Tuesday, September 25, 2007

T20 - Some thoughts

Totally enjoyed watching the T20 final ( Finals and the semi's are the only games i watched ). Some thoughts about the game, Indian cricket and more..

  • T20 is surely cricket's answer to the basketball challenge. Americans went the basketball way since the game offered excitement and uncertainity every second of the game and the game itself lasted only about 1.5 hours. From, what we saw in the worldcup, T20 can clearly match up to the "American" challenge
  • T20 world cup in 15 years will surely see stiff competition from the countries in the Americas
  • T20 worldcup in 15 years will probably structured the same way as the football world cup ( regional level competitions and then the world stage )
  • Bowlers need to be accurate all the time and have 2-3 types of deliveries to keep the batsman guessing. The 07 T20 finals saw Harbhajan being smashed for sixes. Harbhajan was attempting to just bowl 1 type of a ball ( fire the yorker in ) and the batsman can, by default, wait on the front foot to smash him. This puts the bowler under a lot of pressure to pitch on the right spot , ball after ball. On the other hand, Irfan Pathan kept mixing the balls - one was a slow offcutter, another was a quicker one, a short one ( at Afridi ), a fuller one and he was clearly successful
  • Also, the T20 worldcup clearly showed that the batsman has to have solid batting skills to excel. The batsmen who smashed - Yuvraj, Hayden, Misbah and others had a clear method to their hitting. T20 may not bring out the same grace from the batsman as a TEST match does, but it will surely match up to the One day international levels.
  • As a result of T20 games, if the One day international games are played ( i see the one day games dying out very soon ), the 50 over a side games will see totals of 400+ being scored regularly
  • Lastly, i couldn't feel more sorry for Sachin - He gave his everything for the Indian team for 17 years. Sometimes, it was as if he was the only guy who was playing straight - literally and otherwise. He deserved that world cup the Indian boys won as much as guys such as Yuvraj, RP Singh and Dhoni, if not more. He should have been a part of the team. That cup should be dedicated to his contribution for the Indian cricket. ( Joginder must be one lucky guy on planet earth. He kept bowling at all places on the pitch and still managed to be a part of the world cup winning side). Sorry Sachin - Life is really cruel sometimes

8 comments:

Abhinav Vinayakh Shankar said...

Surprisingly no ambidextrous fielders, no new deliveries / shots invented!

Anonymous said...

I knew a post on T20 would be on dreamchaser:)The finals was an awesome watch and we all had loads of fun...But I never gave a thought to all these finer details mentioned here.Rather I was just waiting for the last wicket to fall...In future I will try to note all this!

Nithya said...

I misd sachin too!!! :( He deserved to b thr. However, as u rightly said - life is cruel sometimes!

Vishnuvardhanan Vijayakumar said...

Bro...T20 will revelutionize the club cricket... Who knows after 15 years club cricket will take center stage for the better!!!
As I told you before... even T20 cricket has grace, not the same as the test cricket but unique and wonderful in its own sense.

Vetti Guy said...

I guess the millions and millions he has earned on endorsements should offer sachin some degree of consolation :-)

Princess Fiona said...

hey..i actually dont agree with u there on the sachin point..while there's no takin away that he is the moghul of Indian Cricket...T20 is a fast paced game where if not big sixes, quick singles and slog shots is the order of the day..and for someone like sachin who's as technically sound as they can get and not the fastest between wickets..in my opinion this game would not have been his cup of tea!!! and on another note i think joginder sharma looks so sidey :(

Karthikeyan (KK) said...

@ Abhinav - why "surprisingly" ???

@ Archu - Oh yes... probably, you should watch a game with us next time ( and pay for the drinks too :P ). We will teach you the skills :P

@ Nithya - hmm Think Sachin will start to have some fun now on and play freely. Youngsters are playing better and if Sachin decides to quit, he should be a happy man.

@Nano - Yes sir. Agreed !!

@Vetti Guy - He still hasn't won THE CUP ! Hopefully, that should keep him motivated till the next big CUP!

@Amritha - On the contrary, Sachin's strike rate is 87.2 in ODI's ( clearly more than most T20 batters ) and he is arguably the swiftest runner ( judges the run to perfection ). But yeah, with his aging body, it will be difficult for him to cope with the demands of T20. Hahaha.. am on your side, on Joginder...

Abhinav Vinayakh Shankar said...

surprising because I was expecting to see something new..