So.....Utterly....Disgusted
I hate Dravid. I officially hate Dravid.
I am so utterly disgusted with this shameful display of cowardice and utter lack of self-belief by this man whom the press bizarrely calls potentially the best Indian captain of all time, that I don't even have the patience to write a detailed post blasting holes into the last 3 hours of the test, which may well have been played in the Twillight Zone instead of St. Kitts.
An hour or so after lunch, until Dravid came to the crease, I was composing in my mind a post ridiculing Lara for his decision to bat again, and his weird declaration. I even had a perfect punchline in mind as an explanation for Lara's actions - The West Indies have not lost a test match for a long time now, and so withdrawl symptoms have set it.
Instead what I saw was the Indian team proving to us that it has become addicted to not grabbing wins which are there for the taking.
Virender Sehwag is the only man in this team who actually thinks about winning test matches. All the remaining players, especially our esteemed captain, are too pussy-scared of losing to even believe themselves capable of a test win unless it is literally thrust into their hands by the opposition.
A decade back, Prabhakar and Mongia were handed suspensions for not trying hard enough to win a match. In my opinion, this farce deserves a much harsher punishment. But of course, we know that no action will be taken against the man who has been appointed captain until the end of the World Cup. That the deadline is demarcated by the World Cup, an ODI tournament, shows how little value the board or the team management attaches to test matches. The Australians and the Englishmen use The Ashes as reference points in their calendars. We use glorified one day tournaments.
And even after this match, which seems to have been scripted by the looniest of dopeheads, Greg Chappell will hold forth about how we need to pick 5 bowlers to win test matches.
No Mr. Chappell, it's not the paucity of bowlers that is holding your team back. It's the paucity of balls.
I am so utterly disgusted with this shameful display of cowardice and utter lack of self-belief by this man whom the press bizarrely calls potentially the best Indian captain of all time, that I don't even have the patience to write a detailed post blasting holes into the last 3 hours of the test, which may well have been played in the Twillight Zone instead of St. Kitts.
An hour or so after lunch, until Dravid came to the crease, I was composing in my mind a post ridiculing Lara for his decision to bat again, and his weird declaration. I even had a perfect punchline in mind as an explanation for Lara's actions - The West Indies have not lost a test match for a long time now, and so withdrawl symptoms have set it.
Instead what I saw was the Indian team proving to us that it has become addicted to not grabbing wins which are there for the taking.
Virender Sehwag is the only man in this team who actually thinks about winning test matches. All the remaining players, especially our esteemed captain, are too pussy-scared of losing to even believe themselves capable of a test win unless it is literally thrust into their hands by the opposition.
A decade back, Prabhakar and Mongia were handed suspensions for not trying hard enough to win a match. In my opinion, this farce deserves a much harsher punishment. But of course, we know that no action will be taken against the man who has been appointed captain until the end of the World Cup. That the deadline is demarcated by the World Cup, an ODI tournament, shows how little value the board or the team management attaches to test matches. The Australians and the Englishmen use The Ashes as reference points in their calendars. We use glorified one day tournaments.
And even after this match, which seems to have been scripted by the looniest of dopeheads, Greg Chappell will hold forth about how we need to pick 5 bowlers to win test matches.
No Mr. Chappell, it's not the paucity of bowlers that is holding your team back. It's the paucity of balls.
