Match Report

It was a pathetic batting display after Watson and Ojha departed and with a target of 133 to defend our bowlers never really felt confident enough to win this and that showed in their performance. It was an easy cakewalk of KKR and an end to an indifferent campaign, which promised a LOT but we eventually finished 7th with the worst Net Run Rate ! Hopefully next season would be better and hoping warne will return if not as a player, at least as the coach of RR to show us his magic again like in the Match against Deccan in Nagpur!

This will be the last of the posts in the Interblogactic IPL Battle for me !

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Well, what can i say, it’s not a fortress anymore! IMO Warne made a wrong call by batting first after winning the toss, as everyone knows how good RCB are at chasing down targets and 130 a Jaipur was never really going to cause them any headaches! Now, we have to hope that Chennai looses against Punjab, we beat Kolkata Handsomely and Deccan loose by a big margin at the kotla, then we will sneak through in fourth position! It’s not all over but only a mathematical possibility remains as given the Performance of Deccan in the past 4 matches after their choke against us its difficult to see them loose to Delhi by a big margin and a fired up Chennai to lose against a low on confidence Punjab, but stranger things have happened! All we can do is win our match at Kolkata and Hope and Pray!!

The match was as one-sided as the score card shows it to be we never really had a chance once we lost Pathan at 72 and it read 72-6 after 13.1 overs! Anyhow Lumb and Raut put up a brave fight by taking upto 130. Jhunjhunwala was the worst of the lot, he should have got out a lot earlier rather than scoring a test match type 13 of 22 ( which is unacceptable in ODI’s as well).

Kamran khan was brought back, he got Kallis early and from then it was the KP show and he stole the match away even before Warne had bowled an over!

Here’s hoping we win BIG in Kolkata!

The bowling performance was great at the start with Watson getting us of to a dream start, finally his bowling has come good and should be lethal in the coming matches! Dole again leaked runs but took the crucial wicket of pollard, rest of the bowling was good but nothing special from Warne in this match! As i have mentioned earlier the end overs leaked a bit more than what we would have liked, but still the target within reach and we needed Watson or Pathan to play well.

The team got off to the worst possible start when Naman Ojha, (the leading run scorer for us in this IPL) got out cheaply someone had to take up his role and anchor the innings as we were chasing a big target, but the batsmen had other plans, 3 runouts in the Top 4 and you are never going to win a match with stuff like that happening, it looked like we were giving Delhi daredevils competition for the team with the worst running between the wickets, the runouts hurt us bad and the required rate was climbing up all this time. generally Warne takes sensible and logical decisions, but holding back Yusuf Pathan for so long was a big blunder IMO, the reqd rate was around 12 when he came in and by the team he settles in it was 14! It was too much for the Big man to do! he should have come in after Fazal had got out , so that there was time for him to settle in and smash the bowlers around! The tail wagged and lessened the margin of defeat with Aditya Dole getting some blows in, it was the least he could do after dropping the crucial catch of sachin which let them get 20 runs more, anyhow the margin of loss was BIG (37 runs) and it once again dented our NRR!

Now that CSK and RCB have very good NRR and even DD have a better NRR than us, our only hope to make it to the semis would be to win both the matches and secure 16 points which would assure us of a place in the semis! Today, we play RCB and its imperative we bowl first as RCB has too many clean hitters of the ball ( Uthappa, Taylor, Kohli, White) who can chase down any target in a small ground like Jaipur! We need to restrict them to below 160-165 and chase sensibly. This should give us the best chance of winning!

Here’s hoping RR win this match and make it to the semis !!

Match Report

Punjab were on a High after chasing down 200 against an undisciplined KKR and were carrying on from where they left off, but it was Aditya Dole who turned it around as he did in the previous match against the Deccan Chargers for us! He is expensive but gets the big fish out and in this match he stopped a Rampaging Mahela and Yuvraj and that about settles the match! after the double blow, Punjab never recovered and were not able to hot a boundary leave alone clear the ropes, their batting performance in the last five was even more dismal due to the disciplined effort from our bowlers, who sealed the deal but restricting them to a way below par score of 153.

I have previously voiced my opinion about the inclusion of a certain Adam Voges into the playing XI, finally they have listened to me, but instead of dropping Lumb they choose to drop a bowler which also makes sense as Watson is proving more valuable as a bowler than Tait and Morkel combined of late! Anyhow Voges didn’t have a bowl nor a bat, but it added to the team balance and a deeper batting lineup.

Punjab bowlers were down and out by the target and Lumb cashed in big time and Ojha, who is in the top 5 run getters in this IPL continued his form with Pathan finishing off, All in all in was a perfect game which even helped our NRR a fair bit!

Mumbai are next, the key is to get Sachin out before he gets 20 and the rest will take care of itself Mumbai “Indians”, true to their name are playing like the Indian cricket Team of the 90′s these days! If only they have won 5-6 matches till now it would have been a whole lot interesting for their semis berth! Warne vs Tendulkar, even after 12 years after his desert storm innings is one any cricket fan would not want to miss out on!

Halla Bol!

159 in an IPL match was never going to be easy t defend and with Gilchrist going ballistic at the top it was even more difficult, Warne needed to pull all of his tricks out of the bag for this one and the best one of the lot was his bowling, the loop, flight, spin and setting up a batsmen were Top class and he was back to his best! he literally ripped through the Deccan middle and lower order by snapping up 4 of them, which in a matter of 4 overs is huge and turned the game on its head. The best thing i liked about his spell and captaincy was that he applied the pressure beautifully on other batsmen by not allowing them easy singles by employing 6 fielders in the ring and getting the fielders into attacking the ball inside the ring so that singles arent taken and forcing the batsmen to hit out, at which the Deccan batsmen apart from Rohit failed miserably at. In the end it was a “Royal” Choke by Deccan, who generally don’t hold their nerve in close matches which helped RR’s cause!

The teams overall performance with the ball was OK apart from Shane Watson who was taken apart by Gilchrist and then Rohit, he needs to pull up and deliver with the ball as well, and morkel needs to contain the runs and use his height and bounce out the Indian batsmen more often rather than bowling other stuff! The batting performance was shoddy with a middle order collapse that cost us about 20 if not 30 runs, there was over dependence on Watson and with yusuf not firing a below par total was made, the lower middle order needs to take more responsibility and make sure the team reaches a decent target rather than play risky shots and perish in the process! A mention about young Faiz Fazal who is churning in good performances and the other batsmen needs to perform like him if the team has to do well this season!

interestingly Warne gave only 2 overs to Yusuf Pathan of which he conceded only 3 runs, which makes it the most economical figures of this IPL.

I would like to see one change in the line up that is drafting in Voges in the place of Lumb and Voges/Faiz or even Watson can open the innings along with Ojha. Tait can also be taken back into the team in lace of Morkel.

Next match against KXIP at Jaipur, a venue where we have a perfect record 7 wins in 7 and the record should remain intact, the match has more significance as the upcoming matches after this are against top of the table teams like MI, RCB which would be tougher games than the KXIP one.

in the end it was one bowler who stood out and made himself count, Bollinger’s bowling was the difference in this run-fest and even his catch of Yusuf was a killer blow for us. only Two positives out of this match, one is how well Naman Ojha played amidst the shoddy batting performance until Watson gave the much required impetus. Shane Watson’s return will only boost our chances, as seen by the intent shown by him and the form in which he is right now, just coming off from test match mode to hit the arguably the greatest bowler of all time for 3 sixes in an over and finish with 60 from 25 balls, hats off to you Mr.Watson!

I was surprised by the exclusion of Adam Voges who was the main man behind the revival of fortunes after the string of defeats at the start of the tournament, Lumb hasnt done anything wrong but I believe Voges should take his place and maybe Watson or even voges can open the innings, this would give more balance to the side in terms of bowling options when the bowlers have an off day as they have had in the last two matches, from now we need to win at least 3 ( and depend on other results) or 4 ( to be sure) out of the 5 matches remaining to have a realistic chance of making it to the semi finals!

The match against the Deccan Chargers is crucial and a win against them is required for the semifinal hopes to materialize as they are low on confidence.

Nothing went right for us after that from failing to take a wicket and shut the door on Delhi to stopping the flow of runs towards the end! It was really an ordinary performance after that, sadly one has to agree with Gambhir on this! It was a truly spineless display with the bowlers not bowling to their fields which left even the cool-headed Warne angry, mad and what not especially at Shaun Tait who was giving RP Singh’s most expensive bowling figures in the IPL ( 4-0-59-1 vs KKR in IPL ’08) a run for his money! Shaun Tait performance graph has been like a sine wave, brilliant in one and absolutely rubbish in the next! he needs to be consistent if he is a force to be reckoned with in the IPL. Warne was the only bowler who kept the runs under control and everyone else failed to stop the run flow, but all was not lost as the target was below 190 even after such a pathetic bowling performance in the back ten thanks to the good showing in the first 10!

It was always going to be an uphill task to chase this one down and IMO we should have planned the chase more sensibly rather than going hell for leather right from ball one so that the Net Run Rate would not take a bad beating! But the batsmen thought otherwise and were hell-bent on the slog and perish policy and the wickets tumbled and were always behind the eight ball and there was a glimmer of hope when Yusuf Pathan was hitting it all over the park and looked in great touch but he went after a quality spinner like Amit Mishra a bit too early and he foxed him by bowling form a yard or two behind the popping-crease and that was enough for Yusuf to get a top edge and with it took any realistic hopes of winning the match! the other players should have played out the 20 overs so that the damage done could be controlled and the margin of defeat lessened, but they had other ideas and the team was all out in 17.4 overs and helping Delhi to a good NRR and getting ours to a very bad position! ( -0.341 after 8 matches! )

Shane Watson is back and he should replace Lumb and open the batting and even open the bowling or bowl 1st change, he will effectively be two players in one and given the form he has been in the International Arena over the past year the expectations are sky-high on him to sparkle in Chennai !

The match was never really close, the Chennai chase in the second half of their innings never really took off. The scorecard was artificially inflated with the sixes towards the end. Coming to the match it was again a relatively unknown player coming to the party, it was Narwal against the Deccan Chargers and it was Naman Ojha who played a brilliant innings and was the only batsman who was able to score very freely, it is somewhat similar to season 1 where unknown players like Asnodkar and Yusuf Pathan (unknown at that time) made a mark for themselves. Lumb and Ojha are beginning to be a formidable force to reckon with and the left-right combination is unsettling the bowlers. Ojha changed gears brilliantly and was at ease against Murali and Jakati. After end of the 10th over the score was 100/2 and finished at a disappointing 177 when we should have scored at least 190, No one was really able to force the pace and hence the total did not reach expected heights!

Chennai got off to a good start, Narwal wasn’t able to repeat the magic and got flogged but it was good to see Warne having faith in him and giving him another over towards the end, hopefully he should play the next match and other matches as well! Opening the attack with Yusuf proved to a masterstroke as he kept the runs down and Warne is back at his best (albeit his last over), overall it was a clinical bowling performance with Tait being lethal with his pace and full length balls. IMO the best amongst the lot was Trivedi who was economical and on target, in-spite of not getting any wickets, held his nerve and bowled the final over in clinical fashion just giving away 4 runs!

All in all it was a professional performance on the field and we are well on our way to the Semi-Finals!

Coming to the match, Warne outwitted Gilchrist by not giving him the pace to work with by throwing the ball at Sumit Narwal and it paid of big time, then it was a Warne at his best with the ball and snapping up Gibbs, then Deccan virtually gifted the match with their running between the wickets ( most importantly the wicket of Symonds who was looking ominous). The bowling was tight and Tait was back to haunt the Indian Domestic players who had no clue how to face his fast in swinging full length deliveries. Dogra and Jhunjhunwala were live wires in teh field and a sub 150 target was never going to challenge our batting line up.

Lumb continued the good work and the platform was laid for Yusuf to go ballistic and Boy he sure did not disappoint. 2 boundaries and 8 sixes!! Only one man can play an innings like that and he hit the bowlers into the stands. Even Gilchrist was helpless as all the bowlers were reduced to pieces and it was matter of time before the match was over and Yusuf finished it in style. The most important thing about the win IMO was how it helped our Net Run Rate, which will be crucial in the coming stages. We just need to keep the winning momentum going and trash the Chennai Super Kings as well, if they loose they are as good as out of the tournament with 5 losses in 7 games!

Halla Bol!

During the Deccan vs Delhi match at Cuttack there was one thing that caught my attention. Not even a single player in the Deccan Chargers XI are a part of any national team’s playing XI (assuming all players to be fit) in any format of the game! With a mixture of retired (Gilchrist), banned (Symonds) and out of favour international stars (Gibbs and Vaas). Indian International players who are in woeful form (RP Singh), Unlucky (Ojha) or those who get too many opportunities ( Rohit – Why is he in the World T20 squad? Is there a Mumbai quota or something?) and a bunch of Domestic players whose chance of getting a National Cap in any format is worse than Ganguly getting the Orange Cap this year. They are the team to beat and are surely a strong contender for the semi finals and the title as well. As far as I can remember this is a first for a playing XI in the IPL ( Open Challenge: Prove me Wrong! ). No wonder its amongst the least hyped up teams in the tournament.

For the record playing XI for Deccan was :
Monish Mishra, Gilchrist, Gibbs, Symonds, Rohit Sharma, Suman, Venugopal Rao, Vaas, Rahul Sharma, Ojha and RP Singh

With Laxman fit, this might not happen again unless he is dropped !

So as the Chargers song says : Go Chargers Go! ( Hoping they change the title song to something better soon! )