***Official*** Australia in India 2012/13

[ajdude]

The way Dhoni and Kumar were playing?

let's make it fair then, we'll swap lyon who has never played in india for ojha who isn't even playing, done

although that's kind of irrelevant now heh

 

[uvelocity]

Something about the pitch solely getting a wicket on day four which doesn't sit well with me, but to be fair Australia should have batted better/bowled better.

could have happened day 3 had we bowled first imo

 

[silentstriker]

0-4/0-4 will be forgotten because winning in their own conditions is more important though

India lost 1-3 in their own conditions just recently.

But I hate the annoying whining when people complain about pitches being different in different countries. Hey, as England showed, both teams have to play on the same pitch. And India have to bat last.

The wickets aren't uncovered anymore so it's not like overnight rain just makes the game unfair for one side over the other. Learn to play better. Like England did.

 

[Burgey]

That was unplayable. This pitch is a disgrace...how are batsmen meant to play on this???

That's crazy talk mate. 380 and 570 in the first two digs is hardly unplayable.

Alien to some of these fellas, but by no means unplayable.

 

[Teja.]

That was unplayable. This pitch is a disgrace...how are batsmen meant to play on this???

by being good batsmen?

 

[ajdude]

India lost 1-3 in their own conditions just recently.

But I hate the annoying whining when people complain about pitches being different in different countries. Hey, as England showed, both teams have to play on the same pitch. And India have to bat last.

The wickets aren't uncovered anymore so it's not like overnight rain just makes the game unfair for one side over the other. Learn to play better. Like England did.

oh definitely, we've played like dog**** here and india's been fantastic, it was more of a dig at gambhir from last year tbh

 

[weldone]

Rewind 40 overs ago.

 

[Burgey]

India lost 1-3 in their own conditions just recently.

But I hate the annoying whining when people complain about pitches being different in different countries. Hey, as England showed, both teams have to play on the same pitch. And India have to bat last.

The wickets aren't uncovered anymore so it's not like overnight rain just makes the game unfair for one side over the other. Learn to play better. Like England did.

While ever India produces pitches which offer nothing to quicks they'll always be **** overseas. It's a trade off they seem happy with.

 

[silentstriker]

oh definitely, we've played like dog**** here and india's been fantastic, it was more of a dig at gambhir from last year tbh

Yea, BCCI also said something similar. Annoyed me to NO end. I had a big rant about that. It's ridiculous.

BCCI have been trying (to their credit) to prepare more seaming and swinging conditions in domestic cricket (but its hard to simulate the 150kph 6'4 bowlers), but for Test matches, yea, I have no problems with pitches like this.

 

[social]

The pitch this morning makes the decision of Starc to bowl around the wicket all day all the harder to understand

All that achieved was to make it harder for our left handers and easier for their right handers

 

[Teja.]

While ever India produces pitches which offer nothing to quicks they'll always be **** overseas. It's a trade off they seem happy with.

Be reasonable mate. Ishant Sharma is our spearhead. There's absolutely no reason that we prepare a pitch that aids Pattinson, Starc and Siddle when we have no **** who can bowl pace.

 

[silentstriker]

While ever India produces pitches which offer nothing to quicks they'll always be **** overseas. It's a trade off they seem happy with.

I think that's definitely true, but domestically. As I said above, they have been trying to do that domestically but I think for Test matches, they need to keep doing this.

By the time players get to this level, it's hard to then all of a sudden to learn to play on wickets with seam and swing. All of a sudden you're going to prepare swing and seam with Ishant Sharma as your bowler and Sehwag as your opener? That's not gonna work. They have to grow up and develop their techniques on it. IMO anyway. I don't think preparing Test wickets like that will necessarily help much. More tours of young players overseas and much more importantly, domestic preparation of pitches that encourage fast bowling, will have much more of an effect.

 

[Daemon]

That does not disprove the point that it is not lack of concentration but lack of ability.

Poking outside the offstump is the common issue with players who lack good defense, most often backfoot defense. A prime example is Mr Gautam Gambhir. He always suffered this deficiency (still does) and is not able to negotiate the in-between length delivery just outside the off stump which he cant slash to point without looking unfit to open the innings if he keeps getting out that way and cant go back on to his stumps and defend with a straight bat or leave alone. So Mr Gambhir pokes at it in a nervous reactive manner. The only big surprise to his troubles because of that is how long his deficiency in having no back foot defense (disastrous in an opener) went un-noticed by the bowlers in the world for so long..

Gambhir also tried the method of jumping out to the quicker bowlers to make them pitch short so that he could get the width and the length he needed to play the cut but it can't work if the bowlers just keep bowling it there and it finally caught up with him.

The fact that Dhoni poked at them and got out while his attempts to slog sometimes resulted in a few quick runs does not change anything about the point I was making.

A lot of people have been talking of Dhoni's reinventing himself as a batsman because of his dropping strike rate. This is true. But the reason is not a sense of responsibility alone. Dhoni is the smartest cricketer in India (and I include Sachin here) and he realises his deficiencies as much as the best of them (again I include Sachin who sometimes fails to do so) and Dhoni realised his game, rustic street cricketer that he played like) was not good enough against the best in testing conditions and most of all in the longer version of the game. He realised too that it was too late for him to go back to the drawing board and change/work-on his technique in any significant way. So he decided to use his do-it-yourself coaching. Slowly and surely he has been working on how to make the best use of his power and great hands and how to minimise the drawbacks that his woeful technique brings.

This is Dhoni's great self drawn new portrait of himself. He is not going to become a champion batsman in trying conditions. He is still going to look less than very good when the ball moves laterally, late and enough. I am sure he realises that but this does not deter him from getting the best out of himself. For this I salute him and am a great admirer. However, this does not make me tag him with qualities he does not have for they do not necessarily strengthen his case as a remarkable self-made cricketer who is a law unto himself.

Dhoni is technically deficient - PERIOD.

Dhoni refuses to let his deficiencies deter him - FACT

Dhoni has been trying different ways to overcome the situations which have troubled him and had limited success in the longer version and in trying conditions - FACT

He is still working at it and is possibly going to emerge a better if imperfect batsman - MOST LIKELY

I consider Dhoni as among the three best Indian captains that I have seen along with Pataudi and Ganguly. All three had different strengths with the Nawab being the most rounded. Dhoni joins that list because he is the most committed and the most responsible of all Indian captains one has seen in the last half a century and not concentrating when playing for his country would never ever be even a blip in Dhoni's thoughts.

There are others who when faced with difficult situations/form have tried to hit their way out in the correct team - Sehwag is the prime example and the one I am hinting at but unlike Dhoni, Sehwag, when he finds his methods are not working hasn't shown the tendency to do something different (although he may just be starting to do that). Dhoni does not think let alone say things like "This is the way I play and this is what you get from me" Thats why, inspite of being a very good tactical captain, Sehwag should never replace Dhoni as captain as long as MSD is available. For he is a man who does what HE THINKS the team needs. We may disagree with him as most people do in his choice of Jadeja but then that will alwayd happen when a you have a strong man at the helm and Dhoni is nothing if not a strong man - mentally much more than his obvious physical strength.

No I am not digressing or blabbering. The point is that everything about Dhoni is about responsibility and doing his utmost for the team's cause. To suggest that such a man did not concentrate in an entire series, even if one is trying to explain away a heroes technical deficiencies, is to do great injustice to him.

But I never said anything about the concentration issue, I just merely pointed out what you said about the way Dhoni was getting out in England was wrong.

 

[Cevno]

let's make it fair then, we'll swap lyon who has never played in india for ojha who isn't even playing, done

although that's kind of irrelevant now heh

Will trade for a decent seamer tbh and throw in Dinda free too. We tour Sa Next so...

 

[benchmark00]

Hope all these Indian posters stick around for the rest of the series

 

[Burgey]

Be reasonable mate. Ishant Sharma is our spearhead. There's absolutely no reason that we prepare a pitch that aids Pattinson, Starc and Siddle when we have no **** who can bowl pace.

It has forever been thus. It's a choice they're happy to make and fair enough.

 

[silentstriker]

Clarke with a nice six there. I absolutely love his use of feet. Footwork is so much more important than making sure you use the sweep or whatever.

 

[Spark]

ooh an hour of this could be fun

 

[Mr_Ronan]

That was unplayable. This pitch is a disgrace...how are batsmen meant to play on this???

Hahahahaha **** sake fellas lighten the **** up!

 

[uvelocity]

Hope all these Indian posters stick around for the rest of the series

kohli drops one and jono disappears. wac he is