Melbourne: Australian juggernaut rolls on

Here is an idea, I suggest the ICC ban this Australian team from Test match cricket for a period of two years. It seems ridiculous? Well, they did ban Zimbabwe for an entire year to give the team to get its act together. This ban might just do the trick and help the rest of the world catch up with Australia. Cause frankly, it has all got really really boring. Fifteen consecutive test victories is an amazing stat but what it hides is the fact that how dominant Australia has been in those victories. The only thing that is unpredictable about test matches involving Australia is how long the team takes to pummel the opposition into the ground.

The Melbourne test match just went to prove what a lot of Indian fans knew before hand- this team was under prepared and didn’t have the mental strength to stand up to the Australians. The BCCI in its infinite wisdom decided one warm match up would be enough practice for the Indian team. This is Australia for heavens sake!- not England or Pakistan. Its a bit like going into a heavy weight bout against Mohammed Ali with a week’s preparation.

The Rahul Dravid we have come to love and admire, decided that this was the stage for him to go into to his little shell. Yuvraj Singh’s performance again raised questions on whether he is going to be India’s best answer to Michael Bevan. Sachin Tendulkar left me wondering when was the last time he got a test century against a good bowling attack- he seems to get a phenomenal number of fifties and sixties but hardly goes on to hit a hundred anymore. Ganguly’s performance in both the innings suggested that men like Dravid and Tendulkar could do well by taking a six month sabbatical.

Much has been spoken about how weak our bowling attack is but the bowlers (barring Harbhajan) deserve a lot of credit. A 337 victory doesn’t do any justice to their performance. I thought Zaheer bowled well and so did RP Singh in patches. Kumble was absolutely brilliant and led from the front and the only way we are going to get anything from this tour is if this man can take a bagful of wickets. Harbhajan seems to be going through the motions and is living on the performances in Kolkotta and Chennai in 2001.

I don’t care if we end up losing 4-0, that might not be such a shock at all but what I guess every Indian cricket fan is hoping for is a fight. We saw that on the first day when we did brilliantly to restrict the Australian team to less than 400. Can we do that over five days? Stranger things have happened. West Indies just won a test match!

Port Elizabeth: West Indies pulls off a shock win

The utter shambles that West Indies cricket has found itself in over the past few years can be best described by the fact that the victory in Port Elizabeth represents their first test victory in three years. But what a test match it was, West Indies absolutely dominated the Springboks and after four days of action completed a memorable victory.

What stood out for me was the character which the West Indies batsman showed to post a huge first innings score. Men like Marlon Samuels have flattered to deceive time and time again, fantastic talent no doubt but without the appetite to go on and make the big centuries. Chanderpaul showed again why in the absence of Lara and Sarwan that he is the mainstay of the lineup. The pace attack of Powell,Taylor and Edwards backed up by Bravo bowled consistently through the match. If all this is the result of Gayle’s captaincy and the coaching of John Dyson- then long may it continue.

But the West Indies team should be warned- not long ago another team showed pulled off a shock victory against this same South African team and then went on to blow it all away in the remaining two test matches.