The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen

Apologies for the long absence from the blogging scene. There has been a lot happening on the non blogging aspects of life. For one, I should soon be heading back home. No, I have not been laid off as yet but my company seems to have a charming policy for me. It allows me to spend the sweltering summers in India and the freezing winters in UK. My company is renowned for such employee friendly policies.

As I write this post, The T20 World Cup is in the semi-final stage and India, as described in most of the popular media has made an unceremonious exit from the tournament, a train of thought, I firmly disagree with. In my opinion, the Indian team played impeccably well and I will attempt a short review of some of the classiest performers in the team to prove my point.

By the way, if anyone ever comes across a sentence which uses the phrase 'ceremonious exit', then please let me know.

Suresh Raina - I think he performed marvelously and we should not be misled by statistics. He is a performer par excellence and for him the World Cup was a stage, a grand stage to showcase his art. The only issue was that someone should have informed this great artist that this was not the World Cup for Belle dancing, which, had it been, he would have won hands down considering the awe-inspiring dance steps that he regaled the audience with while facing bouncers from the West Indian and English fast bowlers. No prizes on guessing on who would be winning the next Nach Baliye contest. As he gyrated all around the wicket, I think I faintly heard Dhoni shouting from the stands,

"Raina....in kutton ke saamne mat naach"...but it was a tad too late, Basanti..er..Raina had already begun his performance...

Ravindra Jadeja - This guy is a true hero. No longer would terminally ill patients need to petition the government to grant them the right to euthanasia, nor people contemplating suicide take to drastic measures to end their lives. All their misery and suffering can be alleviated by simply watching this master play an innings of cricket. He guarantees you a peaceful death out of sheer boredom. If only the poor chap could have held his wicket for some more time in the match against England, we were assured of a victory as the English players were sure to concede defeat to escape from the grotesque torture that Jadeja was imparting upon one and all in the name of batting. The below is what one of my dear friends Nilabza, had to say about him:
"He should be fed to pigs. Country seller, Olokhi pecha ekta, Dekteo shala ta shutki bepari laage , Gu khawrar dol" (Jinxed Owl that he is, looks like a vendor selling smelly dried fish , Pack of shit eaters)

I leave it to your imagination to visualise this.

Yuvraj Singh - His attitude and facial expressions makes you feel guilty of the fact that you are not paying him special taxes for the huge favour he seems to be doing to mankind by playing cricket. If arrogance and conceit were to ever procreate, my assumptions are that their offspring would have shocking similarity with Yuvraj. Yuvraj was once considered one of the best fielders in world cricket. Even today his fielding is a captain's delight. So what if the captain is now from the opposition teams. The manner in which he let go the ball off the last delivery of Harbhajan's over should be a lesson for any kid but one should remember that there is no easy path to such success. Such finesse can only come from a correct mixture of nonchalance, callousness, irresponsibility and more importantly the ability to withstand pressure of trivial issues such as the fact that you are representing your country. It comes after a lot of practice and IPL matches.

Ishant Sharma - He was once a bowler who bowled with fierce pace and aggression and scared the wits out of classy players like Ricky Pointing. That was becoming too passe and predictable I guess. So the Indian think tank had a new role for him in this tournament. They said, "Ishant tu Zombie banega" and boy did he play his role to perfection !! Of course his stint with the Kolkata Knight Riders team just before the world cup helped a great deal in his preparations.By the time he came into the tournament, he had well perfected the art of bowling like a top notch imbecile and seamlessly slipped into the role expected of him by the team management. BCCI must be complimented for creating this well-oiled machinery that churns out players with such unique repertoire of skills.

Mahendra Singh Dhoni - Last but certainly not the least of the awesome performers was our great Kapitan Kool. But the temperature of his coolness has steadily been decreasing over the past couple of months to have now reached a sub zero level.

Initially I thought that he was suffering from some bowel clearance problems which can understandably make any person irritable, but the lowly mortal that I am, I had got it completely wrong. Under the sheet of ice with which he came up to address press conferences, was a great thinker and strategist at work.

His decision to make practice sessions optional before both the crucial Super 8 matches speaks volumes of his wisdom and far sightedness. Could we have seen the grand Raina-Gambhir Hopping show otherwise ? Continuing with Zombie Sharma in spite of RP having figures of 1/13 of 3 overs and his extraordinary decision to send in Jadeja ahead of Yuvraj and Pathan are what legends are written of. The media is calling him rude but then they fail to see his benign nature which was in full display while he batted. He did everything possible to do away with the tag of being an aggressive batsman which the media again had foolishly added to his reputation over the years. He hit just four boundaries and a single six in the entire tournament which goes miles to show his kind nature and concern for the opposition. After all winning is not everything; there is something known as humanity too which is so much more important than a mere game of cricket.

In light of the above, I think we should stop being unnecessarily emotional about this whole issue and learn to see beyond the obvious. There is inherent greatness in the Indian cricket team way beyond the comprehension of ordinary cricket fans such as me and you. We would never stop watching India play, no matter what we think of their performance. So lets get on with it. There is a series to lose in West Indies. Cheers !!

(Thanks a lot to Anjali for kicking me out of my laziness,,,,....)