What went wrong?

To all those who watched the game yesterday...my sympathies!!

There is little denying that our team strived really hard yesterday, they gave it their all...Sri Lanka were just too good...
We are out of the world cup...not because we lost to Sri Lanka, but coz we lost to Bangladesh. Everyone is analyzing what went wrong, and here are my two cents as well...

The biggest problem on the day of the game against Bangladesh - the team was nervous. I am sure that Dravid and Greg knew this, yet it was decided that we will project confidence on the outside.
Two major risks were taken and they both backfired. First, in spite of the nervousness in the team, we decided to bat first on a pitch that was going to seam a bit initially. Its one thing to project confidence, it is another to feel it. Any person who has played a bit of sports will tell you this. I remember once when I was playing a District level Table tennis tournament...my first round match was declared as the show case match to be played before the Chief Guest. All my confidence evaporated in no time and I was so tentative I lost a game that I probably should have won, In fact I lost quite badly. Multiply the scenario by a million times and you get what happened to team India. On top of that risk, you not only played a batsman out of form, you actually sent him to open the innings - a huge risk. The move turned out to be a disaster with him getting out early. To make matters worse you send in a novice to bat at 3. Yes these are occasions where people can raise their hands and perform well, but it didn't work out that way. The team never recovered after that...the pressure just mounted on, and unfortunately apart from Sehwag there is no player in our side who ignores pressure while batting. The bowlers were expected to do magic, but there was going to be no magic that day...

We should have gone into the first game with the safest team, had we managed a win then we could have experimented in the game against Bermuda. As it turned out, we just couldn't find that flexibility as we were always running behind...

All sorts of drama will happen now...get rid of Greg, sack Rahul - drop Sachin, Harbhajan...the entire team. I say go ahead and do it and I also say that I can bet that all but a few of these will be back in the side in no time - there is simply no one as good as them. I can go on and on...but here no two people think alike about cricket, so I ll just brood for a few days and then start hoping for better days...

The great Indian Pratfall!!

So we lost to Bangladesh in our World Cup opener! Well there was only one team that deserved to win yesterday and that was Bangladesh. They played with flair and confidence, while the Indian team was so jittery it seemed that they were on the field for the first time.

Probably the toss made a difference, but that still doesn't explain how you can lose 5 wickets for almost nothing...
So what happens now?? I think the Indian team is likely to follow Pakistan home. Maybe the two boards should quickly organize a bilateral series...they can play between themselves and feel good, thats what the hockey teams of the two countries do anyways...there will be some "so called" fans in both the countries that will go nuts and make the defeat an excuse to take out their frustrations by burning effigies and shouting slogans against the players....

The others like me will pray...I can almost imagine all the marketing mgrs, of all the Indian companies sponsoring the WC, making rounds of all the holy places seeking blessings for the team when they take on Sri Lanka (prayers are more reliable than our team). Even the Sri Lankans will be asking why India had to mess up things for them also! If the Indian team does a Champions Trophy, I won't be surprised if people lose all interest in the event - the audience might end up being lesser than what was for the football WC last year. Now that would be something...