Off Stump

Now that Mahendra Singh Dhoni has essentially announced his decision to stay on as skipper of the side till at least the 2015 World Cup, every ODI series India plays hereon is a stage for defining the plans and alternatives for that tournament. And none of them will be more critical than the current series against New Zealand given its the closest the team will get to play in conditions resembling that in the actual World Cup. A lot gets written about India's poor record in Test cricket away from home even though its improved hugely since the turn of the millennium. Their one-day record away from home is not outstanding either with a win-loss ratio well below 1 (though only Australia and South Africa are better). What is more concerning is the fact that Australia and New Zealand are two of the three worst venues for the team thereby making the title defence even more challenging. Their recent record and especially the win in the Champions Trophy certainly gives cause for hope

Given his personality (or the supposed lack thereof), it feels slightly odd to imagine Kallis donning a cape and costume but amongst modern day cricketers (ie post 1990) he came closest to being superhuman in terms of his overall achievements in Test cricket alone. Tendulkar and Ponting have more runs (and the former more hundreds), Dravid has as many runs and a few more catches, Ponting and Waugh have more Test match wins, but the fact that Kallis scored as many runs as he did (at an average over 55), took nearly 300 wickets and picked up 200 catches puts him above them all as an all-round cricketer. Add to that over 11000 runs and 270 wickets in ODI cricket, and a pretty successful IPL career (including a pivotal role in one title win) and the superman image starts to build up quickly. My memories of the man however are nowhere close to that image. The first two things that came to mind when Kallis announced his retirement were - 1) All of the cricketers on my favourite XI(I) are