A win at Last !!!!!!!

Here it is!!!! It finally happened. Although many will say it was unexpected victory i believe it was expected. But first let’s celebrate this rare moment of glory in Indian cricket.

After what can be called as pretty forgetful one day series, Indian cricket team has bounce backed with a resolute performance to clinch their first ever test win in South Africa, and deserved every bit of long celebrations that followed (believe me I was stunned when I heard the stats of party. 12 champagnes, 60 beers had already finished and still they had not seen the sunset.) We all know Statistics of the match by now and I won’t bore anybody giving the same details again. Rather would like to view all the performance from a completely different perspective.

At the beginning I mentioned that this win had to be called a expected win. I know most of the people will laugh at me but the fact is India is ranked 3rd in test rating while south Africa is 7th while in one days India is 7th and South Africa is 2nd so one has to say India were expected to win this. Apart from that I strongly believe we are not poor travelers any more. From 2002 England tour I cannot remember a many away test series where India has lost badly. (If I am not wrong the only bad away tour was 2003 New Zealand series). We have series win in West Indies, Pakistan, Zimbabwe, and Bangladesh and have series draws in Australia, Sri-Lanka, England. This is in addition to no Africa tour and a loss in New-Zealand (Yes New-Zealand was disaster fact is we did not have cricket pitches there. They were more baseball grounds where they hardly expected the ball to land on surface and hence had kept all the grace on the surface intact). That isn’t a bad record is it? I think no. So I will still say it was expected.

What haunted this team was failure in last 3 series. But lets all accept a fact that those African teams were 10 times better than this current African team. They had people like Hudson, Kirsten, and Cullinon at top with Kallis, Cronje, and Rhodes waiting to bat after them. Plus they had brilliance of Klusner, Boucher, and Pollock at the bottom. Bowling was furious with Donald, Pollock, and Hayward or in old age Fanny De Villiers and some help from Symcox, Klusner. Compare them to current team and you will find that no current batsman or bowler will get a tick over those legends (except for few who are still in the team). This batting line up looks very weak and lacks experience. Bowling though good is not good enough if all Indian batsmen can raise them game to their own standard level and certainly no way near to previous African pace attacks where every bowler applied tremendous pressure on batsmen. Their side in past was so much better that they came to India in 1997 and became the first side to beat India in India after almost a decade. And only Australia has achieved that after them till now.


Second factor worth considering is timing of the series. Indians are always very slow adapters to the conditions. For both series 1997 and 2001 we had test series first and then the one day series. So each time Indian team failed badly in first test and till they got used to conditions test series was already over.(I am specifically ignoring 1992 tour because that was first series after South Africa’s re-admission to international cricket and was treated more like a ceremonious event than a cricket series. I don’t say Africa was bad in that series but India went on that tour as if they were there to raise funds for charity and was totally unprepared for the tour.) So this time we got time to get used to conditions and that proved to be very vital for this success.

Having said all that I have said I still think it’s a great victory in History of Indian cricket because India often have failed to win the things that they ideally should win. So bad was our performance in past that we had lost even in Zimbabwe. And I believe the credit for this transformation has to go to Sourav Ganguly. Love him or hate him he was and is a differentiating factor between our teams of past and present. And just as if he had to write the destiny again, India needed him to bring on this tremendous turn around. May be this is a signal from almighty god to Chappell and Dravid that they cannot decide destiny or fate of anybody and they are just the peons of God. I strongly believe in destiny and also in the fact that whatever happens to somebody, happens for his/her good. And I think this fits best to Dada. Although manner of treatment given to him was wrong, I think Dada needed to be out of side to understand importance of a place in Indian Cricket team and to bring back the fire and desire that had started to slide away from him.

Although 24X7 media has not said it and have glorified efforts of other people I still think inning that changed the fate of the match was Sachin’s determined 44 along with Sourav’s 51 and VRV’s 29. He never got the due credit and Dada walked away with all the glory. I think that second session on first day was very critical since task of playing out that new ball on a pitch which was at its worst in that session was a great task and knowing Sachin I can surely say that he rates this innings very high in all the illustrious list of innings that he has played.

Finally a word about man of the match Srisanth and his Malayalam dance heroics. I admire Srisanth for his achievement and for his Malayalam dance and believe that this was a much needed treatment for Nel who throws his mouth at everybody at will and surprisingly gets away with it without fight. But at the same time I must say that I hated what he did when he got Amla with a beauty of a delivery. I think this was uncalled for and never fits in Indian cricket and tradition. He needs to be told a word or two by his senior members.

Overall in moment of glory and pride and lets take a opportunity to congratulate Rahul and Chappell for delivering under almost pressure of their career and lets hope that they will play well enough to take home their first ever series win from SA.

IT414

Does the name sound weird? It certainly did to me. But it was the name of my first ever flight and like every other first things this was highly awaited.[;)] Just before I go on to subject one question to you all. Who will be passengers traveling by flight IT420? (I think all hackers will be given free boarding passes for that flight)
But fun apart I really wonder how do pilots remember which flight they are supposed to go in. In short can’t they make flight names more user-friendly. Coming back to subject of first ever things, I was really tense while going into flight. My flight was Ahmedabad to Pune Kingfisher IT414. (I think expect the last thing everything else should be sufficient enough to make a unique flight name.)
The preparation for this journey began with flurry of instructions from my uncle and dad. Thanks to them at the end of that session I felt confident enough to go through the complicated procedures of flight and I left for Ahmedabad airport. But when I said bye to my mom and others at the outside gate, I was left all alone on that big airport trying to figure out where to go.
Suddenly I remembered that I had to go to Kingfisher counter to collect my boarding pass. I went to the counter and waited in a queue. This queue was taking more time than one I had been in SBI branch.(yes despite of the whole new look of SBI it still is a government bank and that day it lived up to its old reputation ) I started wondering if this was also run by government authority. But before I could confirm that I heard announcement of Security check for IT414. I got scared. I thought I was late and they wont give me ticket anymore. I was ready to give explanations like traffic and too much time taken at ticket counter but before that I was asked to join other queue which was moving relatively faster (absolutely faster as well ;) ). And before I realized I was at the counter. One lady (beauty I must say) smiled and said your ticket sir. I certainly got lost somewhere and when I came back from my state of being nowhere I had my boarding pass. Now I made my first mistake here. I was repeatedly asked to ask for window seat. But because of pure shame (and beauty) I didn’t ask for one. I thought the lady at the counter will surely know that it’s my first flight (I was at a complete loss on the airport). But unfortunately she didn’t and I got non window seat (I didn’t mind it as it will come in further discussion)
Next I went for a security check and again inexperience made me look a fool. I gave my hand bag for security check and stood at security counter. Now the guard started checking and he stopped pointing at my pocket where I had kept wallet. I said “do I have to show my wallet as well” and in return he gave me a look that made me feel like a complete idiot. How would I know that it meant that take your wallet out I need to do checking without it. But he least cared what I thought and started checking me more carefully. Did I look like a terrorist to him? (Sure I had not shaved for a few days but I think I look good in beard as well).
Then it was the long wait for flight. Unfortunately flight was ½ hour late and we had to wait there. In one of the instructions it was told to me to switch off my mobile so I had switched it off even before I left for airport (typically middle class isn’t it?). But I found people using mobile. But still I didn’t have guts to switch it on. Also there were around 6 TV’s all showing different channels. But only one showed the New Zealand Vs Australia match which was live on air. So everybody was sitting in front of that TV only. To make matters worse some people had kept their handbags on the chair next to them, so all the seats facing TV were full. Normally on railway station or bus stand I would easily go, keep that bag on the ground and use that chair but on airport I couldn’t (again typically middle class).
Finally the plain came and announcement to go was made. As I was entering the plane one airhostess greeted me with a smile. As always I looked back to see to whom she was actually referring to and this time to my surprise I realized that she was actually referring to me. This is the trouble of not being used to be with beautiful girls, all your life you wish if they could give a smile to you and when they actually do that you don’t know how to react. I forced myself towards my seat though I actually wanted to request that air-hostess to smile again.
My seat was next to the passage through which these air-hostesses serve people. Frankly speaking I liked that seat more than window seat, and I surely had a reason for that as well. There were not one, not two but four airhostesses, and boy o boy weren’t they marvelous beauties. I could go on and on writing about their beauties but that is a subject of separate article.
It was then time for flight to take off and I must admit I was mightily scared. I started thinking what if I die and about all the insurance policies that I have. In the end I realize that I have no policies and no dependents. But that didn’t reduce the fear. But to my help came that beautiful airhostess again with some snacks. While I was watching her serve it to all of my co-passengers and exchanging smiles with them, the plane had already taken off. And when I saw out through the window all I could see was clouds. And for next ten minutes I got lost in another of nature’s beauty. Clouds so beautiful and isolated, sky so dry and so huge and yet they still looked so together, making this beautiful environment around us. I wished if we human beings learn independence and still co-existence from clouds and sky then their will be no dearth of humanity on this earth. There will be no wars and no troubles.
Gods knows how much time I would have spent in these thoughts but thanks to beauties again I came back to real world. This time airhostess (till this point she had also became my crush) had meal dishes in her hand. She gave a dish to my neighbor, that fellow said “Thanks” and in return she gave a million dollar smile. But I thought my neighbor was quite used to it, coz I saw no expressions on his face. At that very instance even I decided to do the same and did it successfully as well, and got that smile from her. For a second I wondered if she also had started falling for me. I thought why not? Am I not worth it? I strongly believed that the smile that she gave to me was different from the rest. And I started expecting something to happen within next few min. Then she came back to take off the dish but at that time I was busy having desert so couldn’t catch her actions.
Till this time it was almost 1 hour in flight and I heard landing announcement. I was like no; I want to fly for one more hour, what the hell? I have paid 3000 Rs for it and its just one hour? But before I could pick up somebody to whom I can complain, we were already on the airport.
I said ok. Now I decided to go by DDLJ way and see if my crush turns back and looks at me when I am leaving. I was quiet sure that it would happen but just wanted a proof. And as usual I had heartbreak. I was turning back again and again to see if I can catch her looking at me. But she was still busy saying bye to everybody getting down. And hence one small love story ended then and there.
So the journey which started with questions ended with heartbreak. It was more like journey of life. You start with questions and till you get all the answers you realize that the answers are no more useful to you.
Next day I was back again to office and except for few moments of heartbreak, I had only good memories which I would cherish for rest of my life.

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Paus Astoch aasa..........

On a rainy day around 7:00 pm in the evening, I was in the office and had just finished my daily work (for a change I had work-item that day. Don’t ask what. It was some CSS issue which I hardly know. But as usual with help of team mates I managed to slog it off.)It was very beautiful outside, I guess it was a right to for poets to write something. That day even I decided that I would pick up my pen and write something. Fortunately found my two other friends online (Pranav who is in Banglore and Sourabh who is in US. Both of them experienced writers and obviously better writers than me). On that chat we decided to write poem online and this is what we came up with.

Paus: Tichya mazayatla.........

paus astoch asa, doghana ekatra aanara,
halkech vijes sangun, sarv antare todnara

paus astoch asa, mazya darat padnara,
tichya mazya ghramadhle, kumpanach vahun nenara

paus astoch asa, manaat khol dadalelaa,
tya gaafil kshananchi, aathavan karun denaara

paus astoch asa, mazya parsat kosalnara,
aamhi lavlele rop, aaplya hatane fulavnara

paus astoch asa, tichya sarkha vagnara,
kadhi tari vadal ,kadhi rimzim barasnara

paus astoch asa, tichya sarkhach yenara,
dabakya pavalani yeun, vadalapari barasnara

paus astoch asa, kshanaat veda karnaara,
nustya athavanine, romanch ubhe karnaara

paus astoch asa , tichyasarkhch asanara,
nighun gelyanantar hi, mrudgandh mage thevnara

Paus: Jivan gane ganara.......

paus astoch asa, mukt khali padnaraa,
jivan aakashatle, dharatila denara

paus astoch asa, bebhaan kosaLanaara ,
taaplya dharatila, shant hirve karnaara

paus astoch asa, mrud gandh fulavnaara,
keval eka kshanaat, gaatre trupt karnaara

Paus astoch asa, aadvalanane yenara,
zudupamagil yugulanna, navaach anand denara

Paus: Thoda hava sa thoda nako sa......

paus astoch asa,lahripane vagnara,
saral jaminivar sudha, vakda tirpa padnara

pasu aastoch asa, hahakar majavnara,
gharat pani ,pan taki mokli thevnara

paus astoch asa, khoop kahi denaara,
kadhi deta deta , khoop kahi nenaara

paus astoch asa, thoda manavirudh vagnara,
magta na padnara,padta na thambnara

Paus astoch asa, tredha tirpit udavnara,
gadivar topi an, haatatli chatri udavnara

Paus astoch asa, suryalahi zakolnara,
dharevar barastanahi, sarvatra hahakar majavnara

Paus: Aathavanincha......

paus astoch asa, hava teva yenaara,
dolyatle khare paani, jagaapasun lapavnaara

paus astoch asa, kagadi hodyat ramnara,
balpaniche ole kshan, haati thevun janara

paus astoch asa, hrudayala bhidnara,
uri japalelya najuk aathvanna, algad jage karnara

paus astoch asa, mazya daarat padnaara,
dokyavarchya chhataachi, jaaniv karun denaara

paus astoch asa, smuriti jagya karnara,
mag aathvanincha rastahi, chimb chimb bhijavnara

Downtime............

They say every good thing has to come to an end and this Indian cricket team is no exception to it. An inspired West Indies team ended Indian cricket teams honeymoon by beating them 4-1 in just concluded one day series. Cricket is a game played in the minds and this time the Indian think tank had no answers to challenges put up by a mastermind call Brian Charles Lara.
A Windies tour has never been good for Indian team since the great Sunil Gavaskar retired but this time expectations were higher than ever before. This same Indian team had beaten Sri-Lanka, England at home, had ended South Africa's winning run in one-dayers and had beaten Pakistan in Pakistan. After all this triumph nobody would have even thought that West Indies will put any challenge to this almighty Indian line up.
It turned out to be most terrible display of cricket by talented Indian cricket team in recent history but I think West Indies never got the due praise for their success. It was not just a 4-1 one day series win; it was an insult of the greatest chasing team in the history of one day cricket. They were made to suffer back to back defeats while chasing and were made to look stupid when they were trying to post a good total. I think West Indies did their home work correctly and was rewarded for their hard work and sincere efforts.

Here are some key aspects that changed the face of the series.

1. Complacency: - India started the series as favorite’s and was a bit complacent. West Indies on the other hand had a new skipper in the form of Brian Lara (A courageous decision made by a brave cricket board. No cricket board has ever reelected somebody as captain at the age of 37) and had won a one day series 4-1 against the Zimbabwe. And still were found preparing very hard for this tour. The energy of the guys was amazing. Indians looked tired, loose, out of socks. Still nobody thought that West Indies stood any chance. This was a first mistake. Indian team management should know that India have even failed to beat poor Zimbabwe side on their own turf. They are poor, susceptible and venerable when they are asked to play on foreign land. Even the best of Indian teams in past 20 years have failed to do well abroad. But management was not in a mood to consider all these things while making their decisions.

2. Team Selection: - The first sign of poor history reading was shown by the team selected for the tour. Playing abroad needs experience and it was the same thing that Indian team lagged. Their persistence to leave out players like Ganguly, Laxman, Kumble and Zaheer did a lot of harm. Amongst the people named above, I thought Laxman should have been included in the team. I can agree that Laxman is not great when it comes to running between the wickets and fielding. But he is a class batsman who has scored runs against all oppositions. His slow but confident innings would have been enough to get winning totals for us in West Indies on those slow pitches.
Another brain masterpiece was shown by Kiran More and his men when they dropped the only inform Indian bowler Ajit Agarkar for test matches and to make matters worse they declared this in the middle of One Day series. This would have surely given great confidence to that poor chap. Justification given to drop him was sick to say the least.He (Mr. Kiran More) said “yes, we are happy that he is back in form. We are really happy for him but given his past record we thought that he is not good for test matches.” Wow! What an answer. Sometimes I wonder from where they find such silly answers. I guess if Hitler was around he would have been proud of this selection committee.

3. Mr. Coach: - The revolution caught fire by Coach Greg Chappell’s comments. He made the famous mistake again. He underestimated the Lions and made comments against a side that is known to bounce back when are not given due respect. Best example of that was in 1996 world cup when they suffered a defeat at the hands of Kenya and then bounced back to beat favorites South Africa, again thanks to one man named Brian Charles Lara. He has been the leader of all the fight-backs and I as a cricket fan, have witnessed some outstanding innings from him when his team has looked down and out, inspiring others to perform at their level best.

4. Utility Cricketers: - This time Windies side was not as poor as everybody thought. Any good one day team has good all-rounders and this time they had a bunch of them. Bravo, Smith, Gayle, Samuels and Bradshaw. Their batting actually looked like a typical South African batting line up with lots of all-rounder’s starting as early as no 5 in the batting lineup. They are called utility cricketers now days and make a difference between average and good side. We need not go anywhere to exemplify this law. The reason for the Indian team’s recent success is these utility players. Players like Pathan, Dhoni, Kaif, Raina, Powar, Agarkar and Sehwag. The term specialist batsman or bowler doesn’t hold any significance in One day cricket now. What matters is ability of players to adapt to conditions and their ability to contribute in each facet of game. This time Indian utility players didn’t click while Windies players did. Dhoni and Pathan couldn’t live up to expectation and they were found wanting in terms of adaptability and responsibility. They were not ready to curve their natural instincts and play according to situations. One major change was inability to surprise opposition team with changes. Dravid never gave ball to Sehwag until final match, Powar and Agarkar never got promotions in the batting line up to show their talent with bat. There was no new batsman promoted up the order. For that matter even tried and tested hero’s like Dhoni never got a chance to play long innings by batting up the order. Only Pathan and Raina played at no 3 which is the most important batting position and most of the batting line up remained same throughout the tournament. This meant that opposition always knew what they had to do and were not made to think and change their plan. Shift of opposition team from plan A to B or C is sign of them going on defensive and means that you can still continue your plan A and dictate terms to them. This never happened in five matches.

5. Pitches: - Another key aspect in this series was the 22 yard strips. Lara’s experience helped him a lot here. He went back to basic’s and realized that Indian batsman like to play on the up (on the rise) and are at their best when they get a pitch where they can drive easily. So he asked curators to make pitches slow and low. But not slow and low as in India, they were a bit sluggish which meant there will be something for bowlers if they bowl it right areas and at the same time batsman cant go bang bang from word go because ball will hold on surface a bit longer than normal. They will have to settle in, bide some time at the center and then play their shots. But even then they couldn’t play their forcing drives and elegant flicks because the bowl was coming slow from the surface. So we saw Sehwag, Kaif, Raina being caught at cover and extra cover region and saw Dhoni dragging balls on to the stumps. Plus West Indies bowlers pitched the ball just short of good length which meant for on the rise drives ball never came of the sweetest part of the bat. The shots were coming from upper part of the blade and hence never had power to clear infield and meant chip shots over cover and over the head of mid-wicket fielder were very difficult as were the pull shots in front of the wicket (favorite shots of Dhoni, Pathan and Yuvraj).
Slow pitches also meant that Windies batsman could play their favorite back foot forcing drives and cuts. It also meant that they had time to counter Pathan’s swing and could play Harbhajan and Powar from back foot after the ball spins.

So in short Windies team had done their analysis, had the design ready and most importantly they executed it even more brilliantly. Indian team on the other hand was not at par to the home team with respect to their thinking and planning. The seriousness of the preparations can be understood from the fact that India’s support staff went on leave before tour for a month. This meant they never had the analysis of Windies players ready. Salute to such Coach and team management. They are leading the team in right direction (downward direction).
I don’t write this just because team has lost the series; I write this because they never looked like winning. It is very disheartening to see such good team loose this way. Champions never do these mistakes and if some team does this mistake again and again then they are not Champions. I write this because history will say that the great success this Indian team has got is a fluke and I cannot agree with that at all. I write this because these are some mistakes if not corrected can cause a lot of damage to Indian cricket.

Sandwiched..........

On a lazy Sunday afternoon I and my friends were planning to go for a movie. As usual the discussions heated up with everybody thinking movie of his choice is the best. So fed up of the office life were we bachelors that we decided to go for a neutral movie. For once the decision was made and we found ourselves at movie theater for a marathi movie "Sarivar Sari" .
Marathi movies nowadays are seeing golden days thanks to the multiplexes. This was also evident there. The movie was running for at least for 4 weeks and is still going strong.
All of us knew only one thing about the movie and that was "it's a serious movie". Yet we had heard good reports so were positive about it.
It turned out to be a good decision and we witnessed something that could make an insensitive bunch of people like us think about it seriously, that too in that Sunday party mood.
The film is a story of a lower middle class or a poor family, which includes of a couple and their two daughters. The man in the family works in some firm to earn the living for their family. The elder daughter is very intelligent, hardworking and is pursuing MBBS. The younger one is a typical naughty, bold, bubbly girl of a family who is not so good in studies but is interested in entertainment industry.
Her parents are traditional and cannot understand and accept this. One day she does a fashion show in college for which she buys coustumes from a boutique on condition that she will do a photo shoot with them for their advertisement. It doesn’t stop there but the store owner also gives her photos to an ad film director who offers her contract.
From here starts a new journey in this family’s life. A fight between family and values, a fight between old and new generation, a fight between family and career starts and takes their family by storm. The girl leaves home and goes ahead with her modeling contract. Gets reasonable success in the career but meets people there whom she cannot totally trust. She starts feeling alone and her family is the only support she can find. The family on the other side starts feeling her absence, her father drinks more, behaves strangely and the family starts going through torrid time.
Both the sides realize how incomplete their life is without the other and hence their
significance, finally trying to understand the other side’s views. Finally an incident breaks the ice and the girl comes home not leaving her career but asks family for their support for whatever she is doing. She expects them to say that they are with her in whatever she does. She tells them she has not been defeated or that she has lost the will to fight, but says that she feels everything incomplete without their support and appreciation. She also tells them that now she is going to do a nude photo shoot with international company and asks them for their support. Unexpectedly her father who even opposed her dancing in the colony gives her unconditional support.
The film ends there but leaves many questions behind. A question that every teenager wants to ask, not just to themselves but to their parents as well. What is a definition of successful career? Is it a career chosen by the parents who most probably will choose a traditional career or a career that they themselves want to pursue?
The big question is how many people in India are satisfied with what they do? How many of them think that they are best fitted for the job that they are doing? How many think that whatever they are earning is good?
Hardly few will give a positive answer to this. Most of the times people land up doing something not because they want to do it but because they make earning out of it.
Parents today will always tell you go to school, study hard, to get good marks and to become an engineer or a doctor. Very few will willing advice them to go ahead with the career that they would think is best for them.
I here don’t say that every child in India knows what he wants to do but surely a good 30 % know what they want to do. If they had been given the freedom, India would not be so backward in every department.
One more question that continues to come to mind is, Is this new generation so bad that they will never want to listen to their family or They are so forward that they wont understand the tradition or They are so selfish that they wont understand the importance of family in their life? I think answer to these questions is NO.
No one willingly wants to go against their family. Nobody wants to something just to hurt their family and I think everybody is quite aware of the fact that without family’s support their biggest win is also a biggest loss.
I think the time has come when parents need to sit with their children, discuss the career options and also tell them what are their expectations from their children and at the same time listen to what their child thinks, understand what he or she wants and come out with the best possible option.
Also at the same time I feel the time has come when children also tell their parents what they want instead of just expecting them to understand. Also they need to be able to find a golden mean of traditions and their aspirations. They need to realize that parents have seen this world more than them and hence will talk sense no matter how conservative they might look.
May be a hope against the hopes, but I would love to see everybody saying “This is what I always wanted” rather than “This is life, you have to live it as it comes”.

Sun Blacked Out !!!

It was a day when people realised that their GOD is no longer blessing them the way he used to.
It was a day when pepple realised that making a Man GOD has its own disadvantages.
It was a day when one man lost all that he had earned in his life.
It was a day when history repeated itself and whispers were heard loud and clear.
It was a day when a legend looked ordinary and game looked very cruel.
It was a day when Sun was blacked out and only time will tell if it was temparory or is it time to go in the arms of darkness.
It was a day when The Great Sachin Tendulkar had to take something that he has never seen before.
It was the same day when,and it was the same stand and deliver cover shot of his which has alteast given him 4000 international runs, brought on his downfall.
Stunned by reality, many started believing that the best of sachin is History now.

The same ground saw a 16 year teenager making his maiden first class century , the same ground which saw a 25 year old making his first first class double century , it was the same ground that has given him all the fame and support and today it is a same ground that has given him an unwanted gift.

World will look at it as Black day in Indian Sports History and a nation that has been known to pull down its own heros has again proved again and After almost 25000 runs and all records , the games great still has to prove himself.

Talk of his retirement is now everybodys favourite subject and games former greats are also speaking the same.Comments like "He know when to Retire" are enough indicators that even people who have been through this believe that Sachin has to call it a day.

With Age,injuries,luck all not on his side and the walk to pavilion on sunday was surely the Longest for sachin, as long as 17 long years of his international carrer.

As the man himself approches his 33rd birthday, he is too old for people who has seen him from a tender age of 16 and have seen him taking all attacks apart. 33 is too old for people who have seen this man score a century in every third innings and half century evey second innings. 33 is also too old for people who have seen him dominate bowlers like no one else has before and 33 is also too old for people who have seen him hitting even the best of balls and best of the bowlers to all parts of ground.

This age of 33 is also too old for people who are consistently seeing their Hero failing and more importantly not looking like rising from ashes. 33 is also too old for people who are not used to see their man getting out to ordinary bowlers and to ordinary balls. May be 33 is really too old.

Ironically his caption is capturing all the glory for right reasons and is now being considered better than him. For a man who has single handedly carried Indian Cricket for last 16 years , doubts like "Is he really great" are being raised. For whom greatness was attached as early at the age of 25, he has to ragain all that he has lost.

Indian people certainly have very short memory. They wont remember any of his record, they wont think of his abilities, they will not think of his influence on the game and the team ,they will not think of any of his injuries , they wont think of anything but results. They say "Form is temparory and class is permenent" may be they need to reminded of that.

Certainly it is not the right time to retire. Retiring now will always leave behind tag of failure and label of being Just another one who has played the game. And amidst all the man himself is quite and for sure will let his bat do all the talking as it has always done.

People who still want to talk about him have to aware of what happened to people who dared to comment on him. If not go ask Shane Warne, McGrath, Caddick, Akhtar, Murli and all who had just maid passing comments on his abilities. Those people then had nightmares and some people now seem to be heading towards that only.

Till the time he silences his all critics and says bye to cricket field as the best player that has ever played the game, i am sure the the man himself will not be happy as wont be his millions and millions of fans.