Another day!!

Its been about a month since I came to Johannesburg .Have been at work place all the while. Exploiting my latop to the core and making it wonder as to who the bigger idiot is, the one who has the keypad or the one who taps it continuously. Had not dared to take a break for a single day. I’m occupied with lot of work would be an under statement. But, as an anonymous (I don’t know the level of brilliance this guy has. I have seen many quotes by this guy) fella said and I quote :

“The day you realize that you are working day in, day out then just understand that you are on the right track. Keep moving!!”

Just a foolish way of consoling myself that I’ve not become a workaholic!!

Finally, got a chance to breathe some fresh air when one of my colleagues here invited me for lunch at his place. The plan wasn’t final till yesterday thanks to the busy schedule. But, I had to oblige when he said, “You can’t give a miss to the lunch plan, I’ve asked my wife to get all the vegetables and prepares some nice vegetarian dishes!!!”Trust me, people here consider eating vegetarian as a punishment and food without meat is an event of rarity for them!

It was really nice of my colleague to arrange for the lunch at his place and stupid of me to have made him and his family to eat vegetarian food!!!

It was a pleasant surprise that he had planned to take me out for a movie with his family. I got to know about the plan only few hours before. I had mentioned quite a few times about this movie which was a big hit back home and was being liked by most of its audience. The movie was “Jaane tu and something”, as my colleague prefers to call it.

We went to this place called Monte casino that has cinema halls which usually screen all the latest hindi movies that get released worldwide. He and his family planned to go for a animated movie, so that their kid can be kept entertained. So, here we were at the ticket counter and lo, I started hearing words being spoken in a familiar language,” Are yaar, theatre toh almost khaali hai”,”Corner seat lete hain jee”,”Beta jaldi toilet jaake aaja”,”Mummy,I’ll buy a fanta and a coke for didi”.I just couldn’t help but look at them and smile and get a smile in return!!Though spotting Indians,Pakistanis anywhere in the city is not that tough.But, So many familiar looking people being around at a time, made me feel I was at home!!

The start of the movie was 15 mins away and here I was seated comfortably and listening to the conversations of people around me.Most common topics were related to Visa, Diwali, Marriage.Their talks slowed down as the lights were being dimmed down.

The movie was nice. Not really a breath of fresh air but of stale air with some freshener sprayed!! Story wasn’t new but the narration and treatment was. So, were the faces. Movie worth a watch.

After my friend dropped me back to the hotel post movie, here I’m staring at my laptop again. This small black case should be relieved that I gave it some time off to relax during the day!!

One month into my visit and still at least 2-3 weeks left before I can get back to base. Its going to be an eventful period of time. Loads and loads of work to do and also a bleak chance of my dreams of few years coming true!!(keep an eye on this space for coming few weeks to know more about what I meant here)

I go to sleep with mixed feelings tonight. No, nothing about the movie!! Fletcher denying his links with Evertoons made me feel good but Selectors continuing to be Rejecters for RD and Dada has left a bad taste. This is definitely not the way the treat the legends. We should be more than thankful for the sheer contribution they have done to world of Cricket. Never mind, they have a very good chance to prove that they are still the best and no better way to do it than with their bats!!

Hmmm..Too sleepy to write anything that make sense (as if I’ve done it in the past) right now. But as they say, All is well that ends well.Lets hope a happy ending to all the turmoil surrounding my idols!![I know I’m trying to be selfish here but I don’t give a damn!!!!]

I’ll try to come up with something more interesting in the future and not to make writing itself boring for me ;-)

Look, what have we done!!

I heard Vengsarkar's term as the Chairman of Selectors will be ending sometime soon.He is planning for a mega bash where he'll be releasing his semi-pseudo-autobiography, "How to turn Hindustan into Kabristan in the name of Youngistan"

Great job Colonel.Mission accomplished.[people may say that it was his team that won us T20 WC and the CB series in australia.After IPL, we all know how methodic T20 is and the win in CB series was due to classy Sachin and few sparks of briliiance from others]

Vegsarkar has one final chance to restore his pride(tending to zero) as he'll be selecting a 30-men probables list for ICC champions trophy ,sometime soon.Lets see what he does before stepping down, correcting his past mistakes or continuing them.

Its been long time since I posted anything.Blame it on work,hectic schedule or whatever!!I just couldn't hold myself back from posting this, India losing 2 consecutive finals under MSD and he shamelessly says in the post match interview, I quote,"We atleast reached those 22 finals" on being asked about the shabby form of India losing 18 of the last 22 finals since 1999.
[It was a treat to watch King Fed vs Rafa in wimbeldon final and hearing their post-match comments.Sportsmen to the core!!]

Great job done MSD.Ordinary performance,Pathetic attitude,Irritating behaviour and on top of it as a cherry comes his shameless public comments.He might have tried to be funny as he can't be too critical at that time.But, come on, more than 1 billion people back this team and spend their days and nights watching them,praying for them,discussing about them.As a captain, I would have expected a mature response.But as Vengsarkar says, its a young team and they will take some time to settle down.All the best MSD!!

We have lost two finals in succession.These were the matches that we should have won.But we still managed to get defeated.

What does retrospection shed light on ??What is it that we could have done differently in this match that to have made us end on winning side ??

We should have batted well!!

No doubt that Gambhir, Viru,Yuvi and others are all highly skilled and are match-winners, the records speak for themselves but they faultered at the wrong time.And this is not first time that we have seen this .

I know that this debate has been sparked every now and then and seems to be the favourite of every cricket follower in this nation and outside...But, what we needed today was someone like Sachin,Sourav,Rahul to have been on the batting line-up..

The time is running out.Bring back Sourav and Rahul into ODIs.Its now or never, this is the last chance we can give to Dada and RD to help resurrect their and Team INDIA's fortunes...These guys are legends already and they have nothing else to prove to anybody.But I feel, more than themselves its the TEAM which needs them.

We can have them in the team and play 2 out of big 3(Sachin,Sourav,Rahul) on a rotation basis and get some stability in the team..THe highly skilled youngsters can gain more experience with them and get ready to hold the mantle of the team in big matches.

I'm not saying that this would have guaranteed a win(in ASIA cup finals or Kitply cup)but definitely the probability would have been higher..We needed somone with enough experience to handle the big match situation and face challenges like facing the mystery bowling of Mendis,other veterans like Vaas and Murali and to pace the chase well.

May what happen,my undying support to Team India will continue.But it hurts when we lose like this because of some Mohd.Tughlaq strategy :-)

What is life without retrospection and correction??Just a boring family drama!!

Lets hope things change and we rule the world of cricket again(actual sport, no the money world ruling it)

ALL the BEST to Team INDIA!!