Cricket World Cup 2011 - India is the World Champion!

[PKBasu]

Interesting article, pointing out that the core of the Indian team for the 2011 World Cup will be largely unchanged from 2003 (with six players -- Sehwag, Tendulkar, Zaheer, Harbhajan, Nehra, Yuvraj -- still likely to be there in the side for 2011):

http://www.cricinfo.com/magazine/conten ... 64265.html

[Altiusdirectory]

Provides online information on ICC Cricket World Cup 2011 Schedule, past winners, performance of players and teams, ICC Cricket World Cup Photo Gallery, cricket grounds in India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, past records, online tickets, points table, ICC Cricket World Cup teams.

Link removed, as it is not an official site or anything. If you need the link, search with the name of the poster.. Mode, Jay

[jayakris]

By the way, I had to search for the official site for the world cup, and was again disgusted that the one world sport than Indians run, does not even have a proper web site, STILL (I think I have complained some while ago, about this).

ICC itself has an yahoo site. Puke. http://icc-cricket.yahoo.net/

ICC's world cup site - http://cricket.yahoo.com/series/icc-cri ... -cup_1241/

Thet is the URL for the world cup, folks! ... Try to remember that. One has to see "Yahoo! My Yahoo! Mail | Sign In |New User? Sign Up" and all that at the top? "Yahoo Cricket Beta?" .. "Yahoo cricket on Facebook?" ... What is "Yahoo cricket" .. The game run by Yahoos from India?

How pathetic. If Indians' money is going in to world cricket, stop behaving like some 4th world people who cannot get anything done. That CWG website was an abslute embarrassment, and now the world cup website seems to be just the same. And we are the hosts. Why we have to host it with the big country and the other one, I have no idea.

Ah, I should go away, the whole deal with cricket just makes me embarrassed all the time, with the classlessness that is all-pervading the sport.

Jay

[prasen9]

I am not disputing anything that you said. But, a website for the Cricket World Cup is pretty redundant. Everyone who follows the game on the internet knows that basically Cricinfo is the site to go. I suppose if they had a website that gave some official information about tie-breaker rules, etc. that would be useful. Otherwise, for the results Cricinfo it is. Even if they have a website, I would not go to that for much information. So I am not that disappointed that they do not have a website.

[Atithee]

Prasen, I don't know if you have noticed, but my unquestionable loyalty to cricinfo has taken a big step back ever since it became ESPN cricinfo. In fact Yahoo cricket is slowly winning me over. Try it if you haven't yet. The cricinfo site has become way too commercialized with some very biased articles. The biggest different I've seen in the past few months is "live" commentary being so far behind. Additionally, incomplete score cards, mismatch between scorecard and live commentary, broken links, poor editorial job, etc. have become far too common now. There is also too much of Indian angle which is not surprising considering the number of followers. But, I think they need to balance it some more. Blatant commercialization (ads) -- almost 100% from Indian sites such as Shaadi.com, rupee transfer etc. just turn me off.

Cricinfo was running fine before ESPN but it slowly starting to stink.

I think Yahoo is trying to get into the cricket domain in the same way as IBM has been doing with tennis. So them hosting the ICC world-cup site is not a surprise; but not sanitizing it so as to not appear a Yahoo extension is. Perhaps the project manager is from India (ouch!).

[prasen9]

Ok. I will try Yahoo Cricket. I don't even look at the ads, so I don't know what they are showing.

[akmohanty]

[Moved in the discussion on pospects of some players for India's 2011 WC team, that started from a coment by prasen in the NZL in Ind (2010) thread, after Yusuf Pathan's century in the 4th ODI - Mod, Jay]

One of the best all-round performances by Yusuf Pathan. Impressive hitting. Pathan may have sealed the all-rounder's spot for the WC.

not if prasen is the selector i assume he still maintains that jadeja would have done a far better job in his place

[prasen9]

Of course, one sunny day does not a summer make. The problem with Yusuf has been his consistency. Just see his record. Jadeja is more talented than Yusuf and I expect in the long run will turn out to be the more successful player. I do not think Jadeja could have played a better match-winning innings than Yusuf if given a chance today. His hitting is not at par with that of Yusuf. Why Jadeja who was a very good striker of the ball has become more sedate is a mystery. But, at the end of the day, there is no denying that Yusuf has a consistency problem. This is his high point. If I had to select the team as of today, I would have Yusuf ahead of Jadeja in the team. I have no problem going with the performing person. But, Jadeja has been ill-treated and has not been given the chances that Yusuf got despite having performed better with the bat in the matches he got. That, my friend, is fact. You are entitled to your likes and dislikes but not to create your own facts. Just like the fact that he was as sublime today as he was awful in the first match. But, at least I have the honesty to call a spade a spade and not a sycophant who calls an innings where one has mis-played about half the balls and been dropped several times as a good innings. I suppose the Cricinfo commentators who have noted the balls that he mishit were lying and one has to bow down to the great Yusuf when he plays a bad innings and ignore the evidence of one's eyes because the sycophants will not allow him to be maligned. I do not know if Jadeja will be a regular, but, I can guarantee you that Yusuf will not become a regular either especially on pitches overseas. For the WC on home soil, maybe his game will hold up. So, I am okay with him being in the team.

[PKBasu]

Sycophant?? OK, I'm happy to be counted among those . Yusuf is a special player for the shorter versions of the game -- a superior version of Sandeep Patil or (more precisely) Kirti Azad. With that century and 3/49, he put in an allround match-winning performance that neither Patil nor Azad ever managed for India. We are blessed to have a guy like him.

Vijay was quietly dropped, and Parthiv filled the bill to perfection -- and hopefully put an end to debates about the pecking order among our 'keeper-batsmen, with him firmly ahead of Karthik again. I have my doubts about Saurabh Tiwary, who does seem to take ages to get going and is an inconsistent fielder. But he hasn't yet been dismissed in his two ODI innings...and both have eventually resulted in victories. So results speak for themselves, and he will stay in the squad for awhile.

[prasen9]

I guess Yusuf is a special player in that all international players are special. He has huge power. That is the only thing I see special in him. I like to watch the more subtle players who are more timing and less power. But, I guess the modern game with an emphasis on flatter pitches is made for the power hitters. I see enough power hitters in the baseball that I watch. (Go Giants!)

I like people who value their wickets. But, Tiwary has a problem in rotating strikes. He was going for firmly hit shots in the first part of his innings and has to learn to place the ball and get the singles with a high rate of success. I think he will learn. How bad is his fielding? I have not seen him field in the matches he played due to work commitments. Even Munaf has improved his fielding. Can someone light a fire under him to get him run penalty laps or something like that for misfields? I like his cool head. You cannot teach that.

Actually, although I have criticized Karthik, if you have to choose a backup keeper for the WC today, I would have to go with Karthik. Patel played a very good knock but let through a wide four that Saha would have stopped. It was nice to watch Saha effect a runout where he caught the ball and fell onto the wicket swiftly in one motion. But, I think Saha and Patel have not played enough international matches lately to be the backup keeper. Patel, with his previous experience, may be fine and less of a risk. I think Saha should be given a long run and he has the potential to be the backup keeper. He is a better test keeper than Patel but Patel is the better bat. But, in ODIs, Saha with his exemplary List A record should be better than Patel and Karthik. He needs matches to develop but maybe the anti East Zone bias will possibly not get him his deserved chances. Maybe if he does well in the IPL, he will force himself in. Doing well in domestics has not gotten him much as it has not got Dhawan.

We do have to take the performance of the Indians against New Zealand with a pinch of salt. This is the team that lost to Bangladesh by a landslide.

[akmohanty]

mate, you seem to have taken it too seriously. chill !!!
none of us, i am confident, are sycophants as i don't think we know any of these guys personally. the opinions we give are based on what we think the abilites of the respective players are and the issue at hand.
it is important to remember that the position in question is the #7 all-rounder position. this person is more than likely expected to come into bat in the last 10 or so overs. at that point, we want players who can provide a match-winning innings, more often than not by having the ability to use the 'long handle' (especially since dhoni has been preferring to play the anchor at #6 of late). for gauging these situations, i don't think just looking at batting averages is sufficient. one needs to look at the potential for playing such an innings and from that point of view, i would always rate yusuf higher than jadeja.
my doubts regarding yusuf are more on the bowling deptt., where perhaps jadeja has been more consistent and economical. however, today's match proves that even in this regard, he has the potential to do better.

[prasen9]

Ok. I think an argument can be made if we are only looking at the #7 position and choose the player who uses the long handle better. Yusuf is a match winner on his day, much more than Jadeja. But, whether he can play when India is 5 down with a 100 more to go and pull out matches was a question. This is one answer. I hope he gives more such answers and then I will have no qualms in rooting for Yusuf over Jadeja. And, maybe you want very inconsistent match winners anyway rather than the one who scores a sedate 30 more consistently.

Wrt his bowling, Yusuf's bowling has gotten better and Jadeja's worse. Jadeja should just go the domestics and find some form. He is better than this. Yusuf seems to be more of a strike bowler, at least on these pitches, but, his control over line and length is worse than that of Jadeja. Do we want the fifth bowler to bowl a tight spell or do we want him to be more of a threat to take wickets? The answer is not clear. Based on your preferences, you would choose to bowl Jadeja or Yusuf. I guess an argument can be made to choose the more attacking spinner especially if we choose Munaf, who bottles one end down and Harbhajan, who has forgotten how to take wickets but keeps things down for the middle overs. Suddenly, you need a bit more attacking power from the fifth bowler that Yusuf provides.

If we are talking about #7, I will always choose the better batsman. The bowling can be handled by Yuvraj-Sehwag-Raina.

Nothing in this world is pure black and white, unfortunately.

[akmohanty]

it appears that selection for the WC should not have too many issues, now that some of the gaps are getting filled up, e.g., munaf back at his miserly best, yusuf filling the #7 spot. as i see it, the order will be - tendulkar, sehwag, gambhir, kohli, yuvraj/raina, dhoni, yusuf, harbhajan, 2 from munaf/ojha/nehra (depending on pitch), zaheer.
beyond the WC of course, i am more concerned about the issue you raised prasen, and that is, the performance of our new breed overseas. it is not just a yusuf or a jadeja who are at sea, it's the whole gang (raina,rohit,even perhaps kohli,gambhir,...). i am sure there will be re-confirmation of it in a month's time in SA, with quite a few startling collapses the only ones who can play reliably there like tendulkar, dravid, sehwag, are ageing and India has to find effective replacements fast

[prasen9]

I don't necessarily know that Ojha will be preferred to Ashwin. Ashwin is a better bat and a better fielder I presume. And he seemed to be a more attacking bowler than the immaculate-line-and-length Ojha. So again a not-so-black-and-white selection must be made. Also, in the bowling mix, I think a strike bowler (Ishant) and Praveen Kumar may also be there. Let us see a few more matches to see how Ashwin and Praveen do. Praveen can only take wickets when it is swinging it seems. If he proves otherwise, he will move into the first team.

Regarding the performance of the new breed overseas, I think skill comes with experience. Except Tendulkar, it took at least one previous trip for the others to learn to play consistently overseas. So, we have to select the youngsters well and stick to them if we want to develop overseas competence.

[akmohanty]

yes, i forgot about ashwin, he has got a good chance of making it based on current form