Passing of an era

As 2013 comes to a close, what strikes the cricket lover most is how this year will always be remembered as the one which marked the end of an era and the beginning of another. With Jacques Kallis calling it quits a few days back, a log of nearly 43000 Test runs stopped counting, thanks to Sachin Tendulkar and Ricky Ponting who retired before him. That is in addition to Rahul Dravid and Andrew Strauss who stepped down last year, and Michael Hussey (who has quite a few Test runs himself, mind you), Tillakaratne Dilshan and Graeme Swann, all of whom quit Test cricket this year. (Jonathan Trott hasn't really retired, but he's quite on the edge, they say.) And with the Ashes far from over, half the England team are writing their wills too.

Colossus: Kallis marks the end of a great era of batsmen

All these retirements make me feel old. When was the last time we saw so many cricketers - legends and below - retire together in the same year? There's little doubt that cricket, through the 1990s and beyond the turn of the millennium, saw many a great legend make and break records. When folks like Tendulkar and Kallis were on, records used to fall almost every game. In fact, save for Allan Border, every single batsman in the top 10 run-getters in Test cricket history played beyond the year 2000. Whether that was because teams began playing more Test cricket in recent times or because batsmanship has evolved to attain greater glory, it's hard to tell. But there's little doubt that the likes of Tendulkar, Kallis, Lara, Ponting and Dravid each revolutionized the game in their own little ways. Now if you want to feel a little older than you already do, considering that the New Year is only a few hours away, hear this - none of the top 5 run-scorers in Test history play any longer. And Shiv Chanderpaul is the only man in the top 8 who still plays - even he, clearly, at the twilight of his long and interesting career.

But all this is not to tell a sob story to the world of cricket. To be sure, all those legends of yore have made way to likely legends of tomorrow. Men like Virat Kohli, Alastair Cook (hoping he survives to live a post-Ashes life), Joe Root and Cheteshwar Pujara are looking good to take the game forward, breaking newer barriers and perhaps even surpassing the grand heights that their predecessors had scaled. With batsmanship seemingly getting better with each passing day and T20 cricket adding a new dimension to how younger kids play, the top 5 batsmen we know today might be sitting a little lower tomorrow. There seems a definite sense of inspiration in the present crop of batsmen, taken from the men of old - Pujara from Dravid, Root from Boycott, Cook from Gooch, perhaps everyone from Tendulkar. So there seems a good possibility that the records we know today might well be broken tomorrow - including even Sachin Tendulkar's. After all, one would recall that back in the 1990s, Sunil Gavaskar and Allan Border seemed humanly impossible to surpass!

But what the cricketing world is likely to miss is someone who can score over 13000 Test runs while taking nearly 300 wickets with the ball - something that Jacques Henry Kallis actually managed to do. As Shaun Pollock mentioned during the recent Test match while on air, "You can find very good batsmen and you can find very good bowlers, but rarely can you find both of those in one man." Indeed, Jacques Kallis will be missed now more than anyone else in the game and the jury's out on whether modern day cricket can ever throw up such an extraordinary talent again. In fact, when you talk of Kallis, you're talking of not one legend, but two. And if you count his fielding skills in the slip cordon, make that three. But for all that he's worth, one often gets the feeling that Kallis, partly by his own good conduct as well as the team he was a part of, was downplayed as a great man all through his career. Would Kallis have been hailed as greater than Tendulkar if he were in the Indian team? One wonders.

With Kallis' Test career coming to an end, an era in international cricket has drawn to a close. Through 2012-2013, the world bid farewell to some enormous names and one wonders how many more are left to leave. But this is not all about nostalgia; there's a great deal of excitement in the new batch of cricketers coming through too!

Adding T20 spice to the Test curry

What an extraordinary few days these have been for Test cricket! Just while it seemed like Australia would succumb to the once-upon-a-time seemingly more balanced Englishmen, the Ashes have been swept away in a hurry and the Roos are now looking at a whitewash. England meanwhile have suffered many a high profile casualty in the ongoing Ashes war. If Jonathan Trott left for home on a temporary hiatus from competitive cricket, Graeme Swann has gone one step further in saying he'll never ever play the game again. That's two of England's finest gone, and the tour is only 60% done.

Few thousand miles away in the same Hemisphere meanwhile, the underdogs (funny when you consider ICC ranks them No. 2 in the world) nearly conquered the Proteas in their own savannas. Buoyed by the return of wily old Zaheer, the Indian Test team did what the world champion ODI team couldn't do - last a whole game against South Africa without being defeated.

Whoever once thought Test cricket obsolete surely is rolling in the mud right now. Never before have draws added so much of excitement to the game. And never before have draws been as desirable to the spectator as they have been of late. In fact, T20 didn't endanger Test match cricket. If anything, it only enhanced it. Is it a strange coincidence then that the number of Test matches ending with a result has only increased since the advent of T20?

Flying Kiwi: Williamson's stunning catch off Chanderpaul

While the classic connoisseur might squirm at the very mention of Twenty20, what he doesn't realize is that the little baby of world cricket has only made better that which gave birth to it. The new age batsman, unlike his monotonous Test-playing forefather, is not just brash and daring but also far more capable of adapting to situations. Only so would you find that Rahul Dravid's heir apparent Cheteshwar Pujara is able to strike boundaries when he so wills it, even as he grinds it out like his role model did for hours on end on the Test pitch. And just so do you witness AB de Villiers summon enough confidence to play the scoop shot in pure whites when he senses the need to win, even while he's amply capable of blocking and leaving, session after session.

But it's not just the batsmen. Mitchell Johnson's killer instincts might remind the old cricket-loving gentleman of his own contemporary - Jeff 'Thommo' Thompson. But Johnson isn't Thompson. He's a different breed - far more superior, agile, athletic and lethal. He knows how to take the batsman's head off, just as well as he knows how to crush his toes - a modern day skill born out of T20 needs and one that Stuart Broad experienced first hand from his Aussie rival at Perth.

And then the fielders; Ajinkya Rahane did twice in two days what his middle-aged forefathers found hard to do even once a season - fall into the earth, stop a speeding ball and take the stumps out with a full-blooded hurl at them. And in New Zealand, almost at the same time, Kane Williamson got rid of Shiv Chanderpaul by grasping a catch you'd have to see to believe. Indeed, the modern day tattoed-arm fielder - thanks to the furious pace of T20 cricket - is light years ahead on athleticism than the old times.

But above all, where T20 has really impacted Test cricket is in the way teams now think. The realms of possibility in the mind of the captain has widened incredibly today. What seemed impossible once upon a time is more readily chased down today. Two of the biggest fourth innings chases in Test cricket were scripted in the last 3 years and South Africa nearly added the topmost cherry last night. Indeed, the modern day captain is less afraid of losing than he was before - simply because he is far more confident of winning from a certain situation than he was previously. Players have become more versatile and, therefore better able and more willing to win games than before. And as a result of it all, the spectator is getting to see some riveting cricket for all that it's worth.

When T20 was invented, one hardly expected it to have an impact on the way Test cricket is played. As T20 became more commercial, there were alarms raised over the life expectancy of Test cricket. But what T20 has done instead is to spice up the Test curry and serve it with a delectable aroma. Cricket has never been better.

Why Sachin deserves his Bharat Ratna

Just hours after the legend retired, Dr Singh's government presented him with that Indian award of awards - the Bharat Ratna. It seemed long overdue to many. But surprisingly, there were more than just a handful of dissidents, some rather politically influential. While a few claimed that it was an 'election campaign' publicity gimmick, others felt the government had jumped the gun.

Regardless of what dissidents think, I think there are ample reasons to assert why Sachin deserved his Bharat Ratna. Granted, he didn't rule the country, remove poverty, fight wars or save lives. But that isn't exactly what the Bharat Ratna is all about. Contrary to public thought, the Bharat Ratna isn't just meant for the 'messiahs' of the Indian people. It is in many ways borrowed from the Mughal concept of the 'Navratna' - the Emperor's nine court jewels that symbolized his reign and empire. Therefore, the Bharat Ratna is meant to felicitate those who symbolize the idea of India in some way or the other.

Motherland First: Sachin has been the new India's flagbearer

If one accepts that idea, it shouldn't be too hard to see why Sachin Tendulkar deserved the jewel. For 24 years, Indian cricket - indeed Indian sport - has been synonymous with Sachin Tendulkar. So much so that Mark 'Tubby' Taylor once remarked after losing to India that his Aussie side "lost to one man." In similar ways in fact, if one were to extend the argument, Tendulkar has been synonymous with world cricket itself. If cricket to the colonial world meant Sir Donald Bradman, cricket to the contemporary age means Sachin Tendulkar. There are countless individuals in different parts of the world - even where cricket has never gone - who adore Tendulkar without even knowing his trade. As one of my friends in the Middle East put it after his teary farewell, "I don't know cricket but I do know Sachin Tendulkar." Hard to think of another man who transcended his profession by such a distance!

But that isn't the only reason why Tendulkar deserves his Bharat Ratna. Consider India in 1989. A young democracy that was reeling under a lack of direction, searching for a path to its 'Tryst with Destiny'. Its economy was caged and soon nearly capitulated. Its finance minister had to pledge gold at the World Bank to keep his country alive. But perhaps in more relevant terms, its cricket team - its most followed sports outfit - was struggling too, for breath. Six years after a World Cup win, many were writing it off as a one-time wonder. That was in Tendulkar's early days.

But fast forward 24 years later. India is the world's third largest economy. Its consumerist middle class is making the world sit up and listen. It is world cricket's biggest superpower and nations jostle for its good offices. It owns one of world sport's most popular and powerful domestic leagues and millions (both people and dollars) are flowing into the country.

In the midst of it all, Tendulkar has been the one constant. His resilient career of 24 years has symbolized a new and buoyant India - one that has and will fight many odds and get better in the face of adversity. Tendulkar has been a brand ambassador for this new and buoyant India, defining and advertising its growing and widely acclaimed soft power. His cool and soft nature perfectly matches the world's view of India - a soft, peace-loving and tolerant force for good in the world.

India's soft power, they say today, is comparable to that of the rising superpower that Kennedy's America was in the 1960s. Several individuals are a part of it. Sachin Tendulkar one of the most notable ones - a true Bharat Ratna.

The Next Brian Lara?

Even as Sachin Tendulkar plays his 200th and final Test match in his backyard in Mumbai, people everywhere are paying tributes to his marvelous career, asking almost rhetorically if there will ever again come a man who can strike out record books like he did. But for all of Tendulkar's superhuman feats on the cricket pitch, there is one particular record he hasn't broken (yet) - the highest Test score. Tendulkar has never scored a triple hundred in 24 years. The highest he has ever made in international cricket is an unbeaten 248 against Australia in Sydney nine years ago, in what was an innings of great resilience. But the highest score in Test cricket, of course, is well over that with fellow legend Brian Lara logging no less than 400 against England in Antigua.

So an interesting question was posed to me by my friend as we reminisced Tendulkar's 24-year-career. Will Lara's 400 ever be surpassed? Perhaps if Tendulkar couldn't do it, surely no one else can?

Spacewalk: The surreal scorecard

A key stat to note in both Tendulkar's 248 and Lara's 400 is that both those knocks were unbeaten. So if time and circumstance had allowed them to go on, God knows how far they would have reached! But that precisely is the point, isn't it? If one must score a triple hundred, or indeed a quadruple hundred in Test cricket, he needs to go at the rate of knots, before time annuls the game. That makes sense when you consider that the only four people to have thus far scored two triple hundreds in Test cricket are Sir Don Bradman, Brian Lara, Virender Sehwag and Chris Gayle - each one a devastating name of his generation, capable of sending shivers down the spines of the most rugged pacers.

That isn't to say that Tendulkar couldn't have joined them. After all, he did become the first man ever to have scored a double hundred in the 50-over game! So is strike rate the lone problem to breaking barriers in a Test innings? Not at all. The trouble with scoring big in Test match cricket is that you need to not just score at a rapid pace in order to keep time for your bowlers to gain a result out of the game, but also make sure you do it before you run out of partners at the other end. In other words, you need to make the most of every ball you face for hours and sessions on end - something that requires tremendous agility, fitness, concentration and mental toughness. So Tendulkar couldn't do it. Can anyone still?

The one man most people would have backed to break Lara's 400 is Virender Sehwag. Sehwag is perfect for the job. He is devastating on his day; he makes the most of every ball he faces; he scores runs so quickly that it doesn't matter how long he bats; and above all, he is the kind of guy who will try hitting you for six even on 299*. That ticks almost all the boxes you need. But Sehwag seems to be past his prime and is currently on exile from the Indian team, playing in little towns for little teams. One can't tell how long it will take him to be back in Team India if ever, but even if he does, the age old question of 'is he too old' will continue to persist.

So if one were to count out Virender Sehwag for the moment, the hunt for the next Brian Lara can be streamlined to the hunt for the next Virender Sehwag. That should be much simpler surely, considering that modern day batsmen have become far bolder after the advent of T20 cricket? Maybe not. But even as he struck a string of hundreds in the early part of his career in the Baggy Greens, David Warner seemed like the deal. But soon enough, he ran into trouble and only retains a ceremonial position now at the top of Australia's batting line-up.

Many then would be tempted to go for Virat Kohli. The man, after all, is all of only 24 years and in many ways seems 'the modern day version of Sachin Tendulkar' (but when did Tendulkar become ancient anyway?) Kohli seems a likely candidate. He is gritty alright, and scored a fine hundred in Adelaide on India's abysmal tour there nearly two years ago. He has also shown the ability to score hundreds off fifty balls and consistently win T20s when they long seemed lost. But can Kohli do all of that and be consistent with the rapid scoring for all of 400 runs, coming in at four in the Indian Test team? Perhaps. But also perhaps not. At any rate, it seems unlikely that Virat Kohli's batting role in the Indian Test team will afford him the luxury to do it at any given time. It also remains to be seen if Kohli can bring his ODI batting prowess to the Test arena without losing the strike rate too much.

That brings me to my favorite candidate now - Shikhar Dhawan. Shikhar Dhawan, following his reinvention after an embarrassing start in 2010 against Australia, has become all but the next Virender Sehwag. Winning a Test debut earlier this year, Dhawan avenged his earlier failures by smashing a breathtaking 187 against the same opponent. He then went to England for the Champions Trophy and ravaged every part of the British Isles for a fortnight, before eventually returning with the cup. Indeed, he is devastating. He is gritty. He makes the most of every ball he faces. He doesn't mind whacking sixes in the 90s (or 190s or 290s or 390s, although he hasn't got there yet.) He has the right attitude to batting. He has the right team around him. And if you must add more, he too is from Delhi.

Of course, scouting someone who can be the next Brian Lara isn't just difficult; it is impossible. Lara didn't just hit triple hundreds; he hit bloody big ones and did it twice. Surpassing his 400 is obviously going to be the stuff of legend. And someone is going to have to be living the most divine day of his life to make it happen. Something still tells me that it's as unlikely as can be.

The Elusive Art of Bowling

India and Australia are currently locked in an enthralling bilateral series in the subcontinent. Of the six games played, both sides have won two each with the visiting cyclone taking the other two. As you'd expect in India, batsmen have been ruling the roost. But not like before. Excluding the half game at Ranchi and the washout at Cuttack, both sides have scored over 300 each time they've batted, save for India's collapse for 232 in the very first game. That, of course, included the fairytale 360-run chase by India in Jaipur.

Heave-ho: Bailey has been a prime slogger so far

Although their bowling hasn't fared much better, Australia have been playing a settled eleven in all the games thus far. India, on the other hand, have been playing Russian roulette with their tailenders. Ishant Sharma has till now been the most notable victim with Ravichandran Ashwin tempting fate with every passing game. But the slam-bang in this series so far has even rattled Captain Cool MS Dhoni who quietly confided after the last game that he no longer knows what constitutes 'good bowling'. Indeed, the very art of bowling has started to prove increasingly elusive at least in the subcontinent. The new rules of ODI cricket (Google them if you want to) has left MS Dhoni fuming at times and exasperated at other times as captain on the field. All is well when his batsmen know how much to get. But as George Bailey has found out twice already now, it's anybody's guess how much is enough to restrict the willow-wielders wreaking havoc these days.

Of course, beyond a doubt, watching batsmen on a rampage is highly entertaining. For years now, the sole objective of cricket's lawmakers has been to increase the number of fours and sixes. They have done this by bringing in the boundary ropes a mile from the crowd, making grass become nearly frictionless (I'm a science student and I find this particularly intriguing), replacing the batsmen's earlier sticks with thick wooden clubs, tightening the popping crease on the hapless bowler and asking the captain to leave the farther outfield virtually deserted. In result, with each passing game and each new debutant, world cricket's erudite rulers have allowed past batting records look silly. Worse still, bowling has been reduced to mere formality. Gone are the days of bowling skill in the one-day game when the strength of the pacer and the vile of the spinner could win you games. If the game that Andy Roberts and Malcolm Marshall played back in the 1970s was called cricket, this isn't cricket.

The sad part about the one-sided batsman's game we now watch is that bowling isn't the only casualty; slam-bang cricket also takes the sting out of fielding and captaincy skills. The fact that your bowlers aren't expected to win you games anymore means that your fielders are less motivated to turn in outfield brilliance. Captains too have become helpless on the field with all those restrictions putting a cap on their thinking and imagination. It's alright these days to concede 300+ bowling first simply because you know you can chase it.

All this isn't to say that the modern day batsman is an untalented slogger. Indeed, some of Virat Kohli's silken drives and Rohit Sharma's late cuts invoke memories of old, when batting was far more tested and runs scarcer. But both the spectator and the lawmaker need to understand that cricket isn't simply a game of batting - no more than baseball is a game of slugging. But unlike the baseball pitcher who has a natural advantage with the pace he generates and the weight of the ball he chucks, the modern day bowler has little in the game to safeguard his rights. It's certainly harder to get the slogging batsman bowled today than it is to go past the baseball slugger for three strikes. Some say that cricket has evolved. I don't think that should mean a streamlining of skill. The rest, of course, is for the crowd to decide.

The Master Graduates

It's the biggest news of them all - Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar will soon be history (of course, he's also made enough of it). The next few days will see tributes flowing in from across the cricket world, even before Tendulkar plays what will be his final Test at the Wankhede against the West Indies. Personally, I had wished that Tendulkar retired after the magical World Cup win in 2011. It was a World Cup after all. And it was his home ground too. And he was being carried around the field by a third generation of cricketers whom he's shared the dressing room with. What could be more romantic than a goodbye at that point? But Tendulkar had only scored 99 international hundreds by that day (yes, I said 'only'). And fairytales don't happen in sport. Remember Sir Bradman's last innings?

A Final Wave: Tendulkar now leaves cricket

When Sachin Tendulkar finally bids adieu to the cricketing world at the Wankhede, he would have played a total of 200 Test matches in a career spanning 24 years. That's literally almost the size of two high-quality professional careers on its own and Tendulkar's cricketing odyssey is older than my own little story on Earth. After Sachin Tendulkar retired from ODI cricket late last year, Harsha Bhogle made a rather interesting observation - "What percentage of Indians is below the age of 23? That's the number of Indians who've never known an Indian team without Tendulkar!" Indeed, I've never seen an Indian team without Tendulkar hanging around it somewhere. When injured, the world hollered to see him back. When dropped (who dared do that?), Mumbai shut down. When 'rested', the captain had a tough time answering pressers.

But the greatest tribute I've yet read to a sporting legend came in TIME's May 21 edition last year. I found it rather striking to see a cover story on a cricketer in an American magazine, going to the extent of calling him the 'world's best athlete'. Surely, they loved baseball more? But as I read the article, I got increasingly fixated by it, until I came across an interesting comparison somewhere in the middle. Here's what the author said, in essence - To understand Sachin Tendulkar, imagine Michael Jordan for a moment. Imagine Jordan played for the United States of America and not the Chicago Bulls. Then imagine that the population of the United States is 1.2 billion and consider that at least a billion out of that number take basketball to be a matter of life and death. And imagine Team USA toured the world all year long, tirelessly. And now imagine that Michael Jordan is the single greatest American sportsman in history and has been doing all of this for a period of 23 years. Now you have Sachin Tendulkar.

The author then further went on to say - In most sports, you would find that one 'great man' who transcends them all, but you would also find someone breathing down his neck, waiting to break his records. Not Sachin Tendulkar. The man second best to him is Australia's Ricky Ponting, who has 71 international hundreds to Tendulkar's 100.

In conclusion, the author says, Sachin Tendulkar is the 'world's best athlete'.

The numbers apart, there are many reasons to cherish Tendulkar's legacy. Consider the fact that he entered the Indian team at the age of 16 and was promptly sent off on a tour to Pakistan - a place where India used to send more soldiers than cricketers at any given point in time. And he didn't simply explode onto the scene - it took Tendulkar no less than 5 years and 78 ODI innings in order to get his first limited overs hundred. But unlike a number of other perhaps equally talented child prodigies who burst onto the scene - Hasan Raza made his Pakistan debut at the age of 14 and Tatenda Taibu for Zimbabwe at 18 - Tendulkar did not simply fade away. He kept himself grounded and gazed dreamily at the skies in pursuit of his legacy; and built it across three generations of Team India.

Today, as the world listened to Sachin Tendulkar announce his retirement, one is inclined to recall how Indian cricket has evolved during Tendulkar's career - from the shy, under-confident outfit of 1989 to the young and rather brash World Champion unit of 2013, the story of Indian cricket is tightly woven around Tendulkar's own. I know there are those out there who'd have loved to see him go on forever. But finally, the Master graduates.

Era of Legends

Rahul Dravid and Sachin Tendulkar are currently facing off each other (unfortunately, yes, they're on opposite sides) in what will be their last limited overs game in competitive cricket. That's quite a big moment for Indian cricket. The Dravid-Tendulkar combine has scored a total of 29315 runs in the Indian Blue. I'm not going to try counting the List A domestic one-day runs here. The figure is astronomical and rather unnecessary to quote. And there is no need of stats and figures to measure the legacy of the Dravid-Tendulkar era. Both of them took Indian sport to new heights, not just on but also off the field. The dignified nature of the duo will be sorely missed in modern-day cricket - a place where young kids face off mercilessly, each one writing his own code of conduct.

Hall of History: Roger Federer with Sachin Tendulkar

When one thinks of modern sport and the legends that adorn it, a number of names spring to mind - Sachin Tendulkar, of course, but also inevitably, Roger Federer, Tiger Woods (against his ex-wife's wishes), Lance Armstrong (until his bubble broke), Michael Schumacher (before he ruined the aura of invincibility around him), and perhaps even Usain Bolt (the self-confessed 'legend'). Discussing this landmark Champions League game, one of my friends asked me - "Do you think anyone will ever come near Federer or Tendulkar in our lifetime?"

That's a toughie. I'm a big fan of the former - someone I consider as the greatest sportsman I've seen - and also a dreamy admirer of the latter. To me, Tendulkar and Federer (indeed, even Dravid) are not merely names attached to a string of numbers. Undoubtedly, the scoreboard is all important in the world of sport. But then there are those who, over a period of time, transcend it. There are those who become independent of numerals for their survival in the Hall of History. Tendulkar and Federer sit at the top of that list. They are those who define their respective sports, rather than the other way round.

But leaving the romantic rhetoric aside, my friend's question still is a very interesting - and certainly complex - one. Consider the current crop of players. Many say that Virat Kohli and his fiery brand of cricket has already taken him to places Tendulkar had never been to at his age. Yes indeed, when you add the fact that there is far more cricket being played today, at least by India, than there was during Tendulkar's heydays, Kohli has a chance of not just surpassing Tendulkar's record, but maybe even setting a new one in some far distant statistical galaxy.

But that's not as easy as it sounds. Tendulkar became Tendulkar, not just thanks to his run-scoring ability, but also his longevity. 24 years is an awful lot of time in any profession these days, let alone sport. In a tumbling global economy, one now sees 40-year-old software engineers get laid off. But not Tendulkar. Indeed, the man is well past his prime, and probably has been for a couple of years now - maybe more. But even the harshest Tendulkar critic would agree that the maestro's best days stretched right from 1989 to at least 2004. That in itself is 15 years - the average span of some of the greatest players in modern history. Kohli's challenge then won't just be to score runs; it'll be to keep them coming for a sustained period of time. That would take great fitness, agility, mental aptitude and strength of character, including a cool head. There are reasons to be sceptical about the young man yet.

Come to Federer now. Roger Federer entered professional tennis in his teens as a hot-headed young man. It took over a year of mental conditioning thereafter for Federer to reinvent himself. When he returned, he took court to become one of the greatest sportsmen in history, now sitting on a record 17 Grand Slams. But the Federer stats chase is a little more complex than the Tendulkar stats chase. Unlike Tendulkar, Federer has a reinvigorated Rafael Nadal rushing up the ladder with 13 Slams against his name. Will Nadal catch up? He could, and certainly has a greater chance than Virat Kohli has in Tendulkar's case today, but again, it's a question of how long he can last. Nadal's knee injuries are the stuff of tennis folklore and despite some dramatic bounce-backs, few can guarantee his body will last the long haul. His style of play is particularly damaging on the knee and every time Nadal tries to change the way he plays, he simply doesn't look as scary. But there are other factors too: Federer spent a total of 237 weeks as world number one between February 2004 and August 2008. That was a period when the Swiss master went largely unchallenged, save again, for Rafa Nadal. Nadal doesn't have the luxury of dominating world tennis the way Federer did, not just because of his knee, but also because he lives in the era of Djokovic and Murray. It seems to me that for the next 3-4 years at the least, Nadal, Djokovic and Murray will share Grand Slam honors with each other, with one of them or someone else winning the fourth Slam of the year. Even that should be enough for Nadal to beat Federer's Grand Slam record, unless he loses his stronghold at Roland Garros. But again, Nadal's greatest enemy when it comes to longevity is not Djokovic or Murray, but his own knee.

In many ways, as amusing as it may seem, Nadal's knee will decide the settings of tennis history for the next few years to come. Kohli's attitude on the cricket pitch may too do the same.

CLT20, Chimps & Champs

Here's yet another T20 league on the international circuit! The Champions League T20 is into its fifth year now and somehow, when coupled in the same year as the Indian Premier League, one would feel it seems rather annoyingly redundant. But there's something different about the CLT20 this year (or there at least was) - we had a Pakistan team; although the Faisalabad Wolves, overawed by the rare opportunity to visit their 'superpower neighbor', caved in during the course of the qualifiers and ensured their non-participation in the main draw. There were wild dogs howling everywhere even before the Wolves landed in India with radical Hindutva agents saying Pakistan should cease to be recognized as a nation following their antics on the border and the Indian government officials conveniently sleeping over the players' visas until a day or two before their arrival. In the end, all that turned out to be a non-event with the Wolves, save for the unflappable Misbah, succumbing to all and sundry in the three games they played.

That then leaves us in the main draw with 4 Indian teams (well, for all technical purposes, you can count Mitchell Johnson and Dwayne Bravo to be Indian too for now), 2 South African and Australian teams each, and 1 team each from the Caribbean and New Zealand. The Sri Lankans and Pakistanis lost their only representatives in the qualifying stages and will now have to shift loyalties to their 'superpower neighbor' if they want to partake any further in the tournament.

Showstopper: Dhoni's mohawk has been the sole talking point

Crowds thus far at the CLT20 have been abysmally thin and that brings to my point on why the CLT20 still is a redundant phenomenon. The CLT20 was thought to have been conceptualized back in 2009 in order to have a fair competition between the best clubs of each league in the world. That was what I thought at least 4 years ago. But now when I come to think of it, when 40% of the main draw is Indian and the semifinals by all means might be 100% Indian, the CLT20 is not much different from the IPL T20 after all. Barring the Indian domination, the Bangladeshis didn't have a representative even in the qualifying stages and for unofficially known reasons, the English have been forbidden from taking part in a game they themselves invented. This clearly isn't a league of champions; it's a league of Indians garnished with a handful of other teams.

The question now is whether the CLT20 really needs to take place at all. In its current format, certainly not. Although T20 cricket is rather entertaining and watching Kieron Pollard tonk sixes anywhere is mesmerizing, there's only so much of it that fans can really relate to passionately enough. Anything overdone is unessential and more so when it's done in so redundant and pointless a fashion as the CLT20 currently is. The BCCI needs to rethink this tournament before it throws away the charm of the game. But maybe for the greater good, the BCCI shouldn't have veto powers in the matter at all.

Umpiring the Ump

What a great game of Test cricket at Nottingham! If there ever was a need for an advertisement of Test match cricket, here was one. Notably, we seem to be getting quite a few of these of late. In fact, Test match cricket has become so interesting in the modern day that the case for getting rid of it now seems increasingly absurd! What is equally absurd though is the case for extending the failed DRS or Decision Review System. England won't be complaining about the DRS at all, considering that it has won them the first match this Ashes. It's almost intriguing too that the tides of the DRS - a system so staunchly supported by viewers and experts in England - always seem to favor the Poms!

Frankly speaking, the DRS is a failed mechanism. Although novel when introduced, the system has been disappointing in adding flavor to the game. Let's face it - the DRS has taken the zing out of this particular Test match for both sides. The umpires have been allowed far less sleep after its inception and captains now spend as much time training their players on umpiring as they do on batting, bowling or fielding! There are technical issues with the DRS as well, I hear, but I have enough complaints against it without having to even touch on those.

Crossing his heart: Umpire overturning a decision

Firstly, as hard as it is for the system's supporters to admit this, players are not exactly great umpires and they certainly aren't great umpires when they're playing for their country and are fighting for sporting glory. They don't have to be either. Even if they were great umpires, there is enough stress on them to perform their playing duties without having to watch the lines, predict leg-befores or sense faint edges. Why all this fuss? If the umpire can't do his job all so well, how can the players be expected to do it? After all, when the ball is being bowled, the umpire has nothing else to do but watch closely and make decisions. He's paid for it and he's expected to be good at it. If part of his job is being given to the player, you might as well start allowing umpires play for their teams on the field as well!

My second grievance with the DRS is the fact that the umpire's authority on the field is essentially being challenged by it. An umpire is a match official. He is above and beyond the players and therefore, it is his duty to ensure that the game is played fair and square. As much as we universally agree that an umpire is a human being and is hence entitled to make his fair share of mistakes, no umpire likes to know when his decision is wrong. No umpire likes to overturn a decision. It is no coincidence then that when an umpire overturns a decision early in the match, he suddenly starts looking so ordinary for the rest of the game. No, it messes with the morale of the umpire. He does not feel authoritative anymore and when an umpire does not feel like an authority, he almost loses the ability to stand above and beyond the game of cricket he officiates in, thereby becoming unable to ensure that the game is played fair and square. After all, that is his primary duty, without which, in the age of technology, there is no need for him to stand with a hat on his head all day.

My third grievance is quite clear cut. When an umpire has a bad day and gives an absolute howler of a decision at a crucial juncture in a match (like Aleem Dar did with Stuart Broad) and when the team at the receiving end has run out of reviews to challenge him (like Australia did in the same episode), the DRS effectively fails. The DRS, I hope, wasn't formulated in order to check the umpiring skills of players and captains and penalize them for default on that front. It was, again I hope, formulated in order to arrive at the right decision. In the above instance, the right decision certainly wasn't arrived at. At the end of the game, that particular instance proved to be quite decisive and Australia, therefore, in a way lost this match due to their poor umpiring skills. So how then did the DRS prove to be a success?

My case is not to call for a return to the previous status quo. What world cricket needs is to stop reviewing the umpire and allow the umpire review for himself. It must become more of a convention - perhaps even part of the training of umpires - to use technology by on-field discretion when you're in doubt. Also, when an on-field umpire makes a call which violates all common sense and is clearly obvious to the man assisted by technology (which is the third umpire), the latter must make an intervention and ask the on-field umpire to correct his call. In this way, the umpires are not made to lose their authority and nor are they challenged, and eventually, the correct call is made every single time. The players are also relieved of their umpiring duty and can now play the game without a fuss.

When the DRS was introduced, many people called comparisons with tennis and invoked the great success of the review system in that game. Unfortunately, cricket is not tennis. Cricket involves far more complex variables and there is nothing really clear cut about it. So it's time to let the umpires do their job without wreaking any further havoc.

Wimbledon 2013 - Still anybody's game

I'm a bit late on my blog post on Wimbledon this year - one of my most favorite sporting tournaments. What makes Wimbledon so special is, of course, the court. Not many lawn tennis tours in the modern day are really played on lawn. The reason is pretty obvious - lawn courts are terribly difficult to maintain in pristine condition. This year's Wimbledon just proved how difficult maintaining lawn courts can be. In what later became an unfortunate incident, the All England Lawn Tennis Club's main groundsman retired last year. Perhaps not so coincidentally, everyone playing at SW19 this year have been slipping and sliding on some lush grass. To be frank, as a viewer of Wimbledon this year, I've felt at times as though I was watching an ice skating show, not so much the showpiece event of world tennis. From Maria Sharapova to Victoria Azarenka, tennis stars have been falling flat on the ground. Perhaps the nastiest fall of them all was suffered by Juan Martin Del Potro during his quarterfinal game against Spaniard David Ferrer. Luckily for Del Potro, his 6'6" height means that the court is only three steps wide, so he later decided that he would win the game without having to sprint after the ball at all.

The Fancied Quartet: All back home

Slippery or not, lawn generally is hailed as the surface that separates the legends from the lads. To win on grass, one needs a sharp and accurate serve, some great court sense and a rather cool head. Blind slapping won't work here. Perhaps that explains why the genius of Roger Federer held sway over The Championships for so long, winning the title seven times! That's what makes lawn tennis so exciting - a moment of callousness can cost you a game, a set, maybe even a match. And so, even though I'd blogged last year about Wimbledon being anybody's game, one year on, nothing much has changed about that theme. In fact, things have only gotten eerier! Rafael Nadal, flying to London after winning Roland Garros for the eighth time, was put on a flight back to Mallorca very early by an unheard Steve Darcis. Maria Sharapova, the powerhouse of female tennis, slipped, skated and slid out in the first week as well. Victoria Azarenka barely put a foot on court before packing her bags due to injury. Defeat also greeted Caroline Wozniacki early in the tourney with the Dane blaming the grass for her undoing. Serena Williams - a player so dominant that Andy Murray thought of challenging her to play him - lasted long enough to dominate the little known players in the first week but bowed out in the quarters against a reinvented Sabine Lisicki. But perhaps the greatest upset of them all - Roger Federer, holder of every known record in Wimbledon and world tennis history, crashing out in the second round to Sergiy Stakhovsky. Stakhovsky may well make it to many a quiz question in the near future if Federer decides to retire anytime soon.

What really made the difference this year? Was it the grass? Was it a dying old generation? Or was it simply the growing prowess of unknown names in world tennis? The answer to me seemed fearlessness. While many big guns seemed hounded by their past glory and pressed by intimidating expectations, the little unheralded kids of world tennis played a freewheeling brand of tennis largely unseen in past years and highly suited for lawn courts. Sabine Lisicki's defeat of Serena Williams was particularly revealing on that front. With the big American expected to steamroll the unfancied German with a barrage of aces and whizzing winners, Sabine let loose her passions on court and played particularly aggressive tennis with little regard for the scoreboard.

Perhaps the grass was rather slippery. But then again, it was the same old grass for Sabine Lisicki and Del Potro as it was for Rafael Nadal or Serena Williams. Grass often tends to favor the brave. For that reason, the hallowed lawns of Wimbledon would probably always be for anybody's taking.

Champions Trophy 2013 - Unveiling the Champs

The last couple of weeks in the UK have been most entertaining! Now we are down to the top two sides in the competition who will fight for the honors this Sunday in Birmingham. No surprises though that it's India v England. One side has been on top form on home soil, warming up for the Ashes. Their new ball bowlers have weaved magic and made it swing so much that some even doubt ball tampering. Their batsmen have been solid, although they've often been accused of letting down the anchor while trying to sail. The other side has been a revelation. Their batsmen have struck rich form and one Mr. Shikhar Dhawan has even rendered heartfelt tributes of "we miss you" to Virender Sehwag irrelevant. Gautam Gambhir too has been forgotten with Rohit Sharma deciding that it's about time he unraveled his own little kit of tricks. There are two wicketkeepers in this side - one of them can even bowl, apparently - and plenty of predators on the field. What's more, they even have a man who can legitimately call himself "Right Arm Fast"!

Boys in Blue: Dhoni's Army

This is a different Team India on display. I remember those long gone days of old when I'd never expect two consecutive victories from the Indian team anywhere. If I saw one good, comprehensive display of cricketing prowess from them, I'd brace myself for a drubbing the next day. But this Indian team has been a spectator's delight. They've made an initially suspect bowling attack look menacing courtesy of some brilliant fielding. Batsmen seem frightened to score runs. Let's simulate - if you're a batsman taking guard against Team India in the CT 2013, you will find Ravindra Jadeja and Virat Kohli on either side of you. Dinesh Karthik and Rohit Sharma lurk just beside them. Turn around and you'll spot MS Dhoni, arguably the best keeper in the world right now. Try to beat him with a cheeky shot through the slips and you're most likely to find the safe hands of Suresh Raina. Notwithstanding that, also good luck to you trying to middle the seaming ball delivered by Bhuvneshwar Kumar! The Indian batting, too, has been spectacular. No one has yet been able to conjure up a reason why Shikhar Dhawan and his mates have consistently scored at 6 RPO or thereabouts in conditions where everyone else celebrates anything over 250!

England, the other finalists, are perhaps just as deserving. Their new ball attack has excited the English connoisseur of old and a certain James Tredwell has ensured that the injured Graeme Swann isn't missed. Their batting is solid, indeed, but as some people reckon, perhaps a bit too solid for the standards of modern-day limited overs cricket. One man has impressed me above all and that's young Joseph Root - the 22-year-old Yorkshireman who has lived up to the legacy of his county. Geoff Boycott is in awe of this kid and has made that sufficiently apparent on all given occasions. But what makes Root special to me is his versatility. While he ground out a 229-ball 73 in his debut Test match in India a while back, he showed the ability to hit a 55-ball 68 against Sri Lanka in London a few days back, even exhibiting a little lap shot while he was at it.

Undoubtedly then, we have in the finals of this Champs Trophy the two most potent teams of the competition - and by far. What really strikes me about this tournament, however, is the fact that most teams are currently under transition. India came without Sehwag, Zaheer and Tendulkar. South Africa arrived without Kallis and Smith. Pakistan left out Afridi and Umar Gul. New Zealand have only recently reinstated Ross Taylor and Daniel Vettori, almost on a farewell note to the latter. England have played without Andrew Strauss and Kevin Pietersen, the latter out due to injury. Australia have, of course, lost their long list of legends - Ponting and Hussey the latest of those. In other words, save for the calypso boys of the Caribbean (even they're slowly evicting Ramnaresh Sarwan out of the side), everyone else was waving goodbye to one great man or the other walking off into the horizon.

How then have India and England left the others so far behind? The most plausible answer seems to be captaincy. India and England seem the only sides with stable, seemingly permanent, captains at the helm. There has been no threat whatsoever to the authority and influence of MS Dhoni and Alastair Cook over their side. In many ways, this Team India seems to have been built by MS Dhoni. Much like Imran Khan and Steve Waugh, Dhoni is the seniormost member of his team, both by age and by experience. Following the two whitewashes in England and Australia, Dhoni went about identifying a young, exuberant team and stuck with them with dogged faith. The likes of Rohit Sharma have repaid him kindly so far. Other teams have lacked such a stable, influential captain. For New Zealand, Brendon McCullum continues to be haunted by the ghost of Captain Ross Taylor. Sri Lanka have at least 3-4 former captains in their playing eleven. West Indies have only recently replaced Darren Sammy with Dwayne Bravo. Australia's Michael Clarke has been watching from the sidelines with a back ache. Pakistan seem to have a new captain every series - they want to give everyone a chance, I suppose. And that leaves only AB de Villiers of South Africa, himself an unaspiring leader, if one were to believe what is often reported.

Dhoni and Cook, in contrast, have served their teams well. They've captained their ships with great inspiration and their fans have shown tremendous faith as well. This should be an exciting final. The champs shall be unveiled.

IPL 6 - India XI

The IPL season is now over and amongst all the murk, the Chennai Super Kings have faltered at the final hurdle. Sachin Tendulkar does the wise thing and retires from T20 cricket, being carried off by his jubilant Mumbai mates at the Eden Gardens. I'd posted a handpicked all-star XI a few days back. The team generated fair amount of enthusiasm and there were calls that I also make an all Indian XI for the IPL 6 season. There is no guessing how hard this one was. With all the stars going around, hogging the limelight, Indians are left with little time in the spotlight. However, there were one or two names that broke barriers and raised eyebrows. So on popular demand, here's my India XI:

1. Shikhar Dhawan:

(Mat: 10, Runs: 311, HS: 73*, SR: 122.92, 50s: 3)

Few Indian openers at the IPL 6 flourished consistently enough to make an impact. It was all about the Gayles and the Husseys and to a certain extent, Dwayne Smith as well. The big Indian guns Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir were miserable failures, although Sehwag did make a cameo 95* the moment Sir Viv Richards arrived at the Delhi dugout. But Shikhar Dhawan was by far the most successful India opener, pipping his Sunrisers partner Parthiv Patel to make my India XI.

2. Rahul Dravid (c)

Shooting at the Wall: Rahul Dravid at a presser

(Mat: 18, Runs: 471, HS: 65, SR: 110.82, 50s: 4)

A disputable decision to have Rahul open the batting alongside Shikhar Dhawan but his captaincy over the season has proven to be too valuable for the Rajasthan Royals to ignore. Going at a decent strike rate and standing solid as a rock (as always) Dravid bags the captaincy tag here, as he did in the all-star XI and is a worthy candidate to play the sheet anchor's role while the others go crazy around him. His calming influence in the top order will be more than handy.

3. Virat Kohli

(Mat: 16, Runs: 634, HS: 99, SR: 138.73, 50s: 6)

Kohli was made 12th man in the all-star XI, missing out to the magic hitting of David Miller, but there was no doubt in my mind that he'd be at No. 3 in the India XI. Kohli is a useful asset in any side in world cricket and his steady batting alongside the storm that was Chris Gayle and the genius that was AB de Villiers carried the Royal Challengers through the tournament.

4. Suresh Raina

(Mat: 18, Runs: 548, HS: 100*, SR: 150.13, 100s: 1, 50s: 4)

Arguably the best Indian T20 batsman, Raina's fireworks combined with Mike Hussey's class took CSK all the way to their fifth finals. With Raina and Hussey falling cheaply in the finals, CSK found themselves in a real hole. Testimony to the importance of Suresh Raina in the Chennai setup.

5. Rohit Sharma

(Mat: 19, Runs: 538, HS: 79*, SR: 131.54, 50s: 4)

The IPL-winning captain finds a place at No. 5. For many years now, Rohit Sharma has earned himself the reputation of being the Golden Boy who never discovered himself. In a competitive playfield, Rohit Sharma has lost out to many lesser talented batsmen in Team India. But along with Dinesh Karthik, the captain lent stability to the Mumbai Indians' middle order, allowing Kieron Pollard to burst out at the other end.

6. MS Dhoni (wk)

Helicopter: MS Dhoni taking flight

(Mat: 18, Runs: 461, HS: 67*, SR: 162.89, 50s: 4, Ct: 15, St: 2)

No doubts on this one. Best wicketkeeper in the world, best limited overs batsman, coolest customer in world cricket. MS Dhoni decides when a match should end and how. Unfortunately, he dropped himself far too low down the order in the finals (a decision he has made on too many occasions now) and found himself having only Ravi Ashwin for company. He's the finisher of this India XI. Hopefully, Rahul Dravid will send him in earlier in crunch situations!

7. Ravindra Jadeja

(Mat: 18, Runs: 201, HS: 38*, SR: 148.88, Wkts: 13, BB: 3/20, Ave: 24.84, Econ: 7.48)

This was a decision between Jadeja's bowling magic versus Stuart Binny's hitting prowess, but Sir Jadeja's golden arm helps him take the all-rounder's position. Jadeja's batting hasn't quite fired in the recent past. However, considering his exploits with the ball and the strength of the batting order here, Sir pips Stuart Binny to take the No. 7 spot.

8. Vinay Kumar

(Mat: 16, Wkts: 23, BB: 3/18, Ave: 21.43, Econ: 8.19)

VK did a grand job for the RCB, bowling his heart out each time he got the ball from Virat Kohli. In a side that was otherwise far too dependent on the batting, Vinay Kumar provided some moments of magic with Ravi Rampaul, saving matches, taking wickets and prolonging games into the super over. He also had the purple cap on his head for a little while.

9. Bhuvneshwar Kumar

(Mat: 16, Wkts: 13, BB: 3/18, Ave: 28.53, Econ: 6.50)

Like I'd mentioned in my all-star XI, when Chris Gayle went bonkers at the Chinnaswamy during his 175*, Bhuvi walked off the field with seemingly unreal figures: 4-0-23-0. In other words, an economy rate of 5.75. To know the obvious significance of that performance, check the scorecard. But for Bhuvi, perhaps RCB would have made 300 that night! That wasn't a one-off occurrence. Bhuvi's now famous swing bowling abilities kept pinch hitters at bay for the Pune Warriors all through the season, helping them finish one above the bottom rung. He'll be a handful with the new ball for sure!

10. Amit Mishra

(Mat: 17, Wkts: 21, BB: 4/19, Ave: 18.76, Econ: 6.35, 4w: 1)

Amit Mishra's name is no surprise here. Having made it to the all-star XI along with Sunil Narine, Mishra will now shoulder spin bowling responsibilities with Ravindra Jadeja. His new found confidence from the Sunrisers' fruitful season certainly would help him on the field!

Super King: Mohit Sharma

11. Mohit Sharma

(Mat: 15, Wkts: 20, BB: 3/10, Ave: 16.30, Econ: 6.43)

The only real surprise perhaps in this India XI lineup. Indian seamers have never really been the most threatening at the IPL, save perhaps the odd moments of magic from Ishant Sharma and Zaheer Khan. But for the CSK, as Andy Bichel had said, Mohit Sharma was the big find. With good broad shoulders and a nice easy run-up to boot, Mohit ended up taking a mind blowing 20 wickets in his debut season from 15 games at a commendable average. Easily the find of the season.

12th Man: Dinesh Karthik

(Mat: 19, Runs: 510, HS: 86, SR: 124.08, 50s: 2, Ct: 12, St: 2)

As was the case with Virat Kohli in the all-star XI, Dinesh Karthik is perhaps unlucky to find himself as the 12th man of this team. However, given Raina's and Rohit Sharma's greater consistency in the tournament and MS Dhoni's natural wicketkeeping abilities, Karthik - as is often his case in Team India - will have to stay satisfied on the bench for the while. Unless, of course, Rahul Dravid decides to draft him into the playing eleven!

IPL 6 - My XI

It's becoming customary now to name IPL XIs at the end of each season. I did this last season so I'm going to try and do it again. Remarkably though, choosing an IPL XI seems harder this season than it seemed last year. There were roller coasters in store and surprises everywhere. 2012 table toppers took the wooden spoon and the defending champions didn't even make the playoffs. There are two more games to go in this year's IPL - the Qualifier II and the Final - but I've decided to go in with my XI now anyway. Readers must take note that to condense 9 teams down to 11 players is hard work. And I've also made an exception to the four-foreigners-only rule in order to do justice to those who put their best foot forward irrespective of nationality. So here goes -

1. Christopher Gayle

Hail the Pirate: Chris Gayle after his 33-ball 100

(Mat: 16, Runs: 708, HS: 175*, SR: 156.29, 100s: 1, 50s: 4)

A no-brainer, for the second time in a row. Only a very adamant hater of Chris Gayle (how can you hate this man?!) can keep this Jamaican bully out of his T20 XI anywhere in the world. For the record though, I'm becoming a greater admirer of Chris Gayle with every passing day! Leave alone his Stick Cricket style 175* that made the Pune Warriors look like a bunch of toddlers trying to have fun in the park; what makes Gayle special to me is the amount of calm he brings to the crease in the adrenaline junkie's world of T20. Being an opening partner to Chris Gayle must be quite some experience, I'm sure!

2. Michael Hussey

(Mat: 16, Runs: 732, HS: 95, SR: 129.78, 50s: 6)

I'd mentioned last season that choosing Chris Gayle's opening partner was a hard one. Mr. Cricket just made that job a whole lot easier for me this time round. Who said old men can't play T20? This recently retired Aussie is 38 years old for all those who thought he's only 25. He's not the bully that Chris Gayle is, nor the grafter that is Rahul Dravid. What makes Mike Hussey special is his ability to adapt and invent to all forms of cricket, anywhere, anytime. After a long drawn battle with Chris Gayle for the orange cap, this Australian legend finally snatched it and for that, I put him in as his opening partner. Meanwhile, some young Australian men are on their flight to England, looking for a man who can win them back the Ashes.

3. Rahul Dravid (c)

(Mat: 17, Runs: 428, HS: 65, SR: 110.30, 50s: 4)

Many were surprised when I included Rahul Dravid as my captain last year. Be prepared to be shell-shocked because I've retained him for the second time in a row. When Twenty20 was invented back in England, the last person they had in mind as a possible exponent of this game was Rahul Dravid. For four years, he struggled in the IPL, facing flak and being written off. But then he bounced back to show the world why he's such a legend. Dravid's captaincy of the Rajasthan Royals has been inspirational to say the least. Inheriting from Shane Warne perhaps the most underwhelming squad in the IPL, Dravid has reinvented his old tentative leadership tendencies to become a more free-wheeling, self-believing captain, taking his side into the playoffs quite comfortably. What Dravid has done particularly well this season is to divide responsibilities equally on all, thereby allowing the big Shane Watson to play more freely. His uninhibited faith in young kids like Sanju Samson, Stuart Binny and James Faulkner has been quite a revelation. He's now officially in charge of my XI!

Devil's Food: de Villiers feeding on some bowling

4. AB de Villiers

(Mat: 14, Runs: 360, HS: 64, SR: 164.38, 50s: 2)

He's been retained for the second time in a row, once again a no-brainer. If there's one man who can do it all on a cricket field, it's AB de Villiers. Want to bat out two days and save a Test match? Call AB de Villiers. Want to tonk Dale Steyn around the park in the dying hours of a T20 match? Call AB de Villiers. Want a safe pair of hands and an athletic live wire at backward point? Call AB de Villiers. Injured your wicketkeeper and want someone to take on the big gloves? Call AB de Villiers. I had a good mind to make AB de Villiers my wicketkeeper for the second season on the trot but then decided that there's another wicketkeeper who deserves that role more. But it's a privilege to have a finisher of the class of ABD in your side and now I can call 17 for all kinds of emergency!

5. MS Dhoni (wk)

(Mat: 17, Runs: 398, HS: 67*, SR: 167.22, 50s: 3, Ct: 13, St: 2)

Here comes the world's finest wicketkeeping genius! Two World Cup wins, five IPL finals, two trophies (the third one will be played out for on Sunday), a Champions League cup - this man has got to be the most prolific captain that India has ever had. In fact, some may say it's criminal for me not to make him my captain! But for Rahul Dravid's brilliance with a little known team, MSD would have made it to the tag. The jury's out on which one of the two is the better captain of IPL-6. All said and done, MSD and ABD are a formidable pair of finishers to have in any side in the world, in any form of the game.

6. David Miller

(Mat: 12, Runs: 418, HS: 101*, SR: 164.56, 100s: 1, 50s: 3)

Surprise, surprise! I had quite some dilemma in my mind taking a call on this one. It was Dinesh Karthik vs David Miller, although not for the same role. If DK were in my side, he'd probably bat higher up the order, pushing ABD and MSD to 5 and 6. Karthik got off to an absolute flyer this season, piling on runs and agony on the opposition. His feats were particularly remarkable given that he managed to rescue the Mumbai Indians each time the legends at the top had let them down. But then Ponting benched himself and almost eerily, the fuse blew out for Dinesh Karthik. Miller, on the other hand, gave the Punjab team some great moments in the season and even poked fun at cricketing logic by snatching away a lost game from the RCB and becoming one of the reasons Chris Gayle couldn't go into the playoffs. For those odd moments of magic, Miller takes the pinch hitter's position.

7. Dwayne Bravo

(Mat: 17, Runs: 106, HS: 23*, SR: 117.77, Wkts: 28, BB: 3/9, Ave: 16.25, Econ: 7.77)  

Coming to No. 7, I needed an all-rounder who was equally adept at batting and bowling. Dwayne Bravo wasn't the most natural choice with Thisara Perera competing with him. However, after much thought, I decided that Bravo had the better season, particularly with the ball. Picking up 28 wickets at a remarkable average, Bravo, along with Chris Morris and Mohit Sharma, was one of the reasons Chennai were able to inflict the opposition with some fair amount of shock on the field. His economy rate has been pretty decent as well, considering that he has bowled a fair bit at the death. Add to that Bravo's electric fielding and innovative dancing skills and you have a more than handy all-rounder in your side.

8. James Faulkner

(Mat: 15, Wkts: 27, BB: 5/16, Ave: 14.48, Econ: 6.60, 5w: 2)

When Chris Gayle was tearing apart the Pune Warriors bowling in that miracle of an innings in Bangalore, there was one man who walked off the field with his head held high and his reputation intact - Bhuvneshwar Kumar. Bhuvi was fantastic all through the season for the faltering Warriors but he just ever so narrowly missed out to one of the many gold mines that Rahul Dravid unearthed at the Rajasthan Royals. I remember first watching James Faulkner play as a young rookie for Tasmania in the Aussie domestic circuit. He was zippy off the surface although the ball was almost always off the radar - much like Ashok Dinda now for Pune and India. But something happened to the same old James Faulkner when he joined the Rajasthan Royals. The ball was back in the working zone of the radar and wickets were falling everywhere. Taking five-wicket hauls in a T20 match is hard work with only 4 overs allotted per bowler. But James Faulkner made use of those 24 balls for Rahul Dravid like no one else ever had. Besides, Dravid also said that Faulkner can bat!

Game Turner: Amit Mishra

9. Amit Mishra

(Mat: 17, Wkts: 21, BB: 4/19, Ave: 18.76, Econ: 6.35, 4w: 1)

One of the unfortunate stories of Indian cricket has been that of Amit Mishra. For most part of his childhood days, it seemed like Amit Mishra would grow to be the replacement that India needed for Anil Kumble. And so it was that when Kumble retired, Mishra was promptly brought into the Indian team in his place. Strangely however, young Amit Mishra disappointed and, with the rise of Ravichandran Ashwin, was dumped from the Indian team altogether. That hasn't stopped Mishra from using his tools at the IPL. With the first man to take all of three hattricks in the league, Mishra has made big news and was one of the engines of the Sunrisers Hyderabad bowling this season. Now that he's back in the Indian team, he's also debuting on my XI.

10. Sunil Narine

(Mat: 16, Wkts: 22, BB: 4/13, Ave: 15.90, Econ: 5.46, 4w: 2)

The mohawk was the only thing that was saving face for the Kolkata Knight Riders this season with the defending champions quickly falling into oblivion. Perhaps the only reason he doesn't have the purple cap on his head is because most batsmen were too wary of giving away their wicket to the wily Trinidadian. For the record, Sunil Narine has never given away more than 5.50 runs per over in an IPL season yet, and this is Twenty20 cricket that we're talking about - a place where spinners were thought to be sitting ducks. With Amit Mishra at one end and Sunil Narine at the other, I wish batsmen the very best at posting anything more than a humiliating total. Mohawk's second season in my XI on the trot.

11. Dale Steyn

(Mat: 17, Wkts: 19, BB: 3/11, Ave: 20.21, Econ: 5.66) 

I started with the Gayle storm and will now end with the Dale storm. Sunrisers Hyderabad are extremely happy with their run this season and they can't be more grateful to anyone than they are to Dale Steyn. Running in like a bullet and delivering cannon balls at opposing batsmen, Steyn Gun has held his side in good stead wherever they've gone and whomever they've played. In fact, having Dale Steyn in their side pampered the Sunrisers' batsmen so much that they didn't need to score more than 140 on most occasions!

12th Man: Virat Kohli

(Mat: 16, Runs: 634, HS: 99, SR: 138.73, 50s: 6)

I didn't have a twelfth man in my XI last season but I thought it imperative this time around because Virat Kohli would be a terribly notable miss to the team. It was difficult to make room for him in the starting eleven, it being a bit too batting heavy to start with anyway. Putting in Virat Kohli as the 12th man doesn't mean he's the Glenn Maxwell of the team. Kohli's role here would be more than to carry drinks to the players on the field. Undoubtedly, he's one of Indian cricket's young sensations and has had a fruitful season, perhaps overshadowed by Chris Gayle's pyrotechnics at the opposite end. So maybe I should have drafted him in place of David Miller up there? Well, I'll leave that call to Rahul Dravid. After all, why should I have such a legendary captain if I make all the decisions myself?

When Players Fix

Only a day or two ago, I thought my next blog post would be on how inspiring Rahul Dravid's Rajasthan Royals have been. But even as I sat down to type this one out, some of his mates set the serpents out in the open. So here I am having to vent my thoughts on some of the most unpleasant moments in world sport when I could have so easily gone on about Dravid's fantastic acclimatization to T20 cricket and the Royals' fine teamwork in the IPL-6.

Anyone who says that he didn't expect there to be the odd accusations of spot fixing in the IPL was only deluding himself. It's always been there in the air: talk of how corrupt a corporate tournament where young kids just out of school rake in the moolah can get. It wasn't cricket, they said. It was just another form of Bollywood-style entertainment. But it was entertainment nonetheless. You still got to see Chris Gayle blowing bowlers away. You still got to see Sunil Narine foxing batsmen in the middle. You still got to see the odd brilliance from Kieron Pollard and David Miller. You also found new talent in the form of Ravi Ashwin and 'Sir' Jadeja. Even those who are born sceptical and believe from the bottom of their hearts that the IPL is ever so vulnerable to fixing turn on their television sets each evening to unwind and watch some slam-bang. Yes, for all you know, what you're watching may be scripted. But then when you think about it, so are the movies! Yes, it's not sport. But well, it still is entertainment!

What is surprising and hurtful though is that a young man oozing with talent - someone who foxed the likes of Alastair Cook and Jacques Kallis in the hostile environs of England and South Africa and someone who was seen to be aspiring a comeback to the national squad - would betray the finest gentleman in world cricket. One really would feel for Rahul Dravid tonight. He doesn't deserve to be in this at all.

Why is the IPL so vulnerable to fixing?

Caught in a fix: Sreesanth on his way out

Personally, as temperamental as Shantakumaran Sreesanth may be, I'd never in the wildest of my dreams imagined that he'd throw away his career in such a trifling. But perhaps he was frustrated. Perhaps he was miffed at having been overlooked in favor of comrade Irfan Pathan for the Champions Trophy in England. And perhaps he wasn't as optimistic as the rest of us and thought his India career was now truly over.

Those harboring that last thought are precisely those who are most vulnerable to be booked by the bookie. There are so many of them out there in the IPL. First things first, there is little sentimental value to loyalty in the IPL. In the IPL, a sportsman becomes a corporate employee - not something you'd want in the ideal and certainly not something a sportsman should get used to. You can't expect a young man from Jharkhand or Uttar Pradesh to identify himself with the red and gold of a Vijay Mallya owned team based in Bangalore as he would perhaps with the colours of Team India. So lest this young man is Vijay Mallya's good friend or falls in love with his adopted city in a matter of days, where is the loyalty?

The good thing with young men though is that they are highly ambitious and always roam in search of moments of childhood fantasy. The force of motivation then comes from the fact that turning in a series of good performances for the Chennai Super Kings or Rajasthan Royals may see you gain the coveted India jersey. And thus were born the likes of Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja - symbols of the IPL's true success in unearthing latent talent. But what if age has caught up with you? In modern cricket's intense competitiveness, a zillion Indian players are lost in the domestic circuit. These men, on the wrong side of 25 or 30 are the most vulnerable to fixing. Seeing that there is little to lose and in the quest for some quick extra bucks, many second or third tier Indians outside the international spotlight are easily netted by crafty bookies for their cause.

The troubling part for the ever-passionate Indian cricket fan is that it's really difficult to grasp the idea that the IPL always was and always will be a corporate tournament. The IPL was never meant to grow into the competitive play field that club football is. Never mind the Gayle storms and Dale storms, you still want to see every man on the field give everything he's got every ball he bats, bowls or fields. That's the true essence of sport. It's "unscripted entertainment". Is this sport then?

Why I watch the IPL

Unlike its counterpart in the football world and elsewhere, club cricket took an extremely long time to find public favor as compared to international cricket. In fact, cricket is one of those few 'high-profile' sports today that has had far larger and more enthusiastic following when played at the international level rather than at the club level. Are cricket fans more nationalistic then? Perhaps.

Cricket is a game that's largely limited to the Commonwealth of nations - former British colonies who try to show their former masters that they're better at it than they are. Not many people alive today would take keen interest in reading about the first ever international game of cricket played. No, it wasn't the famous game between Australia and England at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. In fact, the first game of international cricket ever played was in the year of 1844 in the unlikely city of New York (most things worthwhile seem to happen there somehow) between the unheard of national teams of the United States of America and Canada. But that's not how it was marketed; the game was billed to be between "the United States of America and the British Empire's Canadian Province." The Empire won by 23 runs.

The famous game at the MCG was in fact the first ever test match played - in 1877. Australia, of course, won that game. And then came the Don Bradman era of the Invincibles. Part of the reason Sir Don was so popular in all parts of the British Empire - except England, of course - was because he stood for exactly what cricket enthusiasts in the colonies wanted to show - that they can play the game far better than their rulers. The rivalry has diversified thereafter and nations of the Commonwealth now slug it out against each other with great intensity - particularly India and Pakistan - every time they have a point to prove to the other.

T20 cricket has brought about a change in the cricketing world, helping the growth of club cricket courtesy of domestic leagues like the IPL and the Big Bash. The old-timers have complained about the loss of nationalistic feelings on the cricket field, the divisive nature of regionalistic sentiments (especially in India), and even at times about the danger of 'match fixing' brought about by the infinite amount of cash out on play. They talk of how the good old 'gentleman's game' is becoming more materialistic and less traditional, almost mocking its great legacy built over the better part of two centuries. They also talk of how young talent is corrupted by being exposed to the waves and fortunes of high-speed T20.

Childhood Fantasy: Mumbai's Ponting-Tendulkar pair

As a fan who is often wont to side with the old-school, I to a large extent agree with these old-timers. But it doesn't stop me from watching the IPL. If anything at all, it only turns me from being a fan to being a spectator. I'm the old cricket-loving Indian nationalist who puts the pride of my motherland over the fortunes of a Kolkata team that has a South African in it or a Bangalore squad that has a West Indian dominating it. But it still doesn't stop me from watching the IPL. Because there are a number of things that the IPL and T20 in general give me that classic old international cricket doesn't: the throb of fast-paced entertainment. Nowhere else will I be able to see Ricky Ponting and Sachin Tendulkar walking out with bats in hand together. Nowhere else will I get to see Dale Steyn furiously peppering Jacques Kallis with hard-core bouncers. Nowhere else will I also get to witness Lasith Malinga and Chris Gayle expressing their talent without the pressures of international rivalry and an over-nationalistic media behind them. There is a certain thrill in watching the game merely for taking in the splendid joys of a bunch of legends showcasing their class. Compare if you'd like Rahul Dravid's free-wheeling captaincy of the Rajasthan Royals as opposed to his constricted, tentative leadership of Team India.

So I may not love Gautam Gambhir's Kolkata Knight Riders as much as I love MS Dhoni's Team India. I certainly won't express frustration over KKR's failures as I do with Team India's downfalls. And that's how it's supposed to be. The latter has far more history behind it than the former. The latter also directly represents my nation, my people and myself. But it doesn't really mean that I shouldn't watch the former, just for the kicks of uninhibited
entertainment.

MS Dhoni finally finds his team

Customs are that you can never predict where Indian cricket would be headed. Just days after rolling in the mud, one comprehensive defeat after the other, MS Dhoni's blue boys pull off a historic never-before Test series whitewash against the cricketing superpowers Australia. It doesn't take much to realize how unusual this is - the last and only time Australia lost a Test series 4-0 was in South Africa, way back in 1969-70 under Bill Lawry; and India has never in history won all Tests in a tour. Bill Lawry later gave way to the effervescent Ian Chappell as captain of the Australian team. But although Michael Clarke's place in the side isn't under scrutiny in this case (in fact, he's probably the only one whose place is for certain after this tour), his Indian counterpart has ticked off most of the tasks put in front of him after a horrible end to 2012.

Blue Boys of New: Dhoni seems to have found his team

At the start of this tour, Dhoni had headaches everywhere - his openers were withering, his middle order was brittle and his famed spin cupboard was looking bare. Gambhir and Sehwag were living on past glory and there seemed to be no replacements to them. In a brave move, the selectors decided to omit Gautam Gambhir and brought in Murali Vijay in his place. The Tamil Nadu mainstay stumbled in the first game and it seemed like India's top-order woes would never end. Cheteshwar Pujara, meanwhile, was settling in to the all important No. 3 slot and was doing reasonably well. But come Hyderabad and Murali Vijay reinvented himself, piling on 370 runs in a massive partnership alongside Pujara, even as Sehwag continued to choke. Vijay's new-found confidence gave the selectors the leverage they needed to now bench Virender Sehwag himself. In his place came another Delhi boy, Shikhar Dhawan. Coming in at the age of 27, Dhawan was not what you would call a "young man" in general. He was one of those people waiting outside the side, kept away by heavy names. In Mohali, Dhawan created history with a fiery 187, flaying the hapless Australian side in what was the fastest Test century by a debutant in history. The top three were now settled and Tendulkar's fading sheen was less noticeable with Vijay and Pujara virtually finishing off each match together. Yet, every time Vijay and Pujara got out, the middle order seemed to subside, with the exception of MS Dhoni's 224 in Chennai - a mercenary's brute innings that wounded the collective Aussie psyche irreparably.

Bowling was the woe against England. Trusting India's age-old talent in producing trendsetting spinners, Dhoni laid out dustbowls against the English everywhere, from Mumbai to Kolkata. In a classic case of irony, Graeme Swann and Monty Panesar outbowled Ravichandran Ashwin and gang. There seemed to be a need to sort out Ashwin's many technical downfalls. When the Aussies came, he had transformed himself - bowling with far more flight and guile than ever before. Ravindra Jadeja for his part proved a revelation with subtle variations between the one that spun and the one that didn't. In fact, he was so very effective that by the end of the tour, Harbhajan Singh was made rather obsolete! The swing of Bhuvneshwar Kumar came in handy every now and then too. Yet, pace bowling remains Dhoni's biggest headache ahead of more overseas cricket.

Despite the gaps in the middle order and question marks over pace bowling, MS Dhoni seems to have done what he needed to do following repeated failures - to identify a pool of players and persist with them. Dhoni decided to persist with Ashwin, Jadeja and Vijay and reaped rewards against a crumbling opposition. In many ways, MS Dhoni seems to remind me of Imran Khan, the headmaster-like World Cup winning captain of Pakistan. Like Dhoni, Imran Khan too thrived as captain when at the helm of a team of youngsters where all were below him and none above. He proved instrumental in building the legendary careers of Wasim Akram, Waqar Younis, Shahid Afridi and Inzamam-ul-Haq. Now that Dhoni has identified his team, maybe he can build a few legendary careers himself too!

Spin tricks make Test cricket classic

How odd cricket is! After casting aspersions on their spinners only a month or two ago following England's triumphant walloping of their former colony, the Indians trumped an arguably more intimidating Australian outfit on yet another dustbowl in Chennai. It seems that spinning a web around the 'Roos is considerably easier than doing it to the Poms. And Australia shall now really have to pull off something extraordinary in the coming days to avoid further embarrassment ahead of the Ashes.

Turning the Tide: The Aussies were 'spun out'

The great thing to have come out of recent test cricket in India is further proof that cricket still is unique in being so vastly diverse a game. How one team dominating in a particular part of the world is so easily thwarted a few thousand miles away is so intriguing and exciting. The purists in Australia and England so often harp about how cricket in India is so "farcical", sidelining the traditional excitement of pace bowling and making cricket so boring and dreary. To many purists in the Westernized world, test cricket in India is essentially a game played in "slow motion" on "slow tracks" where the ball refuses to go to the batsman and the batsman tires in despair against the turning, twisting leather - so much in contrast to the tall, intimidating paceman steaming in on a "green top", threatening to take out the head of any soft-hearted batsman 22 yards away!

What the contrasting performances of the touring English and Australian batsmen has shown is so very different. The England team, desperate for a win and well aware of the dusty pitches the Indians were laying out for them, went on a countrywide hunt ahead of the tour looking for potential weapons and pulled out Monty Singh Panesar back from the graves, along with a certain unassuming Joseph Root from good old Yorkshire. The Australians, on the other hand, stayed true to their traditional strengths and vowed to bring along an extra-charged pace battery to the subcontinent, although including the off-spin of Nathan Lyon for academic purposes.

The Poms struggled in their first outing in Ahmedabad after keeping out Monty Panesar from the playing squad, but on correcting their mistakes in the dustbowls of Mumbai and Kolkata, reaped rewards that few of their ancestors had ever tasted before. It was England's most emphatic show of strength in India since the Battle of Plassey and the joy was more than evident. The star cast of England didn't just include their new-found spin twins Graeme Swann and Monty Panesar; in fact a more predominant performer in the tournament was their eternally classic captain Alastair Cook. Digging deep and grinding long, Captain Cook earned much accolade for his sense of application in alien conditions.

Cook's batting exploits throughout the tour was a fitting answer to the Western purists. He showed how classic test cricket is when a batsman patiently grafts the twisting, twirling ball, countering the spinner's tricks with a few of his own. The Indians had few questions to ask the English captain as he played on their patience and wore down their minds. The Australians in contrast so far have adopted their 'natural game', summoning courage and aggression with the hope of hitting the Indian spinners out of the game. The disdain hasn't worked.

Judging from their first game, the Aussies have much to learn about adapting to modern cricket's diverse playfields. They might also have to take a leaf or two out of Captain Cook's book. Test cricket in India is now the real deal. Playing spin isn't all about "slow motion" hurling or easy slogging. It's about beating the opponent in the mind. And that's what makes it ever so classic.