Rohit Sharma – The Man, The Maverick

From once being Maggi’s unofficial ambassador to becoming the badass who has now scored two double centuries in one day cricket, Rohit Sharma has matured as a cricketer. Social media woke up from it’s customary hibernation and the news spread that Rohit Sharma has rocketed past that landmark score of 200 once blessed by Sachin himself. A gentlemen complained that he had gone to take a piss and when he came back Rohit was past the 250 mark – first time it has happened in one day cricket. And for the record, Rohit has scored 264 (173) those who have no idea what we’ll be talking about for the next few minutes.

Rohit Sharma was once hailed as the next big thing in Indian cricket. Cricketing bigwigs identified and acknowledged the promise Rohit showed. But he hardly was able to do justice to those claims at the international stage. He did however display glimpses of his skill, but unfortunately lacked consistency. He found himself out of the team XI and lost his place to other worthy competitors in Suresh Raina and Virat Kohli. The biggest disappointment in his career however was not being a part of World Cup squad which had Nehra and Ishant to boast of, and they eventually turned out to be a world conquering combination.

He became the butt of jokes and found harsh criticism directed right at him. There was once a time when children bought Maggi by saying ‘bhaiyya do Rohit Sharma dena’. But just like Sir Ravindra Jadeja rose from the ashes to prove his worth, Rohit too saw a change in fortune and led his Mumbai Indians side to the IPL crown as well as the Champions League title. He also managed to get into the test squad and has a couple of centuries under his belt.

But it was his amazing achievements in ODI cricket that left everyone flabbergasted and amazed. Once Sachin officially declared the 200-run club open for entry, Rohit has pretty much owned that club. When Sachin scored 200, the world thought this is the record that will stand for decades. When Sehwag shattered the Master’s holy record, the world though “Well this is it. This one will stand for decades for sure.” But then Rohit made a joke out of the record and banged the hapless Sri Lankan side left right and center and scored 264 runs and the mayhem lasted till the final ball of the innings.

Incidentally this was the second time Rohit, or any batsmen for that matter has breached the 200-run mark TWO FUCKING TIMES. So yes he definitely is an experienced player when it comes to this particularly exclusive club. The first time it was the widely respected Australian bowling attack that bore the brunt of this maverick. The second time today, he went one step ahead and practically ripped through every ounce of self-respect a Sri Lankan bowler plays with.

Rohit’s success can be largely attributed to his meeting with PM Modi a few weeks ago. And out of respect Sofia Hayat has already shed her clothes saluting his brave innings. Poonam Pandey probably was fast asleep and missed out but keeping fingers crossed :p. Incidentally India has also scored 400+ runs in a match the most number of times but that hardly matters. And spare a though for another Sharma who lies on other end of the ‘talent’ spectrum – Ishant. Wake up man, subah ho gayi. Sri Lanka was not humiliated like today since Lord Rama.

Take a bow Master. Today was the ‘Holy Shit’ and ‘What the fuck’ day in cricket. Won’t ever be forgotten for the writer shares his surname with the man himself.

Also published at Campusghanta.

Cricket, Football and Hockey Walked Into a Bar...

Cricket, football and hockey walked into a bar. The gathering cheered heavily for football and free drinks were offered. Cricket sulked and occupied a rather lonesome corner, unusual for it to get treated with such anonymity. Hockey paid for the drink and stared contently at the TV set, which ran Chak De India, coincidently.

A completely new and never seen before football fewer has gripped our country. Well, the whole planet for that matter but it’s particularly unusual for India. For the current generation, it is strange for them to see cricket not being on the front page in commandingly highlighted news reports when there are some pretty decent series going on. To be honest, Indian media does not care about other country’s cricket tours. What’s rather surprising is that they ignored the Bangladesh tour of the INDIAN team. Cricket is being meted out the treatment reserved for other untouchable sports like… well… say Hockey and this may have hurt their ego, the BCCI I mean.

Hockey was once the one sport we Indians knew how to dominate. It was our only chance at glory. We supported it like crazy. The national side repaid the country’s faith in them by decimating the opposition, winning medals by the bulk. “He scores goals like we score runs.” Sir Don said in the honor of Major Dhyanchand. Of all the teams that have dominated a sport – Brazil in soccer, Australia in cricket, India’s complete domination of the pre-1980 era hockey may be a more intimidating story to tell. Tragically, the lack of media fan-frenzy during those days meant those wizards and their wizardry could never be a part of the legend.

Then a group of players collectively termed as underdogs defeated the two-time champions and favorites to lift the Cricket World Cup in 1983. The foundation was laid for a new religion to be born. Hockey, on a slide downwards in terms of performance, was pushed aside completely. The cricket bats and tiny little cricket balls became the default first toys of the newborns. Overtime, the newspaper got a new and exciting sport to fill their sports section with. With the turn of the millennium, cricket in this country had reached an unprecedented following with Sachin being unanimously chosen as the deity to be worshipped.

The overdose of cricket after the advent of IPL did hamper the mass delirium this sport generated. India hosted the Commonwealth Games in 2010, and amidst all the scams, it did help some lesser known sports being recognized. A new interest out of curiosity was developed. But the 2011 Cricket World Cup win brutally butchered the slightest opportunity other sports had of being recognized, and mind you, for some of them it was their best chance.

Football, amongst everything, never had the fortune of being a recognizable sport in the country. First there was hockey, then cricket to overshadow any heroics that the football team achieved, if there were any. We’ll never know because the media never cared a bit, or maybe we didn’t. As a result, our FIFA ranking lingers around the 150 mark, 154 precisely as of this moment. The needs of the handful of football fans are satisfied by the English Premier Leagues, the La Liga, Serie A and so on.

Having said that, the attention to the FIFA World Cup by the media, fans and even some non-football fans is a welcome change. Sunil Chhetri is guaranteed a place in our memories, if not as the captain of the national football side, then at least as the pseudo-expert on the Himmatwala-esque pre-match, mid-match and after-match blood sucking so-called talk show that provides insights and analysis of the matches. Yeah, right. KRK would have been a more interesting and insightful analyst.

News channels are riding on the fact that the matches are telecast in the night and more often than naught, sleep gets the better of the excitement of quality matches and against our wishes, we have to turn to one of these news channels first thing in the morning to know what happened.

To sum up, it feels good to finally see the cricket fans, like me, getting pumped up by the soccer mania and ignoring the recently concluded series in Bangladesh which, incidentally, we won only because Bangladesh played like Bangladesh. I hope Indian national side qualifies for the World Cup finals before humanity is erased off the planet, even if we get to play like England.

Cricket and it's Avatars

In a country obsessed with cricket, you cannot deny them the thrill of the game. Cricket is said to be one of the most expensive game on the planet, but only at the professional level. The million fans have eventually designed and perfected numerous ways to enjoy the game, some without even having to walk out into the ground. ‘jugaad’ is the technique used. Humaare yahan to PM bhi jugaad se select karti hai congress. Anyway, here are some of the forms of cricket that I know of, feel free to add more…

Gully cricket,

It’s tough to arrange the cricket equipment, the wickets, the ground and other gear. But we were never bogged down by such petty constraints. And here enters gully cricket. The only necessity is a ball; other requirements like bat, ground and wickets are arrange-able depending on the available resources.

Bat – if available, fair enough, else we can use any pseudo-bat with length ranging from 0.5 to 1.0 m. Parts of broken furniture of furniture broken for the specific purpose. I have played cricket with branches of coconut trees.

Ground – so what is we don’t have a stadium to suit our needs, the world’s a playground. Any space will do – parking lots (a vehicle or two doesn’t matter), football grounds, the hallway or even the confines of a room.

Wickets – bricks, tree branches, shoes, chair, dustbin and if unavailable draw the wickets on a wall.

The rules of gully cricket are modifiable to fit the ground constraints (1 tip out, direct bahar jaana out, 3 miss hona out etc.)

Video games,

These are an alternative and widely popular. Those who have crawled upto this piece of writing must be familiar with the concept of virtual cricket, so no point trying to show-off. They are closest to the real thing in the complete sense and packs in the comfort of your home. EA Cricket and Brian Lara cricket rule the market.

Finger cricket,

It’s played on the lines of scissors-paper-stone, an ingenious invention bumping off the need of any equipment whatsoever. All you need are a pair of hands belonging to different persons with fingers intact. The batsman and the bowler flip their fingers simultaneously and it’s a dismissal only if both correspond to the same score. Other than that it’s a run-feast. 1 finger means 1 run, 2 fingers means 2 runs and so on and the thumb means a sixer!!

 Leg cricket,

In the absence of a bat, the Neanderthal fans started using their limbs as one. The style of bowling consists of underarm-along-the-ground deliveries and they are fend-off by hitting it with the leg. There are a lot of close-in fielders present unless it’s Hulk himself you are bowling to. It’s surprising to see the batsmen evolve with their square-cuts and on-drives with their legs!! Anyway, other rules, whichever applicable, are the same as the professional cricket.

Book cricket,

From the looks of it, this was the brainchild of some nerdy cricket fans. It consists of opening the book at random and the last digit of the page number on the even side gets translated to runs on the scoreboard. Even side is chosen because a ‘0’ sends you back to the pavilion, according to the popular convention. An ‘8’ means a dot ball. Rules are changeable to suit requirements. It’s an open-source format of cricket, so to say.

Parchi cricket,

This one is a great time-pass too, albeit a bit tedious. You are required to prepare small chits with various terms and runs written on each individual one (1 run, 4 runs, LBW, runout, catchout, wide, noball etc.). The player on-strike calls out instruction like ‘4^th card from the top (or bottom)’ and the instruction on the card is equivalent to your performance on the pitch. It’s an advantageous format compared to others as penalty, handling the ball etc. become possible here.

Well, take your pick and get busy. Or better, design your own format and apply for the patent. Hindustan mein cricket kisi maidaan ya balle ka mohtaaj nahi hai. We are a cricket crazy nation not without a reason. All you football maniacs, I dare you to come up with something like that. Good luck.

Kenya sues team India for copyright infringement; says India copied their style of play.

Johannesburg.  After the recent loss to South Africa in the first one day of the series, it comes as an additional blow to the wounds of defeat that Kenya’s cricket board is suing the Indian team for copying their style of play.

Copycats

The laziness on the field, the clueless batting and the directionless bowling has been a trademark feature of Kenya’s international cricket matches.

In the first one-day against the pink Proteas, India’s strategy and play had a striking resemblance to that of Kenya’s. In a report released by the Kenya’s cricket board, they have mentioned the unique style of the Kenyans and the similarities with India’s innings in detail, a copy of which was sent to the Faking News headquarters.

Analyzing the Indian performance, the report said that Rohit Sharma was afraid to touch the ball with his bat as he feared contracting the HIV virus, a clear indication that he bunked the sex education classes in school.

Yuvraj Singh seemed upset being woken up from his mid-match nap and went back to the pavilion soon after he was forced on the field by the team management. MS Dhoni’s yet another innings was an exact copy of what Steve Tikolo played multiple times for Kenya and the Kenyan board has decided to file a separate case against Dhoni.

Before that, India were Kock-ed by a great innings, which according to the detailed summary released by the board, “was a mockery of our matches when we used to be brutalized for no apparent reasons.”

An excerpt from the report, “India’s bowling in the first one-day international, dated 5^thDecember, 2013, was in clear violation of the copyright laws as defined by the joint patent by Kenya, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe and we are left with no other option but fight back for what is truly our heritage.”

No official from the BCCI could be reached for comment, however this journalist heard frantic laughter from the BCCI office as soon as the news was released.

MS Dhoni, in a press release, has apologized to the Kenyan public for hurting their sentiments and added that since it was only the first game of the series, it will take them some time to come up with a unique losing style of their own.

Also published on Faking News.

Sachin की diary के पन्नों से...

तेरी short of the length balls  की मस्तियाँ,

तेरी slower balls  की बेपरवाह गुस्ताखियाँ,

तेरी off stump पे लहराती delivaries,

नही भूलूंगा मैं..

जब तक है जान, जब तक है जान.

तेरा हाथों में grip छुपाना,

तेरा spin करके ball का रुख़ मोड़ना,

तेरा फिर पलट के मुझे घूरना,

नही माफ़ करूँगा मैं,

जब तक है जान, जब तक है जान.

सारे fielders को ball के पीछे नचाने से,

बात बात पर तेरे sledging करने से,

छोटे छोटे तेरे cute appeals से,

मोहब्बत करूँगा मैं,

जब तक है जान, जब तक है जान.

Leg पर आने वाली balls को on-drive से,

हर ball को cover drive, straight drive, upper cut से,

Hook, paddle sweep, pull, on flick से,

मारता रहूँगा मैं,

जब तक है जान, जब तक है जान.

The DRS Memes !!

In the wake of the recent DRS disasters in the ongoing Ashes Series, here are a few memes related to the issue !!

Its a basic human instinct. Everyone hates when one's authority is challenged. More so, if you've held a primary respectable position in the game for so many years. Cricket umpires surely are having a tough time coping with this new challenge called DRS !!