made it big – India’s very own Hick, except he was dropped at 23 and never again given a shot at redemption. As many people of my age would concur, life in reality turned out to be an awful lot different from what we imagined it to be in our teenage years/early 20s. I met at the Mumbai airport that day, the very embodiment of that harsh reality.

For 11 and half sessions before that interval, Zimbabwe had done most things right, but they let the game slip away in 8.3 overs on day 4

Firdose Moonda in Harare06-Sep-2013There is a point in a dream when, no matter how real the events unfolding in the deepest moments of sleep seem, you realise they are not. For Zimbabwe, that happened at the drinks break in the third session. Pakistan were 276 runs ahead, Younis Khan had planted roots into the pitch, Rahat Ali had just hit his first boundary, a disdainful slap off Tendai Chatara’s bowling, and the match was turning.For 11 and half sessions before that interval, Zimbabwe had done most things right. They justified their captain’s decision to bowl first in conditions which could assist the quicks, they batted with Test-match temperament, they made good their lead by bowling well upfront again and they had a decent chance of limiting Pakistan to a gettable total through a miserly effort in the second innings. Until then.It was after that break in play that tired legs and similarly exhausted minds overwhelmed the discipline they showed for most of the day. Fuller lengths played into the hands of the last pair who were obviously looking to accelerate in the latter stages of the innings and Zimbabwe’s gameplan unraveled.After conceding at just 2.6 an over for the 71 overs they bowled in the innings up to that point, Zimbabwe leaked at 6.7 runs an over for the final 8.3 overs. Younis Khan went in search of a double hundred and found it and Rahat Ali proved as good at holding up an end as he did at slogging and looking for singles.During those overs, the complexion of Zimbabwe’s Test changed completely. They went from being in the game to just playing in a game, from being in a position to compete on the final day, to being in a position from which surviving would be the only aim and from being able to think about winning to having to focus only on a draw.Realistically, to expect anything more from Zimbabwe would be fanciful. They have scored over 300 in a fourth innings before but the circumstances were completely different. They achieved the score on a dead Bulawayo track two years ago against New Zealand. They also lost the match.The same happened back in 2002 when they managed 310 against Pakistan here in Harare, chasing an improbable 430. Zimbabwean cricket looked completely different then, so any comparisons are unnecessary, although Hamilton Masakadza is a survivor from that very game. But they have never chased in excess of 300 to win and are not contemplating it as a genuine possibility now.”We must be realistic. To get a win would be amazing but we will definitely go into tomorrow playing for the draw,” Grant Flower, Zimbabwe’s batting coach said. “It will be a big challenge for us, against a good attack which includes Saeed Ajmal, especially as it’s keeping a bit low and starting to turn a bit more.”Zimbabwe recognise it would be far better to share honours with Pakistan than to lose. But that realisation – that they have put themselves in a position to beat Pakistan – will sting bitterly when the final analysis of this game is done.For the contest to be decided in 51 balls seems unfair but it is an illustration of how small the margins in Test cricket are. Considering that a maximum of 2,700 deliveries can be bowled in any Test, 51 balls is a mere 1.8%. Numerically, that is how fine the room for error was in this Test. That percentage can translate to something like a dropped catch, of which Zimbabwe had two. Letting Younis Khan off the hook on 83 and 117 proved to be expensive mistakes. Had either Tino Mawoyo or Malcolm Waller held on, Zimbabwe could have been looking at a much smaller target.”Test cricket is cruel and we saw that. We dropped Younis twice and he made us pay,” Flower said. That’s what class batsmen do.”It can also manifest itself in the small errors of judgment bowlers make as a batsmen of Younis’ quality wears them down. A touch too full or too short can happen to anyone but the longer one is out there, the more chance there is of it occurring, especially with an attack that essentially had four specialist bowlers and Hamilton Masakadza to operate as the fifth.Zimbabwe’s cricketers last played a Test over five months ago and this is only their fifth Test in two years. They are not used to regular rigours of the longest format and eventually, that started to show.”In the last hour or so that we were out there fatigue set in, both physical and mental and we couldn’t take back control,” Flower said. “Those passages of play where the ability to drive proceedings no longer exists, is where advantages are squandered.”Whatever happens on the final day, there is no doubt Zimbabwe have improved as a Test nation. Flower regarded the performance so far as the best of 2013 especially because it has come “against one of the best sides in the world and with all the off-field problems”. He admitted they will look for the draw tomorrow and hope to build on the gains made in the next match.But what happens after that? With the Sri Lanka visit certain to be postponed and no Test cricket scheduled for 11 months until South Africa are due to visit in August 2014, the gains made now may end up being worth nothing by the next time Zimbabwe take the field in whites.”That’s what we face in Zimbabwe,” Flower said. “We’re used to practicing a lot because we don’t play much so we have a big emphasis on fitness but we also need to be playing tough international sides in between that because otherwise you get left behind.”If that were to happen even more than it already has, Zimbabwean cricket would face a much ruder awakening than the one they had in the last 8.3 overs of the Pakistan innings today.

To this fan, Sachin Tendulkar is a kid who managed to extend his childhood beyond its definition

Rajan Thambehalli 13-Oct-2013As I sat in my drawing room, sipping some ginger honey tea, I heard a small beep. It was my phone and when I walked over to pick it up, I saw a notification which read .I quickly got on to my Twitter feed and checked for more details. I didn’t doubt the veracity of the message, my interest was more about the source. It was the BCCI who had made this announcement on behalf of Tendulkar.The articles started pouring in left, right and centre. All sorts of people put in their views that captured several themes – logical, cynical, critical, dramatic and statistical – but frankly, I didn’t want to reflect on Tendulkar’s decision to retire. I just kept reading one piece after the other.Every now and then, my mind went back to those laminated picture books I have of Tendulkar (3 to 4 rather big ones). They are still stacked in my room in India and remain my prized possession. My thoughts then drifted to the times I played cricket as a kid. What made me love this game to this day? Is it because the game by itself was so attractive or were there other factors influencing me to take it up?How old had I been? Six, no, five, maybe even younger when I picked up a bat or ball for the first time. Our house was a little way from the city centre and so I didn’t have the luxury of having too many friends. There were three others who were of my age and we started playing cricket on the streets; having a proper ground was unimaginable in those days. Notwithstanding the occasional tips from the elders, we were mostly left on our own to understand the game, a challenge which we relished.Around that time, the cricket world witnessed the birth of the Tendulkar phenomenon. He was young and so were we which brought about an instant connection, a bond which became stronger by the day. I started playing cricket everywhere – on the roads, inside the house and any place which was sufficient to enable my obsession. It didn’t take long for school to become the extra-curricular activity.Outside of my family, Tendulkar has been a constant throughout my life and now that connection is on its way to breaking. He gave me immense joy, and occasionally the source of my tears. He made me go mad. He frustrated and inspired me. He made me a thinker, made me a believer and even gave me the confidence to go after my dreamsWho is Tendulkar? God? No. Demi-god? No. Superhuman with magical powers? No. An ordinary human beingwith extreme talent. Not quite. To me he is a kid who managed to extend his childhood beyond its definition.I believe there is a kid inside every adult, but in Tendulkar’s case, it is the other way around. He is still a kid, and kids tend to move on to a new toy or next set of challenges when they are bored with the existing toy or the next one is more attractive. I believe Tendulkar has reached that phase in his childhood where playing cricket no longer gives him the fun it once did. He has made this call to move on with his life and let the adult in him take over from now on. If cricket was his favourite toy, he has played with it more than one could possibly imagine. He will pad up for his final two tests as an adult, fully aware that his childhood days are now over.My association with cricket started with Tendulkar and with his retirement, a big chunk of my childhood is lost. That void will be replaced by my memories of him as I move on with life, remembering the times when I did everything I could to just watch Tendulkar play.If you have a submission for Inbox, send it to us here, with “Inbox” in the subject line

Starring Srini, Miley, Ban Ki, Andy Z and a number of other superstars

Andy Zaltzman04-Feb-2014At last, one of the darkest chapters in English cricket’s playing history has been completed. Whoever wrote that chapter has a dangerously twisted imagination, verging on the sadistic. Parts of the next edition of will read like a gratuitously grisly crime novel.It has been a three-month, three-format thrashing of historic proportions, in which England have been smithereened on and off the field. They were dismal in the Tests, careless in the ODIs, and clueless in the T20s. It has been one of the great sporting disintegrations. On the positive side, it did not go quite as badly as Briddleswick CC’s club tour of Pompeii in 79 AD. Although historians may well still be picking over the remnants of this winter’s whackings in thousands of years’ time.Also on the positive side, England can now look forward, rather than merely try to assuage their cricketing pain by trying to lose limited-overs matches by a dignified margin.For the first time in years, there is massive uncertainty about England’s Test line-up. The bulk of the side Flower led to Australia had been there since his first tour, to the West Indies, five years previously. By contrast, here is The Confectionery Stall’s England team for the first Test against Sri Lanka in June:Cook (captain), AN Other, AN Other, AN Other, AN Other, Stokes, AN Other (wk), AN Other, Broad, AN Other, AN Other.Cook deserves the opportunity to learn from the batterings of this tour, although his batting has been patchy for the last two years, and was damagingly vulnerable in the two Ashes series. Stokes was the sole significant positive from the five Tests of Torture, and Broad bowled decently throughout (although he could do with watching some videos of himself batting from a few years ago) (not just the highlights).I contemplated leaving out one of the AN Others for Bell, the decisive player in last summer’s victory, but after only two good series in the last nine (in five of which he has averaged under 30), he should be expected to find runs and fluency in first-class cricket. Pietersen’s place is partly squabble-dependent, but he has done little since his Mumbai masterpiece 14 months and 14 Tests ago. Anderson deserves leeway but needs wickets. Root should be persevered with as a long-term prospect, but that does not necessarily mean he must be part of England’s immediate Test future. Botham is too old, Hammond too dead, and Grace too controversial. Thus, eight spots in the team are, or should be, up for grabs. It will be the most eagerly followed start to a county season for years.Alongside the tantalising uncertainty in the make-up of the team, it has also been widely argued that England need to reassess/refresh/sack/impound their support staff. Others have suggested that the players must take responsibility. Which in itself suggests that England need to reassess/refresh/sack/impound their support staff.It seems as good a time as any to speculatively throw out babies with bathwaters, so the Confectionery Stall hereby advocates a complete overhaul of the England backroom. The world must be scoured for the best available candidates to drive and guide the renaissance of English cricket after its three-month Dark Ages. No expense should be spared. No obstacle should be insurmountable in the quest to give Cook, Stokes, Broad and the eight AN Others the best possible support structures to play to the best of their abilities.The Support Staff to Take England Back to the Summit of Mount CricketBatting Coach: F Bruce
For the past few years, England’s batsmen have been overseen by two leviathans of modern batsmanship – Flower, a one-man statistical miracle, and Gooch, England’s record run scorer, player of some of England’s greatest innings, and a man who spectacularly cracked Test cricket late in his career after years of undulating form and disrupted availability. Despite the input of two of the most knowledgeable sages of batsmanship in the known universe, in 30 Tests since January 2012, no England batsman has averaged over 40 in Tests (excluding one-Test, once-out Chris Woakes). Clearly, it is therefore time for them to be coached by someone who knows absolutely nothing about batting. BBC newsreader and frontwoman Fiona Bruce fits the bill perfectly. I assume.Bowling Coach: N Srinivasan
The ECB’s new best buddy might have no expertise when it comes to bowling, nor any discernible fondness for cricket, but England should attempt to coax the BCCI supremo into their inner circle with the offer of a plum coaching job. This could be a valuable first step on the road towards creating a joint England-India Test team that could be charged out at astronomical hourly rates to play against other Test nations, if any of them can afford it, or, more profitably, large multinational corporations, or XIs put together by dubious billionaire Russian oligarchs.Fielding Coach: M Cyrus
The alleged singer, notorious cricket obsessive, and self-styled Professor of Twerkology at the University of Grind, claims to have modelled her trademark posterial posturing on a combination of Sir Garfield Sobers clipping one to square leg, Imran Khan following through after bowling, and England’s 1981 Ashes-winning slip cordon.Her renowned tongue-out facial hallmark, meanwhile, is an obvious homage to her lifelong heroes Ravichandran Ashwin and Harbhajan Singh, and yet another expression of her obsession with subcontinental offspin. This lifelong passion famously reached its zenith when she had a large tattoo of 1980s Pakistan tweaker Tauseef Ahmed plastered all over her left crumbleflump to celebrate her 18th birthday.Cyrus, who according to her publicist is “half-way through the second draft of her warts-and-all biography of David Boon”, topped the charts last year with her single “Wrecking Ball”, which is considered by most music experts to be the most moving song ever written about Angus Fraser’s offcutter. Furthermore, the former star and Tennessee Women’s Under-23 3rd XI allrounder reportedly limbers up for her energetically gluteal dance routines by having her long-time choreographer and confidante Derek Randall hurl cricket balls at her via a slip-catching cradle.The partially nude songstress would bring an innovative approach to often mundane fielding drills, and would help draw media glare away from England’s beleaguered players. An outstanding candidate for the all-new Team England.Chairman of Selectors: HRH Queen Elizabeth II
Long-serving professional monarch would bring natty headgear and a constitutionally impartial perspective to team selection. Experienced, even-handed, popular, and almost psychotically obsessive about county averages.Motivational Psychologist: Pope Francis
It would take a big compensation package to prise the Vatican No. 1 away from St Peter’s, but the star Pope has made a big impact in a short time in Rome with his refreshingly modern attitudes, and could do the same with English cricket.

United Nations secretary-general and 60s-rock-drumming-sceptic Ban Keith Moon will bring an air of international authority to England’s media relations. Years of attempting to defuse combustible international spats make him the ideal man to ensure Pietersen takes the field again

Statistician: W Buffett
Hyperbillionaire business wiz and philanthropy celeb with a lifetime’s mastery of turning numbers into much bigger numbers. Viewed by the ECB as “significantly less likely than Allen Stanford to find himself slammed up in an American penitentiary wearing what looks like the Dutch one-day kit”, Buffett’s tax bracket commands the instant respect of 21st-century sports players. Would also be able to buy the entire IPL and relocate it to Chad, to bring an end to any T20-aggravated tension in the England dressing room.Dietician: H Blumenthal
Eight-two-page recipe pamphlets would become a thing of the past with the Michelin-star-spangled concocter of complicated comestibles – 82 pages would barely even cover a single Blumenthal starter. The Fat Duck frontman’s flamboyantly experimental yet scientific approach to cookery could help unlock a more adventurous England. As the old saying goes: “eat defensive, bat defensive” (Marcel Proust, , 1922).Dishes to be served at Blumenthal’s proposed cricket-themed megabistro in the pavilion at Leicestershire’s Grace Road ground include: freshly skittled tail-end of monkfish, thinly snicked into a cordon of shrimp slips, served with slow-grafted crab Chanderpaul, potato Inzamams and yorked carrot stumps, and drizzled in a Bob Hollandaise sauce.Fitness Coach: U Bolt
Two-time treble-Olympic sprint champion has all the know-how to turn Monty Panesar into a turf-scorching exocet in the field.Sledging Consultant: J Sadowitz
Legendarily foul-mouthed Scottish magician-cum-comedian – the British Shane Warne, in many people’s eyes – will give England a harsher, more expletive-ridden edge in the verbal jousting that has become “all part and parcel of the game”. The Miles Davis of Swearing.Media Manager: BK Moon
United Nations secretary-general and 60s-rock-drumming-sceptic Ban Keith Moon will bring an air of international authority to England’s media relations. Years of attempting to defuse combustible international spats make him the ideal man to ensure Pietersen takes the field again in an England jersey, even if he has to be escorted to the crease by an international peace-keeping force.Head Coach: A Zaltzman
Has never failed in a top-level coaching role. Undefeated in Tests as both a player and a coach. Plenty of spare time.These are extreme times for the England team. They require extreme measures. And they also require a separate coach for T20 internationals. To have the same coach in five-day cricket as three-hour cricket is akin to hiring the same composer to create both an orchestral symphony expressing fundamental truths about the human condition and an advertising jingle for children’s processed-cheese snacklets. You might find someone who can cover both disciplines. But you would probably be better off not burdening that person with two such non-complementary duties.

Kumar Sangakkara’s form in Bangladesh this season has been sublime. But his record in ODI finals has not

Mohammad Isam07-Mar-2014People in Bangladesh have got used to watching Kumar Sangakkara bat long and bat often this year. He has been insatiable in these conditions against all sorts of bowling, but in the Asia Cup final against Pakistan in Mirpur, Sangakkara will have something to prove. Sri Lanka need him to play a defining innings, which has largely eluded him in tournament finals.Sangakkara has scored 931 runs in 10 matches – two Tests, two Twenty20s and six ODIs – in Bangladesh this season. His aggregate is third on the list of runs in a season in a particular country away from home: Viv Richards scored 1045 in England in 1976 and 1057 in Australia in 1984-85.Sangakkara’s delight in batting at the moment was evident in how he made 76 against Afghanistan. He was getting beaten outside off stump by Mohammad Nabi, and for a while he looked like any other left-hand batsman. However, any other batsman might have gone after little-known Nabi out of pride, but Sangakkara was able to show the bowler the respect he deserved at the time, and then move on to succeed.He seems to bat without an ego, a quality every aspiring batsman should cultivate, but sometimes Sangakkara needs to lose that habit and play with a bit of arrogance. It could give his proficient game another gear. Something like what Aravinda de Silva used to shred India in the 1996 World Cup semi-final.Since 2009, Sangakkara has either played second fiddle in finals that Sri Lanka won, or he wasn’t effective enough to win his team the game. Among the 38 batsmen who have more than 500 runs in ODI finals, Sangakkara has the 15th highest average. For a batsman of his stature, the fourth highest run-getter in ODIs, that is an anomaly.In 26 finals, Sangakkara has scored 1023 runs at an average of 40.92. He does not have a hundred. In 13 of those games that Sri Lanka won, he top-scored in only three innings. He is missing a big score in finals, the sort of innings Sanath Jayasuriya, Aravinda de Silva, Marvan Atapattu, Mahela Jayawardene and Tillakaratne Dilshan have played.The first final Sangakkara top scored in was in 2004, against Pakistan in Lahore. His 68 took Sri Lanka from 35 for 2 to 181 for 4. The second was in 2006, against Australia, when he made 83 in the first final of the VB series. Sri Lanka lost the next two. Three years later, against Bangladesh in Mirpur, Sangakkara made 59 off 133 balls in a tri-series final. Chasing 153, Sri Lanka were 6 for 5 but he steadied the innings before becoming the seventh wicket to fall, with 39 runs to get. Muttiah Muralitharan finished the job.Sangakkara’s ODI career is 14-years old and illustrious, but there is a gap he might like to fill. He has another chance on Saturday.

Plays of the day from the game between Kolkata Knight Riders and Mumbai Indians in Cuttack

Siddarth Ravindran14-May-2014The jaw-breaker
Few IPL innings go by without a sitter being put down. When Mumbai Indians were batting today, it was Yusuf Pathan’s turn to be butter-fingered. Mumbai Indians were struggling for runs on a tricky surface where the ball kept low at times, and when Rohit Sharma was 11 off 23, he swung hard. The ball soared a mile up, but didn’t get far enough and Yusuf settled under it, preparing to take it Australian reverse-cup style. Not only did the ball slip through his fingers, it also hit him on the chin – an instant rebuke to his shoddy fielding.The grubber
With two decent scores in his past two innings, Lendl Simmons was promising to be the opener Mumbai had been searching for all season. There was not another substantial score today, though, as Simmons was undone by a Shakib Al Hasan arm ball that refused to rise above shin height. Simmons was down the track looking for a big hit, but the ball scooted well under his cross-batted effort to knock over legstump.The variation
Gautam Gambhir and Robin Uthappa had just posted their fourth consecutive half-century partnership, putting Knight Riders on course for a victory. Harbhajan Singh started the seventh over, and got the first delivery to rip a long way outside off. Gambhir smiled ruefully seeing that the umpire hadn’t called it a wide. Perhaps expecting the next delivery to fizz away as well, Gambhir went for the cut, but this time the ball didn’t turn much and a cramped Gambhir could only inside-edge onto the stumps.The free-hit
Morne Morkel was closing in on the 150kmph mark in the early overs. One of the rare chances the batsmen got to swing at the ball was when there was a free-hit in the third over. Morkel responded with a quick bouncer, but the umpire deemed it too high and ruled it a wide. Morkel’s answer this time was the perfect yorker, which Ambati Rayudu could only tuck away for a single.

MS Dhoni maintains that India have made progress in England and will continue to focus on processes rather than results. But they might ask ‘Did we give it our all?’ at the end of the Oval Test

Sidharth Monga14-Aug-2014The Oval on a sunny day can be a welcoming place to be. There is a general air of friendliness around. It seems within reach of travellers. Unlike Lord’s, its brow is not high. You can enter from any gate. It used to be a quick pitch but has now become slow. Often two spinners can play here. There is no side ground so the practice pitches are on the main square, which means abrasiveness and reverse swing. Not when it rains, though. It can be cold, dank, and prompt people to call it ugly.It rained when India arrived for their pre-Test training. Rain has not been India’s friend on this trip. It has brought India reminders of missed opportunities. After Old Trafford, which India lost in three days, it rained for a day and a half, telling them if they had batted for another hour, they might well have saved the match. Here, India had three possible days of training before the Oval Test. The team missed one together as a unit, MS Dhoni stayed away from the second. He went to a firing range instead. And it rained the only time India’s No. 6 might have got to bat before the Test.Last call for India: Duncan Fletcher runs for cover as the rain comes down at The Oval•Getty ImagesThe Oval usually hosts the last Test of a series, bringing a general wistfulness which is compounded on rainy days. If you are trailing after having led in the series, like India are, you tend to look back more than ahead. Did we give it our all? Did we get desperate enough? Did we overstep any lines? Did we under-step any? What else could have we done? You don’t want to leave with a feeling you could have done things differently.Dhoni is not likely to think about all that. He says he likes to stay in the moment. Being able to draw a Test each in South Africa and New Zealand, he says, was a step in the right direction. A five-match series is foreign territory for every player in this team, so it is natural that that one win at Lord’s might be considered another step in the right direction. Even after Old Trafford he said he was happy with the team’s progress. Hopefully that is just for a feel-good façade for the public. For there have been problems of technique, of temperament, and of strategy that have led to this stage.Not enough for desperation, says Dhoni. The openers are going to remain even though India have yet to add 50 for the first wicket since the start of South Africa tour late last year. “We will have to see whether that [extra] middle-order batsman has really contributed,” Dhoni said. “We have played quite a few matches with five bowlers, which means he hasn’t got much opportunity so all of a sudden in a big game to come with an application like that will have its own consequences.”The big factor in not having big opening partnerships is that you expose the No. 3 batsman, irrespective of whether No. 1 or 2 gets out. And [Cheteshwar] Pujara has to face that pressure. He is always batting close to the third, fourth or fifth over, so he gets more pressure. But he is also getting more chances of facing the challenges in such conditions so it will only improve him.”The process continues to remain more important than results. “It’s never that the result is more important than the process,” Dhoni said. “It is always the process that will be the key because it puts less pressure on the team. As you said, rightly, it is an important Test match but at the same time still it is the breaking up of the sessions that matters because that will give us an advantage. So we will still be looking more into the process than the result.”India have chosen to trust what they have been doing over the Investec series. They will be pleased Ishant Sharma is fit. Bhuvneshwar Kumar, though, has been bowled into the ground. Stuart Binny could come in amid talks of a damp pitch, but India surely have to question this policy of playing a bits-and-pieces player. In three of the four Tests, India have gone in with five “bowlers” but at least one of them has always been neglected.It was a bold move, but bits-and-pieces is not working. Yet, either Binny or Ravindra Jadeja are all set to play. An outsider might legitimately ask the question: do they care enough to revisit and reassess their plans and their openers, or put in extra hard work in the nets, or is one Test win – a significant improvement on previous tours – satisfying enough for them?As India waited in vain for the rain to stop – some of them had a hit in the indoor nets – Ramesh Mane, their masseur and general good old man in the team, was seen sticking images of gods and chants in the dressing room. He always does that, and also plays devotional music before the start of matches. There is not much in his hands, though, apart from the massages. Hopefully the rest of the team, who have a more direct bearing on the result, are not thinking like him.