I am disgusted over India’s performance in Champions Trophy and this multiplied after their pathetic performance against Australia. I am trying to find what is wrong with this team. Consistently, Dravid has been losing games for quite some time now, Gangully at least made sure we showed up in the finals. Today I see that there is nothing called accountability for Dravid or the Indian Team or the Coach or the selectors. There are various reports on the internet that says Greg Chappell will end his contract with BCCI [or be kicked out!?] after the world cup. It seems he is undergoing a lot of problem on his personal side. What so ever! I don’t really care, I think he is not a great coach and will never be one, why wait until the world cup? I am sure nothing will change if the coach is fired right this minute.
Just rewinding more of my frustration, I am still trying to figure out the game plan Rahul Dravid and our beloved million dollar babe coach engaged against the West Indies, . Ramesh Powar was at his best against England, however for some reason he gets dropped, as if this blunder was not enough, he is replaced by a semi-professional bowler popular known for Donkey drops . 1st will any moron tinker with the team that just won a match that too when the bowling department was responsible for the victory? My usual note: - Agarkar was as usual pathetic. I am just wondering what is the reason Selectors, the coach and the captain got in RP.singh instead of Powar?
The way the team played against Australia was sincerely sickening, Kaif in forward short leg position, I have nose cried about this along with many other arm chair experts for past n number of years. Kaif is not the right person to stand in that position, he jumps just before the ball is bowled and hence he is too slow to react, he has dropped a bag full of crucial catches standing in the position. But once again he was made stand in the position , who decides? What is the problem here with Dravid? And these players selected for their fielding drop catches and get about 20 runs per game, at this point I think VVS who was dropped for poor fielding seems better to me. After this loss, Dravid mentioned they lost because – Bowlers lacked experience. What a Bull? Combined games these 3 bowler have played is around 100. If they cannot learn from 100 games , I feel they will never learn. These bowlers were trying to bounce out the Australians. The game plan was kind of a joke.
VB Chandrasekhar made some noise in the press, according to him Tamil Nadu’s Badrinath is a better player than Suresh Raina, and he should be selected in place of him, I am wondering why he failed to make the same noise when he was the selector? Seriously his claims will never count with the title “Former” Selector. He did nothing when he had some power.
Currently the Indian team is in the ICU. Our players should have some pride and passion to improve, however the free flow of remuneration writes off the responsibility and accountability from the players. Who cares, they get paid regardless of winning or losing games and more over an added bonus for showing their esteemed faces in commercials. Passion for the game called Cricket takes the third spot.
Indian Cricket Stinks.
10/31/06
10/19/06
Good Lord!
For past week, my DSL Band width was similar to Boycott and Sunil Gavaskar both on nerves 90s playing for a draw, yes!, I am trying to define the height of slowness. I waited for 2 days, usually Verizon fixes it automatically, however it did not happen. I decided it was time call Verizon DSL support. I searched the bill that was close to an un-ruled 40 pages sugarcane composition notebook, you know what!, there was no support number on the bill . I called the regular billing number, which was closed. I then searched the telephone directory and finally called Verizon DSL support. Has anyone Called Verizon support recently? , Good Lord! The most irritating experience a human being could face.
7:45:00pm : A Vocodar voice says veriZon [ரொம்ப தேவை], then a sweet lady voice greets you , this is followed by her counterpart in “Para Espanola”.
7:45:20 pm : the voice says “I see that you are calling from xxx.xxx.xxx. phone number. The voice asks us to pick an item from the main menu. “We need to say it”, there were no number options. The main menu - “Billing Questions”, “set dosai”, “2 idlly 1 vada”, “IdiAppan paya”, “if you are vegetarian then say Thayier sadam”, “ if you are fat drink skim Milk” and finally “Technical support”. Using my hereditary Desi accent I say “technical suppert”, Sorry…I could not understand you – the menu options are “Billing Questions”, “set dosai” ,“2 idly 1 vada – Might be sold out by now”, “idiappam paya ”…etc, I swallow my tongue in order to get my “peter accent”, whew! This time it understood me. [120/90]. Then I heard the voice say “I am going to check your line”, and after a lot of minutes, it told me my connection was good. Yes! until now I was lying that my connection was slow. [140/110] .
7:50:01 as if the above was not enough, the stupid voice then gave a ridiculous suggestion. If you have problems with your DSL connection [Duh!] Please go to our website where you will find support material. Damn, MY DSL IS DOWN - the reason I am talking to this lousy robot is I CANNOT BROWSE THE INTERNET. How in the freaking world I can go online now and look for help? Maybe, they can add , “Please use your neighbors connection to check our website.” Adding insult to injury, it then lectures about the website, its URL, URI, their internal JDBC connection string, their programming methodology and every other detail that you hate to hear from anyone.
7:58, After all this nonsense, the voice announces outages in various location, most of them were on Planet mars, technically about 5 lights years away from my location and then innocently the voice queried to me – Do you really want to speak to an customer support Agent? I say @#@#$!!@!@#$ YES.
8:02, finally the robot transfers me to a Verizon Service center located either in India or some other eastern country.
8:06 A real female voice greets me enquires vital security information, they want to make sure it is me, I am forced to give details like கோம்பூர் ராமபத்திராச்சாரியரின் பேரனும், கோம்பூர் தேவராஜநின் புத்திரனும்மான SRIKANTH, Bharadwaja gotHram, utharada natchatiram etc., just to make sure its me.
8:10: Agent throws some pathetic technical questions at me: What is your modem model, Are you using the cable we gave you? Are you using a router, now let us shutdown everything and restart, I tell her I did this exercise about 10 times already. I am a network expert, there is fault in your line. But still she wanted me to do it, every electronic equipment and appliances in my house was refreshed.
8:23: After a complete reboot, nothing worked, she then told me that she is going to transfer to level 2 support.
8:25 to 9:00 – a stale big band music with a fretless bass and brass keeps looping on and one….
9:01 @##$##@%^&^$$ - It automatically hung up on me. [200/200]
9:05 Like Ambulimama satRum manam thaLaRatha Vikaramathithiyan, I called again, I did all the steps, finally got thru to the human agent and screamed at her what happened, she threw in multiple freebie apologies, and asked to me reboot, restart and do the same thing. Finally at around 10:00pm they told me they will be sending someone to check the lines today.
Ps: numbers in the [] are my blood pressure readings.
7:45:00pm : A Vocodar voice says veriZon [ரொம்ப தேவை], then a sweet lady voice greets you , this is followed by her counterpart in “Para Espanola”.
7:45:20 pm : the voice says “I see that you are calling from xxx.xxx.xxx. phone number. The voice asks us to pick an item from the main menu. “We need to say it”, there were no number options. The main menu - “Billing Questions”, “set dosai”, “2 idlly 1 vada”, “IdiAppan paya”, “if you are vegetarian then say Thayier sadam”, “ if you are fat drink skim Milk” and finally “Technical support”. Using my hereditary Desi accent I say “technical suppert”, Sorry…I could not understand you – the menu options are “Billing Questions”, “set dosai” ,“2 idly 1 vada – Might be sold out by now”, “idiappam paya ”…etc, I swallow my tongue in order to get my “peter accent”, whew! This time it understood me. [120/90]. Then I heard the voice say “I am going to check your line”, and after a lot of minutes, it told me my connection was good. Yes! until now I was lying that my connection was slow. [140/110] .
7:50:01 as if the above was not enough, the stupid voice then gave a ridiculous suggestion. If you have problems with your DSL connection [Duh!] Please go to our website where you will find support material. Damn, MY DSL IS DOWN - the reason I am talking to this lousy robot is I CANNOT BROWSE THE INTERNET. How in the freaking world I can go online now and look for help? Maybe, they can add , “Please use your neighbors connection to check our website.” Adding insult to injury, it then lectures about the website, its URL, URI, their internal JDBC connection string, their programming methodology and every other detail that you hate to hear from anyone.
7:58, After all this nonsense, the voice announces outages in various location, most of them were on Planet mars, technically about 5 lights years away from my location and then innocently the voice queried to me – Do you really want to speak to an customer support Agent? I say @#@#$!!@!@#$ YES.
8:02, finally the robot transfers me to a Verizon Service center located either in India or some other eastern country.
8:06 A real female voice greets me enquires vital security information, they want to make sure it is me, I am forced to give details like கோம்பூர் ராமபத்திராச்சாரியரின் பேரனும், கோம்பூர் தேவராஜநின் புத்திரனும்மான SRIKANTH, Bharadwaja gotHram, utharada natchatiram etc., just to make sure its me.
8:10: Agent throws some pathetic technical questions at me: What is your modem model, Are you using the cable we gave you? Are you using a router, now let us shutdown everything and restart, I tell her I did this exercise about 10 times already. I am a network expert, there is fault in your line. But still she wanted me to do it, every electronic equipment and appliances in my house was refreshed.
8:23: After a complete reboot, nothing worked, she then told me that she is going to transfer to level 2 support.
8:25 to 9:00 – a stale big band music with a fretless bass and brass keeps looping on and one….
9:01 @##$##@%^&^$$ - It automatically hung up on me. [200/200]
9:05 Like Ambulimama satRum manam thaLaRatha Vikaramathithiyan, I called again, I did all the steps, finally got thru to the human agent and screamed at her what happened, she threw in multiple freebie apologies, and asked to me reboot, restart and do the same thing. Finally at around 10:00pm they told me they will be sending someone to check the lines today.
Ps: numbers in the [] are my blood pressure readings.
10/16/06
Game day - Champions Trophy - India vs. England
Indians won! their first game of the tournament, frankly I was surprised by Indian fielding and bowling performances. [Mr. Barry Richards did you watch it Sir?] In fact even Viru was making few diving efforts to save runs, such incidents denote that there was some real effort put to improve the fielding department. Irfan Pathan and Munaf Patel bowled a clinical line, a consistent line with right length was the secret of success. They never tried fancy experiments, same goes to the spinners too. Power was able to fox the English players more than Harbajan. Harbajan took a very good catch in the deep, while Dravid and Sachin had a “ball” standing in slips. They never missed anything that passed by them, like a hungry frog they leaped on to catches + few insects that flew by them. Indians gave only 5 extras, this is a clear indication for discipline in the bowling department. While the entire bowling office and the fielding was shining with colors, Ajith “Ayopavam” Agarkar was pathetic as usual. I was worried that he would give away the game, But for first time in history, Dravid ‘s thought process was in sync with many arm chair [including yours sincerely!] cricket experts., Ajith Agarkar was never shown the ball again. I feel it is high time to brew someone like Sreesanth to take over from Agarkar.
England performance was very close to the word “poor”. Basic problem they faced was, none read the pitch correctly, Indians due to their home town advantage came close in guessing the nature of the wicket. The ball began to turn with uneven bounce at regular intervals. Top order English batsmen other than Kevin Peterson, none had the technique to face the Desi Ankle Music [opposite to chin music]. English captain ensured Omelets for next day breakfast.
Indian batting started off like the big bang theory, Viru was restored to the opening slot with Sachin. Both the openers blasted off well, Sachin and Viru played some juicy shots, however Viru donated this wicket , he chased a “wide goose” and was caught well in the slips, if Viru had stayed for next 30 minutes, the match would have been over well before supper time. In spite of this wide goose chase batting, I feel Viru has to open with Sachin. , this pair should not be tinkered,. Also India needs a proper #3 player. Irfan should be used sparingly at number 3. #3 is reserved to a “full time” batsmen, someone like Yuvraj or Suresh Raina should come up the order. For England Harmison was not in his usual place., he did not get it right. He bowled very badly till the supper break.
The (dis?)organizers had planned on a fire work display after the game, however someone who had too much coffee, triggered off the fireworks during the game. There was fireworks going on in the background after India lost Pathan. Dravid walked with blasting sound effects. The fireworks seemed to have distracted the newly arrived batsmen Dravid., he was out caught in the slips . Organizers need to ensure such things don’t happen in future. Soon India lost Sachin to a ball that kept low.
Raina walked and contributed on behalf of the Indian contingent for the Omelet breakfast. Soon Dhoni and Yuvraj got the game back on track for an Indian victory, Dhoni wanted to finish the game off quickly hence he tried to show off a little but was out caught, a stupid move by the youngster. Yuvraj and Harbajan then won the game for India. Rameeze Raja announced Munaf Patel as man of the match.
Finally, Sachin scored 35, but more that he reached a lot of mile stones during this game. Today we have people celebrating for 25th day of a movie, I think Sachin achievements should be at least appreciated should not be covered for the words like playing for the team etc. Do you know Sachin has scored more than 6000 runs in day and night games alone., 6000 is carrier score for many players. Well, who cares if you celebrate or not, but I will - I now call upon my good friend Balaji to do the needful and say ……………………..
England performance was very close to the word “poor”. Basic problem they faced was, none read the pitch correctly, Indians due to their home town advantage came close in guessing the nature of the wicket. The ball began to turn with uneven bounce at regular intervals. Top order English batsmen other than Kevin Peterson, none had the technique to face the Desi Ankle Music [opposite to chin music]. English captain ensured Omelets for next day breakfast.
Indian batting started off like the big bang theory, Viru was restored to the opening slot with Sachin. Both the openers blasted off well, Sachin and Viru played some juicy shots, however Viru donated this wicket , he chased a “wide goose” and was caught well in the slips, if Viru had stayed for next 30 minutes, the match would have been over well before supper time. In spite of this wide goose chase batting, I feel Viru has to open with Sachin. , this pair should not be tinkered,. Also India needs a proper #3 player. Irfan should be used sparingly at number 3. #3 is reserved to a “full time” batsmen, someone like Yuvraj or Suresh Raina should come up the order. For England Harmison was not in his usual place., he did not get it right. He bowled very badly till the supper break.
The (dis?)organizers had planned on a fire work display after the game, however someone who had too much coffee, triggered off the fireworks during the game. There was fireworks going on in the background after India lost Pathan. Dravid walked with blasting sound effects. The fireworks seemed to have distracted the newly arrived batsmen Dravid., he was out caught in the slips . Organizers need to ensure such things don’t happen in future. Soon India lost Sachin to a ball that kept low.
Raina walked and contributed on behalf of the Indian contingent for the Omelet breakfast. Soon Dhoni and Yuvraj got the game back on track for an Indian victory, Dhoni wanted to finish the game off quickly hence he tried to show off a little but was out caught, a stupid move by the youngster. Yuvraj and Harbajan then won the game for India. Rameeze Raja announced Munaf Patel as man of the match.
Finally, Sachin scored 35, but more that he reached a lot of mile stones during this game. Today we have people celebrating for 25th day of a movie, I think Sachin achievements should be at least appreciated should not be covered for the words like playing for the team etc. Do you know Sachin has scored more than 6000 runs in day and night games alone., 6000 is carrier score for many players. Well, who cares if you celebrate or not, but I will - I now call upon my good friend Balaji to do the needful and say ……………………..
10/13/06
ICC v BCCI
The ICC and BCCI cold war is now on center stage. Mr. Modi V.P, BCCI made it clear to the media that ICC was trying to dominate its members, he also hinted that some members of ICC are still living in the period of colonization.
ICC should gets this clearly. For past “n” number of years, attitude of ICC officials has cultivated similar opinions in the mind of many cricket loving Indians. Time and time we have seen ICC being biased and, players from South Asia were punished or treated to a greater degree than say, someone from Australia or England. Take the recent one , Ricky Pointing was let go freely without a match suspension for his unruly behavior with the umpire. Asian players have had match suspensions for such behaviors in past. Having been through heavy handed treatments often by match ICC referees, it is natural for a country to have such a frame of mind against ICC. This feeling doubles when you realize that India brings in about 80% of the revenue for ICC to function.
Latest controversy, according to Mr. Modi, ICC is playing unfair and is holding out on the media rights for the 2011 World Cup by saying that the BCCI can bid for the rights only if ICC Development International, its marketing arm, repeals its decision to restrict the bidding only to broadcasters. "It looks as if the MPA was framed only to tie our hands behind our backs, and then ask us to host the 2011 World Cup. Modi further adds , the cynics and sadists could not believe that India could organize the World Cup. We not only hosted one but two World Cups successfully within eight years. That saw the dismantling of other vestiges of the Raj. but there are certain pockets that still seem to suffer from the colonial hangover.", The ICC must remember this, if ICC wants to triple its rights fee to a staggering $1.5 billion, hey considerable percentage of that money has to come from India. As Mr. Modi puts it rightly it is time to have chief executive Afro-Asia, someone who understands the problems of a majority of ICC members and doesn't heed just the affluent alone.
I am finally kind of happy that someone from BCCI had the guts to take such a stance with ICC. India needs more power in ICC, the reason is very simple - Indian board's media rights has leapfrogged from $40 million to $612 million and this is projected to hit the billion-dollar mark in the next four years.In the reply to Mr. Modi statement, Mr. Malcolm Speed has hit out India and suggested to use right channels to take up this issue. We might see more “speed tickets” during India England tie.
As if this was not enough Barry Big Mouth Richards on Thursday launched a sarcastic campaign against India, saying BCCI had transformed the game for commercial interests by their sheer money power. He says that Cricket is now played for money. Only few at the top posts in ICC or BCCI have been involved with high level of cricket. 1st What is this high level he is talking about? And is there international sport that is not played for money? Cricket is a professional sport. Money making is part of it.
Have a Good week end!
ICC should gets this clearly. For past “n” number of years, attitude of ICC officials has cultivated similar opinions in the mind of many cricket loving Indians. Time and time we have seen ICC being biased and, players from South Asia were punished or treated to a greater degree than say, someone from Australia or England. Take the recent one , Ricky Pointing was let go freely without a match suspension for his unruly behavior with the umpire. Asian players have had match suspensions for such behaviors in past. Having been through heavy handed treatments often by match ICC referees, it is natural for a country to have such a frame of mind against ICC. This feeling doubles when you realize that India brings in about 80% of the revenue for ICC to function.
Latest controversy, according to Mr. Modi, ICC is playing unfair and is holding out on the media rights for the 2011 World Cup by saying that the BCCI can bid for the rights only if ICC Development International, its marketing arm, repeals its decision to restrict the bidding only to broadcasters. "It looks as if the MPA was framed only to tie our hands behind our backs, and then ask us to host the 2011 World Cup. Modi further adds , the cynics and sadists could not believe that India could organize the World Cup. We not only hosted one but two World Cups successfully within eight years. That saw the dismantling of other vestiges of the Raj. but there are certain pockets that still seem to suffer from the colonial hangover.", The ICC must remember this, if ICC wants to triple its rights fee to a staggering $1.5 billion, hey considerable percentage of that money has to come from India. As Mr. Modi puts it rightly it is time to have chief executive Afro-Asia, someone who understands the problems of a majority of ICC members and doesn't heed just the affluent alone.
I am finally kind of happy that someone from BCCI had the guts to take such a stance with ICC. India needs more power in ICC, the reason is very simple - Indian board's media rights has leapfrogged from $40 million to $612 million and this is projected to hit the billion-dollar mark in the next four years.In the reply to Mr. Modi statement, Mr. Malcolm Speed has hit out India and suggested to use right channels to take up this issue. We might see more “speed tickets” during India England tie.
As if this was not enough Barry Big Mouth Richards on Thursday launched a sarcastic campaign against India, saying BCCI had transformed the game for commercial interests by their sheer money power. He says that Cricket is now played for money. Only few at the top posts in ICC or BCCI have been involved with high level of cricket. 1st What is this high level he is talking about? And is there international sport that is not played for money? Cricket is a professional sport. Money making is part of it.
Have a Good week end!
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