Watching the SUper 8s without India is just unthinkable. If you see the blog of sangakkara on cricinfo he has said that there is a bit of emptiness on the tournament without India and it is correct. As an ardent cricket fan, it is so painful that the remaining tournament will be without the global powerhouse of cricket. We, are not paper heroes, we have the potential to become world champs. Its only the preparation, lack of attitude that cost us dearly.Ofcourse, also, the itinerary of the tournament. This cup is unlike the last 2003 cup where you had a handful of matches to qualify for the next round.You had only 2 matches to play and Bangladesh is a team that can cause an upset.It defeated a full strength NZ team during the warm up. We were very confident when India won the warm up against WI. Would have been much better if the teams on each group had to play each other twice or if the committee had planned something that would have given the teams a breathing time to collect their thoughts. Never seen an Indian captain crying and do you people think he is acting? Just to rub salt in the wounds, rediff is publishing fotos of players swimming or taking a break or standing in the lobby. What do you want them to do? Just sit in their room and cry is it? Well i would say its just another bad day against BD and we lacked planning. Its not that Dravid lacks the motivation factor and he is not aggressive. I believe he tried his best and it was a collective team failure. Against SL, well our batting was simply pathetic. Going in a big tournament, our players are under immense pressure back home and after a shock defeat, our fans became ruthless and stoned Dhoni's house, burnt effigies. Its so pathetic to see that our own players' home were safeguarded by police. Its really a third rated behaviour and if you comment anything on that, so called cricket fanatics are coming hard on us.And there is this issue of Ad films, well all over the world, all cricketers are acting on ad films. Blame the ad makers who book the players to act for their commercial. When the players are on top, they just blindly book them. Well, wont you act for those ads, when you are approached? Now, Samsung, LG and Videocon have cancelled their contracts for Dhoni and Dravid. So its those corporates who play the game here. They book the players when they are on top and now cancelling their contract. Well those apart, its going to be a tough home coming for our team. As a true cricket fan, i really feel for the team. Well, world cups are going to happen once in 4 years. better change the pitches down here which is very important, make selection process transparent to all, it should be an open house discussion, consult with former captains, have a fielding coach, make the bowlers train in MRF pace academy. If we are not going to change pitches, i am afraid, we will have to rely on only a handful of players. playing on batsmen friendly pitches here, once our team goes overseas, they look like a bunch of school kids except 3-4 players. Never let a politician be a president of the board. and never play politics in selection. Now the blame game will start and each and everyone will point the fingers. yesterday there was a news that chappel was not happy with the team selection and he SMSed a journalist before leaving for WI. why was it not published before the team left for WI? just to create a hype, these so called journalists write some piece of shit. Those apart, the only way to fine tune Indian team is to inject some young blood for the ODI side, change the pitches back home, have two teams; one for tests and one for ODI; have a fielding coach,make our players work out physically and more importantly dont play politics, give due respect and identify young talents. SO long. Cheers India
