Behind The Wicket:Runs and Ruins from South Africa

India had gone to conquer South Africa after completion of 150 years of migration of Indians there.But one of the migrant Hasim Amla batted superbly and saved his new home country from disaster.The score line (2-3) shows that their is a strong fight in between these two teams,but our jobless cricket expert BP thinks the other way.At first what is the reason behind touring fast and furious protea's before the WC.When WC will be on slow tracks this tour gave nothing except criticism to those poor guys(no need to mention who are they) who failed to perform.Batting both top and middle order failed completely before the South African pace battery.The SACHIN 'storm', LAXMAN 'luck' and SEHWAG 'strokeplay' saved the test series,but the youth(oh,emerging promising youth) failed severely at the ODI series.Where's bench strength when M.Vijay failing consistantly and playing and playing again.This tour warned that their is nothing in batting line up except Sachin,Sehwag and Laxman.Only Kohli showed some resistance.MSD the Indian skipper scored only 75 runs@15.00 and walked out from the pitch like his SONATA ad 'WAIT MAT KAR'. Dhoni consistantly avoided himself to promote up the order. Yuvi has just 91 runs in his account and Raina also failed.Another trend we saw in this series that INDIAN TEAM relyed on bowlers to score the runs and to win the match.With out of form batsmans we are dreaming of winning World Cup.And also the in-form batsmans are not playing.Bowler bowled well in this series but some attacking spin is expected in the WC from our tweakers.

World Cup special:Battle of SPIN!!!

And finally all teams has announced their final squad for the encounter at the sub-continent.Spin is always a important factor in sub-continent with spin-friendly pitches,Where the ball turns from the word go.All sub-continent teams has taken many slow bowling options,on the other way Australia will be rely on only one specialist spinner.Suprisingly the proteas has chosen to go with three specialist tweakers with Johan Botha to lead the command.Left arm orthodox spinner Robin Peterson and uncapped Pakistan Punjab born leggie Imran Tahir will assist him.Tahir who has yet to play in Proteas colours will be the surprise package.South Africa has many slow bowling options with part time offies JP Duminy,Smith and leg-break all rounder Faf Du Plessis.Plessis,who bowled just 1 over against India at Cape town is impressive with his drift and bounce.Heading towards team India Selectors has choosen three specialist spinners with Harbhajan leading the attack.Highly rated(only bowler except Mendis to bowl Carrom ball) offie R.Aswin and UP leg spinner P.Chawla are also in the squad.Chawla who has played 21 ODI's(all away) and yet to make his home limited overs debut.Part timers Yusuf,Raina,Yuvi and Shewag will free up their arms if required.World champion Australia eyeing for there 4th consucative title has picked only one spinner.After so much confusion in Ashes with Xaviar Dohetry and Michael Beer finally Hauritz has been make it to final squad.Hauritz,the best available spinner down under who has good record aganist India will be the main slow bowling weapon for the Oz attack. Leggies Steve Smith and C.White have to play the role of Stuart Law.Michael Clarke and David Hussy are the other spinning options.The Ashes winner English team has picked promising finger spinner Graeme Swann as their front line spinner.Swanny is in his best form with 59 ODI wkts @24.33.Left arm orthodox bowler Michael Yardy and inexperienced offie James Tredwell are also in the squad.The 1996 champion Sri Lanka has picked 3 spin experts in their squad.Most wicket taker Muralidharan,spin sensation Ajantha Mendis and tweaker Rangana Herath are in the Sri lankan team.The Lankan has many part time options with Dilshan,Samarweera and Chamara Silva.Pakistan who was in spot fixing scandal has various new faces in spin department.Danish Kaneria and Shoib Malik failed to get world cup berths.Left arm spinner Abdul Rehman and offie Saeed Ajmal will lead the spin attack.Shahid Afridi and Hafeez will assist the attack.It will be a world cup of spin potential.

Sarphera Surprised !!!India's World Cup squad

Finally selection committee headed by Kriss Srikkanth picked the team for upcoming world cup.The high profile much awaited selection is shocking for sarphera BLOGGER.The team for world cup is Sachin,Shewag,Gambhir,Dhoni,Kohli,Yusuf,Raina,Yuvraj,Harbhajan,Aswin,Piyush Chawla,Zaheer,Nehera,Praveen Kumar,Munaf.The team has 7 batsmans,1 wicket keeper,3 spinners and 4 pace bowlers.The selection is so much suprising for sarphera BLOGGER.Srikkanth has picked 3 spinners,can he answer the inclusion of Piyush Chawla?Is he a match winner?If you needed a leggie,Amit Mishra is a better bowler than Chawla.There is no need of three spinners as their is so many off break options.You could have taken one offie,one leggie and one specialist spinner if needed three.Pragyan was not a bad option.Another controversial decision taken by selector is that they excluded Rohit Sharma.Rohit has not poorer form than Raina and Yuvraj.Perticularly Yuvi who is struggling from more than a year should be out of the squad.Outster of Rohit and Parthiv restricted teams opening options.With Sachin,Shewag and Gambhir in injury list a poor decision by the national selectors.The third spinner could atleast be replaced by Another batsman.Selection of seamers is according to SB's prediction.SB thinks the team is not balanced in the lower middle order.

Sarphera's Prediction:Parthiv On The Race!

Thanks to some good bowling efforts by bowlers India won the 2nd game against the proteas to level the series.But a bad news for Indian camp is that master blaster SRT injured on harmstring and left for home.Last time when Gauti was injured,selectors picked Rohit Sharma as additional opener.But now the selectors has taken wise decision by picking the Gujrat player thinks Sarphera BLOGGER.Parthiv,who has the record of playing test cricket before playing first class cricket is the right choice for South African conditions.When India batsmans are struggling at bouncy tracks his ability to play short ball will surely help India.The 'Chota Hayden' whose batting is impressive after the come back positioned himself as a serious contender for world cup.Although their is no time left for picking world cup squad the inclusion of Parthiv Patel in the current touring team increased his chances.It will not be surprising if the current second best wicket keeper gets a world cup berth.With his opening abilities he is much ahead of M Vijay.Wicket keeping is an additional plus point.In SB's team their is a immidiate threat to Pujara's world cup ambitions.It is interesting to see whether the selectors will give another chance to Yuvraj or not.Their is a lot of media talking about R Aswin but I thing Harbhajan and Pragyan should be there.Although Srilanka picked three spinners(as 1996 subcontinent world cup)their is almost no chance of three spinners in Indian squad.

Sarphera Selector:Team For The World Cup

The final squad for the upcoming world cup is going to declare today.The national selection committee headed by Krishnamachari Srikkanth will pick 15 players for the mega event at the home soil.Indian skipper Dhoni earlier said that 'the world cup squad is almost less or more settled '.And again he stated that one or two performance (perticularly at the current tour in SA) does n't matter,Player's last 12 months performance will be taken into consideration for the selection.Sarphera BLOGGER thinks that playing at bouncy track prior to world cup is a bad move for world cup preparation.If SB were chief selector then the 15 player for the world cup will be SACHIN,SHEWAG,GAMBHIR,KOHLI,DHONI,RAINA,ROHIT SHARMA,YUSUF PATHAN,CHETESWAR PUJARA,HARBHAJAN,ZAHEER KHAN,PRAGYAN OJHA,ASHISH NEHERA,MUNAF PATEL AND PRAVEEN KUMAR.As far as opening is concerned their are many players in the squad capable of opening,so their is no place of reserve opener.Hence M Vijay is out of squad.I prefer Sachin and Shewag to open the innings and Gambhir to bat at no 3.Kohli,Dhoni,Raina and Yusuf to bat at No 4 to No 7 respectively.Yuvraj is out of squad for his dubicious form and lack of confidence.As there are many spinning options in the team their is no need of 3rd spinner.So R Aswin and Chawla are not selected.There are 4 seamers in the squad and I think Zaheer and Nehera to be the strike bowler.Dhoni may take risk of playing three seamers as the pace bowlers are not consistent.Rohit Sharma is a good finisher and he can open the innings ,so he is in reserve. The inconsistany of lower middle order forced me to pick Cheteswar pujara.I would prefer Badrinath over Pujara,but Badrinath is not among probable 30.According to SB the sqaud is balanced.

Importance of cheer leaders in IPL

'NO CHEER LEADERS IN IPL IV!'.This report has been brought by our only and completely untrusted correspondence Baabla Patrakar(BP).He has stated that their is possibility of IPL IV without cheer girls.But sarphera BLOGGER(SB) thinks that cheer girls are integral parts of IPL.I can believe Ruk Ruk khan(RRK) without KJo,Mallika without Bold scene,Akhtar without chucking,Aussies without sledging,Steyn without pace,Sreesanth anger but can't believe IPL without cheer girls. People like SB eagerly wait for this big bonanza .After a year of saas-bahu ' ATTYACHAR',they relieved by this mega event.But don't get confused that they are keen to see the cricketing action throughout IPL.Only 10-15 'buddhas' only see the cricket(some buddhas might be exception).But the rest of the pie enjoys cricket along with dance of cheer girls keeping cheer girls primary.No matter how less boundaries or wickets fall in that match a single glance of cheer girls keep the viewers awake till the end of that match.Cheer leaders are also motivatiors for the players.There has been fighting among the players that who should field near them at mid-wicket and back foot point area. You can expect a six from munaf/macgrath if cheer girls are their.And after all the most important thing is that the public support the teams according to their cheer leaders.'NO DADA, NO KKR' slogan through out the streets of kolkata to facebook pages. .As the cheer girls of KKR were covered from tip to toe last year,the public entered the Eden Garden's only to enjoy DADA's magic and the bengal tiger showed his brilliance by becoming the highest run getter for KKR.But this season without him,why public will come to see KKR's game as there is doubt about cheer girls? It is a heavy blow for KKR fans and sarphera BLOGGER.May some RRK lovers will go and see their game.

IPL auction:The unpickable 'Teesra'

'DOUBLE MODI IN IPL',It was a poster seen during an IPL match at Ahemadabad last year.But no IPL Ahemadabad team in IPL IV and the only Modi of the biggest league (I think him as godfather of IPL) thrown away.However the 'MAHA-NILAMI' ended at the garden city of Bengaluru with full of surprises and disbeliefs.Young turks over-shadowed the old guards by snaching whopping bids.Anil Kumble,the JUMBO JET had withdrawn himself from auction as he will be busy playing the KSCA league. 'Prince of kolkata' was surprising left unsolded at the 'KARMAYUDH' of cricket.Dada,who was once icon of KKR failed to fetch a single bid for him.It will be intresting to see the Eden Garden's without the local hero. Unrecognised sources reported that Dada has started practice at Eden and also prepairing for the new pepsi ad 'Dada ko bhule to nahi part-2' to make a strong comback.Ruk Ruk Khan is droping his crocodile tears but the bengal tiger is not in compromising mood.Another big man who will miss the bash is Brian Lara,my all time best backfoot player.The auction is double setback for the Lankan duo Jaysuriya(The man who invented the way of slog hitting) and Vass as both of them failed to make a cut in final world cup squad few days before.Mr wall aka dependable will be seen in 1st slip for Royals leggie warne.Laxman, who has the record of playing 100 tests without playing a world cup match picked for the Kochi team.Gauti fetched a record price of 11.04 cr and will be seen in KKR colours.Everything is possible in love,war and IPL.I add IPL because Bhajji and Symmo sharing the same dressing room happen only in IPL.I may imagine combining Israel with Palestine,Botham with Ian Chapell,communal forces with communists ,but it is out of my imagination that these two offies will play in a team.It will be a pleasure to see both stalwarts playing together.Irfan aka desi akram and Uthappa slapped on Indian selectors by showing their worth.Now I am in confusion that who is right?Indian selectors or the franchise managers?Kochi picked R Jadeja.Punjab and Deccan interchanged their skippers. One good news for us that porkis are out of the league.

African Safari:Mission Unaccomplished

After 5 days uncertainity the final test between INDIA and SA ended on a draw.The hope of making history in south african soil remained unfulfilled.We saw some brillient classy batting displays of Sachin and Kallis,good stroke making of Gauti,firebrand seambowling from Dale Steyn and Bhaji's attacking spin.1-1 is a good performance from the touring side after playing in home turf.Seamers could have done more disciplined and consistant bowling.As doubted before the middle order failed in this series.Lack of experience costs Pujara.Shewag was struggling for form.Indian batting still relying on top order.Sachin scored his 51th ton on new year test.Kallis,the calm customer made his 40th century surpassing ponting on the ton's table.In the 3rd test SA was struggling at 138-6,but Kallis showed his extreme talent despite of an injury and earned a highly aclaimed ton.Loose bowling of Indian seamers gave the proteas to post a fighting total of 341.Again chasing 340 runs in day five was not difficult for number 1 team,especially when you have Sachin in full flow.Recent news: Shewag is out of the ODI encouter against the proteas and Murali Vijay will open with Sachin in the limited version of the game.Let's see whether he will cement his WC place by grabing this chance.Pakistan is playing at New zeland but making news in South Africa and Australia.Taheer,a pakistan born cricketer got selected for ODI's against India and Usman Khawaja, a pakistani origin guy replaced Ricky Ponting in Sydney test.