India draw the series 2-2

What an incredible series to watch. So many intense moments. Could've been 3-1 for either of the team. But just how both England and India fought for victory in this series needs to be cherished.

Today's win for India was special, when I woke up to 35 runs for victory for England yesterday, I was sure this is gonna be a cakewalk. But Siraj and Krishna, what an incredible spell this morning under pressure.

Loved watching every second of the series, no regrets of a terribly broken sleep cycle. :)

The wicketkeeper crisis of early 2000s

After Nayan Mongia retired, the Indian cricket team was in a bit of a Wicket Keeping crisis. They played no less than 9 different wicket-keepers in a span of 5 years. Starting with MSK Prasad, Saba Karim, and ending towards the end with the more charismatic Parthiv Patel and Dinesh Karthik (the only one in the long list that survived beyond a handful of ODI matches). But safe to say the time between the summer of 2000, and winter 2004 was a moment of crisis for the Indian team.

Here's the list: 

1. MSK Prasad (debuted after Mongia’s injury in 1999) (17 ODIs) 
2. Saba Karim (34 ODIs) 
3. Vijay Dahiya: 19 ODIs: October 2000 to April 2001 
4. Sameer Dighe: 23 ODIs: January 2000 to August 2001 
5. Deep Dasgupta: 5 ODIs: October 2001 
6. Ajay Ratra: 12 ODIs: January to July 2002 
7. Parthiv Patel: 38 ODIs and 25 Tests: Famous for being one of the youngest players in the team, debuting at 18; and sledging Steve Waugh! 
8. Rahul Dravid (kept as a part-time keeper mainly in ODIs, including the 2003 World Cup) 
9. Dinesh Karthik: Played his first ODI in the summer of 2004 followed by a test in Australia tour to India in 2004 October / November. 

Funnily I remember most of these players, Deep Dasgupta, Ajay Ratra, Vijay Dahiya and the likes. Why so? I had a knack of collecting player info when they debuted as a way of winning at Cricketer's Atlas (a game similar to Atlas that me and my brother played when we were young) and as you can see there were a lot of wicket keeper debuts when I was a tiny kid trying to beat my elder brother at a game. But I digress.

The crisis continued until MS Dhoni started playing for India. The wicketkeeper who would not only surpass his contemporaries but go onto to be the best wicketkeeper-batsman the country has ever produced, infact even more influential and successful than the stalwarts of the time, Adam Gilchrist and Mark Boucher.

This unique moment of crisis in the Indian cricket team before Dhoni arrived and changed the game forever, has some interesting parallels with the Indian team's current captain crisis. The Indian team has struggled to have a stable captain post Kohli and in the absence of Rohit Sharma for quite sometime now. In T20s we've tried it all, Hardik Pandya, Suryakumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant, Shubman Gill, you name it. ODIs have been stable under Rohit Sharma, but we're staring at a void in tests too. Putting faith in Subhman Gill, but also in the presence of a strong personality Gautam Gambhir as the coach, someone who's not hesitant to shake things. So will Gill be the long run captain? Hopefully. But I wouldn't be surprised if we look around for a bit, until there's someone as good as Kohli or even bigger.

Maybe it'll be a while till we find a stable team combination, and a stable captain, but I find it interesting that the crisis is in some ways similar to other crisis the team's had.

What makes Tendulkar so uniquely great

Inspired by a rather juvenile twitter thread that claimed Tendulkar's contemporaries would've scored more runs if they played as many matches as him. People don't realise, that's the whole point of the "Godness" of Sachin Tendulkar, he not only performed consistently, he performed consistently for 24 years of his career, that began at 16, and ended at 40. No player has ever done that. What gave Tendulkar his longevity, is his adaptibility. He was adept at adapting to the changing format of the game, the changes his body underwent, and the changes in the game that his body demanded once he was over 35.

He scored his first ODI double century at ~37. Most cricketers lose their hand eye coordination and retire at 35. Tendulkar hadn’t even peaked at 35, and to top it off, he still scores in the odd old people tournament, as if he's just shy of 30. He hasn't lost any touch with his form. Tendulkar's records may be broken (Root is well on track to surpass him as the highest test run scorer), but his mastery is unmatched.

India's loss at Lord's today

I'd be remiss to not include the devastating defeat India faced at Lord's today. What makes the defeat so devastating is not the fact that the team practically collapsed, but it's the fact that despite all adversities we came so close to winning the match (just 23 runs away!) and yet lost it to an odd ball that spun backwards!??!! I've never seen a leather ball spin backwards, and hit the stumps with such accuracy. Siraj's dismissal was comical, unfortunate and sad at the same time. It makes the defeat sting even further.

Not to add to the fact that this loss is juxtaposed with the famous win from 4 years ago, when Kohli and the boys gave the British batting lineup "60 overs of hell" in Kohli's words. Well we got pretty close to exactly that this time around. Batting wasn't easy on day 5 at this Lord's pitch and Carse, Archer and Stokes didn't make it any easier.

But the loss is also a reminder of two very important life lessons that I've grown to learn the hard-way: 

1. You may do everything right, yet end up on the losing side and face failure. Hardwork and diligence is no guarantee of success. 
2. There's hardly ever one failure point in a failure. We didn't lose this match because of Siraj's unlucky dismissal, we lost it because the dropped catches, the 61 extras across both innings, the unncessary run out of Rishabh Pant in first innings, all these things added up. 

Anyway, hopefully the team will bounce back. I've been pleasantly surprised by the young-ish team's performance this year. They've shown a lot of grit.

The Mysterious Mongoose Bat!

Vidit Bhargava

We've heard of people trying variations with the bat since the game has evolved. In the early days a bat more like a hockey stick was used to play the game. It gradually changed to the bat we use today. Later in the 20th century Dennis Lillee played with an 'Aluminium Bat'. No problems with that but the ball, it weared off.

Getting the batsmen to hit away from the sweet spot and get them cought was one of the important techniques used by the bowlers. This was the only way to restrict the batting team to a respectible total. We saw it get vanquished for the first time in commercial television when Mathew Hayden used the 'Mongoose' bat against the Daredevils in IPL 3.

Sunil Gavaskar the legendary Indian Batsman feels there is no problem with the bat but he doesn't understand why it is called the 'Mongoose Bat' this is the queastion in mind of many people. Well, Mongoose is just the name of the company which makes cricket bats. Their Product Mongoose MMI3 is the bat which has caused thunder in the world of cricket very recently.

How is it different from a normal bat? If you've seen the pics you'll already know that. Its got a longer grip and a shorter blade. Which is just opposite to the normal bat! At this point you'll be asking yourself "How on Earth does that improve the batting experience? At the end its upto the batsmen, right?" THe Mongoose MMI3 has got no dead spot and most importantly the whole of the blade is the Sweet Spot. You can hit from any part of the bat, the ball for a mighty six.

Er...What about the bottom? The bowlers can still bowl yorkers and put a halt to this bat? Thats what the bowlers did when the batsmen used normal bats. With the Mongoose coming into commercial cricket you would know how foolish is it to bowl in that area now! The weight of the bat that was removed from the top is now given to its bottom. Quite Technical!, yes and also this creates the sweet spot and the end of the bat also. So the weight remains the same, no hassles to use it. And you have a very new way of attacking the yorkers.

You would have found out that since the blade is small, bowling short pitched deliveries will give a sure shot result. Sure Shot result, yes, but not in the bowler's favor. The mongoose bat has been scientifically proven to provide 15% faster speed so the cuts, hooks and pulls you play on a short bowl can be hit better. And remember, if you play the short a little early then also the tip of the end of the bat can hit for the desired result!

The inventor of the bat, Marcus Codrington-Fernadez says in an interview that the bat is specifically designed for 20-20 cricket. Yes, it's main purpose is that. But even if you play test cricket or 50 overs cricket with the Mongoose MMI3 you can easily defend the ball. No Problems.

Where does the problem lie in the bat? What is wrong with this one? You'll be itching to know that. The problem is with the Habit. Yes, the Habit of using a normal bat. So I suggest never use the mongoose for the first time directly in a match. YOu will need atleast 21 days of practice before you can take it on the pitch. Why I say 21 days is because, it takes almost that much time to get into a habit. And if you are not in the habit of using it. You'll find the bat extremely fast. Extremely Small some times. And you'll rather be concentrating on that than the batting.

I know how it would feel to the bowlers, but I would just say, "Come on guys you are the ones with the actual brains in the game, you can easily think of the way to get this so called perfect bat out!"

I know most of you would be ready to go to the mongoose store to buy this one but wait listen to the price first! It's a whooping Rs. 17000! You would only want to shell that money if you are a professional won't you? And yes, like any other bat you can still make it with any wood for home purpose!

Oh yes, A Did you know fact: The Mongoose MMI3 was introduced in May 2009 in English County. Hayden is not the first one to use it!

Given below are two videos I would love to share they explain more about the bat in detail.