Skip to main content

Season ending review

Well, officially the season hasn't quite ended since the last one-dayer between Australia and South Africa still remains to be played but given that its a dead rubber, the season is as good as over.

And what a season its been. Probably as much action off-field as on it, but its been riveting throughout and the quality of Test cricket overall (apart from the WI-Eng series) has been top-notch and a welcome reminder of why I like the 5 day format the most. The two Aus-SA series have in particular been fascinating to watch though a lot of it has been driven by Australia waiting too long to make much needed changes. South Africa though has truly come on in leaps and bounds and though they will be losing Kallis and Ntini sooner rather than later, their decreasing reliance on them over the last year or so has meant that they won't be missed much. Their one-day game has come along strongly too and they should have a genuine shot at the World Cup this time. Australia on the other hand has floundered in the limited overs formats (injuries to Marsh, Watson and Lee haven't helped) but you can bet on them to right things pretty quickly. The two standout players for me have been Mitchell Johnson and AB deVilliers, and if they can keep this trajectory going, they should be the best players in the world in the next two years.

India has continued to perform strongly, and for a change consistently. The end was a bit disappointing with the safety-first approach in Wellington but overall, the team has genuine world-beating ability and belief combined for the first time since 2003-04. Gautam Gambhir's progress has been extraordinary and the return to form of Zaheer and Harbhajan critical. The only missing pieces are the last middle-order berth and the third seamer. They'll also need to identify reliable replacements for Dravid and Tendulkar relatively soon otherwise hopes of world domination will remain just that.

On the evidence of last season, there's a big gulf between these three teams and the rest of the world though. England and Sri Lanka are mediocre at best and seem to lack the edge in bowling (unless Ajantha Mendis can actually succeed Murali) to make them consistently challenging. New Zealand will always fight and have unearthed a gem in Jesse Ryder but without Shane Bond no team will worry about them. Pakistan and West Indies continue to be the most mercurial teams around with a lack of opportunity for the former making things worse. And the less said about Bangladesh, the better.

That said, things can change pretty rapidly and the beginning of the 2009 season, dominated as it is by T20 will likely see some upsets and the emergence of some new players especially in the IPL. The real fun begins after that though  with the Ashes and unlike the last two times, I will be cheering for Australia, not least because England deserve to lose for the way they manage their cricket. More on these later though. The 2008-09 season was a lot of fun and hopefully the 2009-2010 one will be at least as much!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Et tu?

As a single sport website, I think Cricinfo has brought about a revolution and the fact that they were bought by ESPN is testament to how highly valued they've become. Their editing and approach to articles/opinion has been refreshing to say the least and even though they seem to have had a lot of editorial staff movement they've usually maintained very high standards. Off late though, both in their headline styles as well as in actual content, there seems to be an occasional slippage of standards and an inching towards the modern media sensationalism which is a bit of a pity. This piece  by Siddharth Monga is a classic example. Granted that the last two press conferences by Dhoni and Sehwag  indicated clearly that the captain and his deputy did not agree on this aspect of selection but "discord", "dissent", "public sniping" feels rather presumptuous and heavy handed. Yes, it is a team sport but there is no reason why everyone on the team needs ...
1 comment
Read more

First thoughts on the Ashes

The only minor surprise for me in the 2013 Australian Ashes squad announced last week was the selection of James Faulkner ahead of Moises Henriques as the second all-rounder. Minor because given  the Shane Watson shenanigans of recent times, I would have thought that Inverarity and co would have opted for a second batting all-rounder (which is what Henriques clearly is). Instead they've gone with a bowling all-rounder in Faulkner and it'll be interesting to see what happens if Watson's batting woes in Test match cricket continue in the first two Tests. As for the rest of the squad, given the way the inexperienced batting performed in India, Rogers and Haddin were always going to make it in to the team and the choice of Khawaja over Smith appears sound too given that the latter's strength is in playing spin bowling. The batting still looks as unsettled and shaky as the Indian fast bowling line-up and its here that the series will be won or lost for the Aussies. The retu...
Post a Comment
Read more

Much ado about a run-out

Judging by the amount that's been said and written about Ian Bell's run-out-that-wasn't at Trent Bridge, you would think that it has been the most significant occurrence of the series so far when nothing could be further from the truth. Andrew Miller  and Samir Chopra seem to be of the opinion that it was the crucial turning point in the match, which I completely disagree with (the post-tea sessions on days one and two were far more critical and momentum shifting). Andy Flower says that if Tendulkar had been run-out similarly in Bombay, it would have caused an international incident. He's clearly feeling the effects of having been in the England cricket set-up for too long given that a) its very improbable that Tendulkar would do something as daft as Bell did, and b) when a controversial run-out (but within the laws) did happen to him (against Pakistan at Eden Gardens no less), Tendulkar went out to the crowd and appealed to them to calm down and let the game proceed...
Post a Comment
Read more