Restoring the balance in ODIs

An interesting discussion has just begun on Cricinfo's blog Wicket to Wicket about the changes that should be introduced to make ODIs an even contest between batsmen and bowlers. Bob Woolmer just made the first post in the discussion. And his controversial suggestion is:

Allow the ball to swing by adjusting the current legislation to allow bowlers to prepare the ball to reverse swing a lot earlier.

For this, he suggests that the bowler should be allowed to rub one side of the ball. How this change can be accommodated without making all forms of ball tampering legit is left as an exercise to the reader.

On a related note, I just learnt about a new type of swing uncovered by some scientist at NASA, and already put into practice by England's bowling guru Troy Cooley. It's called contrast swing, and its distinguishing feature from conventional swing and reverse swing is that the seam is to be kept upright. Here is a detailed discussion (you might need to use bugmenot to get hold of an ID to access the article). Let's see how the mysteries around contrast swing unravel.

Update: The article I pointed to about contrast swing is no longer accessible. Here is the same article on another site.

Stoking regionalism in India

What would it take for an upset of Mumbai by UP in the Ranji Trophy to generate the same amount of hoopla as LSU's upset of Duke?

Cricket is intrinsically biased?

A recent article on Cricinfo clearly brings out an argument that I have thought about on several occasions - that cricket is intrinsically biased in favor of bowlers. Here's the relevant extract:

If the rules are on the side of the batsmen, it's because the game itself is intrinsically biased towards the bowlers. They get six chances an over; they have 10 people to help them; they can have a rest for an hour or two; they can make one mistake and it hardly matters. They set the tone: in tennis terms, it's always their serve. Physically, it's tougher being a bowler, but psychologically, it's tougher being a batsman, and as the players often tell us, top-class cricket is played largely in the mind.

This is an important argument to make so as to counter the constant criticisms levelled against ODIs that the rules are biased towards batsman. If the game is in itself biased towards bowlers, it of course makes sense to add rules that even out the disadvantage that batsmen face.

I haven't thought through this logic myself. Decided to put it out here as food for thought for everyone.

Is Sachin an all-time great?

Questions about Tendulkar's place in the Indian team have been making the rounds in recent times. Though his ODI form has been awesome, he has been making insignificant contributions in Tests since his 35th Test century. The debate about his place in the team finally came to a crescendo when he was boo-ed by this home crowd at his home ground. The immediate reaction to this incident all-round has been that Sachin is an all-time great batsman and what the crowd did at Wankhede was disrespectful, not recognizing Sachin's yeoman service to the nation over the years, ignorant of his place in history, etc. etc. ...

In light of this, an interesting discussion cropped up today on one of Cricinfo's blogs whether there is any Test match that Sachin can claim to have owned. The author of the post, Gaurav Sabnis, cites 3 examples of other Indian batsmen owning a Test - Laxman at Kolkata, Dravid at Adelaide, and Sehwag at Multan. But, as one of the commenters points out, in these 3 instances, Dravid, Laxman and Sachin played stellar supporting roles.

So, are there any instances at all when a batsman has single-handedly taken his team across the victory line in a non-trivial fourth innings chase or a third innings comeback? If not, maybe we are expecting too much from Sachin?

Sania Mania goes global

Sania Mirza has been named as WTA's newcomer of the year for the year 2005. Sadly, 2006 hasn't really taken off for her as yet. But, I guess that is to be expected after the out-of-the-world 2005 that she had. I haven't seen any of her matches this year. So, I am not sure if there has been any improvement in her game, especially her second serve. However, I was shocked a couple of days back when an ad on ESPN for the sports brand Lotto featured Sania as the lone model. I guess I missed the transition from Sania being hyped just in India to her becoming a global brand!

If the Indian cricket team continues to throw up dismal performances like yesterday, maybe India will produce many more top-ranked tennis players in the coming decade? ... huh, I'm sure if India wins the ODI series, all will be forgotten. Sad. But, true.

Am I drunk?

Just woke up on a Sunday morning. Deleted all the spam in my Inbox. Then, saw this scorecard. And, am now wondering if I am drunk?!!

Will take me some time to recover to my senses :)

New Time-wasting Tactic

If you guys aren't already whiling away enough of your time, check out the new game from Cricinfo. Addictive like almost any other game.

Reminds of the WWF trump cards game I used play sometime around when I was in 8th grade ...