Freddie's Flop Show

Well, well.  IPL season 2 is for sure gonna be a absolute humdinger.Previous year's  super stars are now facing the heat.  Deccan seems to  have got the rhythm going this time around and the daredevil's are some serious contenders for the golden trophy.  The royal challengers have gotten onto their old habbit of loosing whereas mumbai indians are definitely a better outfit.   The defending champ Royals are  hampered by the absence of tanvir, watson and   Grame smith's loss of form hasnt helped them either. The  'Reloaded' Knight riders - lost a close game with yusuf  pathan  delivering a severe blow to their victory chances in a sensational super over. Punjab - Let the rain gods  spare them. I think all punjab matches could be shifted to chennai, to make sure we have a complete 20-20 game.

So that leaves us with chennai. Well at this juncture i've got mixed opinions about them. They seem to be strong on paper, websites and other possible media whereas, they are definitely lacking the firepower towards the death, as i had mentioned in my previous writeup. The unit clicked against the lacklustre  bangalore but then freddie was really benevolent as he  opened the flood gate for the daredevils, towards the end overs.  These crucial runs  really hurt  csk, and  next time around Dhoni should give a serious thought before tossing the ball upto Freddie towards the end.  He's not yet learnt the trick of the IPL trade.  Fielding also wasn't up to the mark. Albie's drop of his team mate de villiers proved too costly.  And one can't hide the feeling that therez the absence of a buzz in the unit, in the field, compared to the other teams.

During the chase aginst the daredevils, Hayden gave us the perfect start. However he could have  gone on a lil fiurther.Freddie again played a real useless  shot  and god only knows what dhoni was trying to do with that  vettori delivery. Raina's heroics weren't enough and  the fact that vettori still had an over at death , made things worse. He conceded only 8 runs and there were few mindless run outs as well. Albie is a mere shadow of his his past year performances. Just not his day perhaps and CSK's as well.

So that leaves us with just 2 points with  3 matches  and the 5 th position in the table, at the time of writing. But then lets not forget that csk was in a pretty much similar situation, last time around, when the foreigners left for their national duty after the initial matches.  Even though they lost to the daredevil's today, they can take heart from the fact that they almost made a match of it, by notching up 180.  They are facing the desperate  kinght riders tomorrow. Should be a cracker of a contest this. Last season, it was the CSK that halted the kolkata juggernaut, but this time around they just have to rub salt on KKR's wounds. 

IPL Season 2 - Did we miss the wily fox ?

Been a long time since the last post.  Now IPL season 2 has given me a lota things to ponder about and scribble as well.  Being an ardent fan of the CSK , the first thing i would sorely miss out is the buzz around the chepauk stadium. Had the IPL been staged in india it would have been a different story altogether. Hmm.. neways no point in talking about suppositions.  

Well, the very first match, your home team playing, a saturday evening , who could have ever asked for more. First 10 overs, having had the  mumbaikars  at 65/1, i fancied my chances. Not so after the next 10 overs but, where that tea kada nair really came in and spoiled  every single dream of mine.  Neither did the piece of commentary "How many ever millions worth, u might be, but if you are gonna bowl half volleys like that at death, you are gonna be taken to the cleaners" , from ravi, when freddie offered those dollies to nair,  did any iota of good to my sombre  mood.

The second half was virtually over after hayden departed,  falling victim to a wonderfully anticipated grab from zak.  Mighty matty meant business right from ball one (well, except while handling the 'same old 'obnoxious weed' bhajji).  This giant's ferocious shots continued to amaze me and the immediate thought that flashed my mind was the kangaroos are definitely gonna miss his services in the upcoming ashes. But then the  life  he gave to sachin , earlier in the day,  was the "citi moment of failure" for me. 

I don really understand y the csk unit is clinging on to joginder sharma. He cant be a hero every day and he has nothing special  at all to  grab attention. The veteran murali should have taken his place instead. His absence was so palpable  when bhajji  made things so diffcult  for csk, freddie in particular.  Though freddie made 20 odd runs, he never really looked settled. He was constantly swishing his bat at everything and had a coupla awkward boundaries, for which even he himself couldn suppress a chuckle.

The difference between the two units was cleary bhajji and his parsimonious spell.  Its pretty blatant that the spinners  have held the aces in almost every contest till now(wat a coincidence, as i write this , vettori has been decided as the mom in contest 3).  Hope CSK learn from their mistake and  let joginder carry drinks and other cricketing paraphernalia alone. Time indeed for the wily fox to spin a web.