Column | Deep Backward Point

Patel bowls to Patel

Imran Tahir by megara_rp via Flickr

This is perhaps an obvious point, but I’d like to belabor it here:

The captain of Canada is named Ashish (and they have Rizwan, Nitish, Parth and yes, a Patel)
Kenya has a Patel
England, of course, has Ravi and Ajmal
South Africa has Hashim and Imran
West Indies has Ravi, Ramnaresh and Shivnarine

This is diaspora.

Cricket’s growth around the world in the past, such as it has been, was largely due to the Raj. The future may be in the hands of the diaspora.

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My Predictions for the World Cup

Ok– so this is part whimsy, part wishful thinking and part serendipity.

Group A Ranking:

Australia
Sri Lanka
Pakistan
New Zealand

Group B Ranking:

South Africa
India
England
West Indies (though I’d just as easily say Bangladesh, but I think Ireland may beat Bangladesh which will negate another Bangladesh upset.)

QUARTER FINALS

Australia v West Indies
Sri Lanka v England
Pakistan v India
New Zealand v South Africa

SEMI FINALS

Australia v India
Sri Lanka v South Africa

FINALS
India
v
Sri Lanka

WINNER
India

At least, that’s what I came up with while playing Cricinfo’s Predict the Winner. And even I don’t agree with it.

And it’s in complete contradiction with what I thought was the best path for India to get to the final.

The Best of the Rest, and Other Lessons From the Warm-Up Games

Everyone is curious about those other cricket-playing countries once every four years. Look how cute the Bermuda team looks in their bright blues. Is Obuya a common name in Kenya? Has Mugabe ruined Zimbabwe yet? They play cricket in Canada? And so forth.

Here’s a handy guide to the best of the rest, based on what happened at the warm-up games this week:

The Best of the Rest: The World Cup Warm-Up Games

Everything clear now?

You will notice, I left Bangladesh out. I think they are a cut above the rest, but they regularly prove me wrong.

Here are the lessons we gained from the warm-up matches this week. You know, the warm-up matches that everyone assures us mean nothing. Except when they win.

Canada beat Netherlands. Afghanistan beat Canada. Kenya beat Afghanistan. Netherlands beat Kenya. Ireland beat Zimbabwe, and Zimbabwe beat Ireland. The associates are a most exciting bunch, but only when they play among themselves.
Ireland came close to chasing 300 against New Zealand. Canada came close to beating England. Upsets in the World Cup seem inevitable.
India Proved they could win a match with the bat as well as the ball.
New Zealand’s bowlers enter the World Cup with even less confidence than they had before. Giving up 360 to India is one thing, but 279 to Ireland is criminal. At this point, I wouldn’t mind trading New Zealand and West Indies for a couple of promising associate countries on the international calendar.
Australia is in trouble. Plain and simple. They couldn’t take a wicket against South Africa in 46 overs. They couldn’t get past 217 in two attempts. Of course, I’ve said it before, I wouldn’t bet against them. The format of the World Cup allows them to be mediocre for the first four weeks, and surge towards the end. And the Australians can surge.

1 Comment

February 15, 2011

The 2nd-Most Awesome Thing Ever Said About Javed Miandad

Miandad and More

There is a story, perhaps apocryphal, about Sunil Gavaskar’s wife. She was once asked who her favorite batsman was. Here’s what she said:

If I wanted someone to bat for my pleasure, I would ask my husband. If I needed someone to bat for my life, I would ask Javed Miandad.

This captures much of what I feel about many things. For example, the iPhone (or the Mac) for pleasure over Android (or Linux) for my life.

∞

This is only the second-most awesome thing anyone has ever said about Javed Miandad. The most awesome was Rashid Latif in Outlook magazine. Latif claimed that, sure, Miandad fixed matches. But only to win them.

Which is patently ridiculous, but awesome all the same. Fixing a match to win it is worse than fixing to lose, because fixing to win means that all the other times you weren’t being paid, you weren’t putting in one hundred percent.

∞

Remember Outlook’s series of match-fixing exposés? They were Tehelka before Tehelka. They were News of the World before News of the World.

Manoj Prabhakar, for his part, claimed that Kapil Dev fixed a match. This brought about the second-most famous incident of cricket related crying, when Kapil cried for Karan Thapar on BBC.

∞

The most famous incident of cricket related crying was Vinod Kambli at Eden Gardens at the World Cup semi-finals.

The rest of the country would have been crying with him, if they had looked up from the burning effigies in their backyard.

3 Comments

February 10, 2011

How to Read the Redacted ICC Pakistan Spot-Fixing Report

The ICC, apparently, has no computer skills. To read the “redacted” parts of the ICC spot-fixing report:

Download the PDF from ICC
Upload it to your Google Docs account
Click “View as HTML”

That’s all. Oh, and the form to download the PDF doesn’t care what information you fill in. And then it gives you a direct link to the PDF. If I was younger and more adventurous, I would put the link to the PDF here.

2 Comments

February 6, 2011

The Sachin Tendulkar Era: Part I

One Hundred and Thirty Nine cricketers have represented India in One Day Internationals since Sachin Tendulkar made his debut against Pakistan in November 1989.

This is their story.

The Sachin Era- Part I

[Click for larger version] [Click for PDF with ability to zoom all the way in on every name]

Acknowledgements: Created with the help of Cricinfo Statsguru, Wordle, MS Excel, custom Python scripts and Acorn.

2 Comments

January 31, 2011

India’s Path to the World Cup Finals

Never Again.

The Cricket World Cup is still three weeks away, but it’s never too early to lay out a hypothetical situation.

The Group of Death
The fourteen teams competing in the World Cup are divided into two groups. The top four in each will make it to the quarter-finals.

First, take a look at the two groups:

Group B	Group A
Bangladesh England India Ireland Netherlands South Africa West Indies	Australia Canada Kenya New Zealand Pakistan Sri Lanka Zimbabwe

One of these things is not like the other. Clearly, based on recent form, Group B is the group of death.

100 Hundred Overs = 98 Ad Breaks
Thankfully for the members of Group B, cricket is ruled by a powerful few, and their television revenues. The ICC cannot afford (another) World Cup where the most popular teams fail to make it to the later rounds. For this reason, four teams from each group will qualify for the next round– which should make sure most, if not all, of the high advertising-revenue countries will play the quarter-finals.

Note: Of course, major upsets are always possible, as we saw in 2003. And 2007. Just ask Bob Woolmer. In all seriousness, statistically, a single upset among eight teams is likely. If I had to guess, Bangladesh could beat West Indies to a quarter-final slot. Pakistan, New Zealand and India also have the tendency to vastly under or over-perform, but never meet expectations.

So, in all likelihood, the usual suspects will make it to the quarter-finals. For sake of argument, my nominal prediction:

A1: Australia
A2: Sri Lanka
A3: New Zealand
A4: Pakistan
B1: South Africa
B2: India
B3: England
B4: West Indies

For the most part, the ranking within the group does not matter. You could come fourth in your group, and still make the quarter-finals. Except, if you’re in Group B, this will likely mean you have an early date with Australia.

[Note: And no one wants an early date with Australia. Not even New Zealand. They live next door, they would know.]

On the other hand, a top-three place within Group B would (likely) ensure avoiding Australia until at least the semi-final. The other three potential opponents are deadly on their day– and Sri Lanka in the sub-continent can be lethal– but if I had to choose when to meet Australia, I would choose the finals.

[Note: In reality, I would choose never, or when the moon turned blue, or when Ponting returns to form.]

[Note: Note to self: never bet against Ponting.]

Location, Location, Location
There is another wrinkle in the story.

If India finish second or fourth in their group, they play their quarter-finals in Dhaka, Bangladesh.

If India finish third in their group, they play in Colombo, Sri Lanka. If, simultaneously, Sri Lanka finish second in their group India play Sri Lanka in Colombo. Short of playing Australia, this is probably the second worst-case quarter-final scenario.

Here’s the best case: If India finish at the top of their group, they play at Sardar Patel Stadium in Ahmedabad, India. India does not have a terrific One Day record in Ahmedabad (winning only five of twelve), but they would prefer a home ground to Dhaka or Colombo any day.

[Note: India has a better record at Dhaka, but that’s only because they played Bangladesh. The three times they have lost were to Sri Lanka and Pakistan. India’s recent record at the Premadasa in Colombo, isn’t too bad either. They have defeated Sri Lanka five of the last seven times in the past two years.]

As an added benefit, the winner here would play their semi-final in Mohali instead of Colombo. And everybody loves Mohali, right? Right?

[Note: India have lost their last three ODIs in Mohali.]

#1, #1. #1
In short, while the early stages of the World Cup are largely meaningless (as they have been for some time), there are a few minor goals to shoot for.

If they finish in the top three in their group, India may be able to avoid Australia. For now.

If the they finish on top, they have the home advantage and most likely avoid Australia until the finals. And avoid a repeat of 2003. And hope someone else beats Australia before them.

1 Comment

January 24, 2011

The Curse of the Pakistani Cricket Captain

Imran Khan & Javed Miandad

Let’s first get this out-of-the-way– in my opinion, Pakistan has been the most entertaining cricket team of my lifetime.

Ok. On to business.

Bumbai mei khelte hain, Imran se darte hain

As with all good filmi melodrama, this story begins with a Khan.

In 1987, after the World Cup, two subcontinental heroes retired from cricket– Sunil Gavaskar and Imran Khan.

Sunny ascended to the commentary box. Imran got a call from the General– Imran Khan returned to cricket in 1988 at Zia ul-Haq’s behest.

(Note: Zia is the first, but by no means the last ul-Haq in our tale.)

At the age of 39, Imran Khan led his scrappy team to their first World Cup victory and promptly retired. Again.

Musical Chairs

And Pakistan cricket was never the same again. Over the next three years, Javed Miandad, Saleem Malik, Rameez Raja, Wasim Akram, Waqar Younis, Moin Khan and Saeed Anwar had all been One Day International (ODI) captains. What’s worse, they all had to coexist on the same team. In the mid 90’s, Pakistan was a team full of former captains.

Here is the list of all Pakistan ODI captains since Imran (criteria: captained > 5 ODIs):

Javed Miandad (’92-’93)
Saleem Malik (’92-’95)
Rameez Raja (’92-’97)
Wasim Akram (’93-’00)
Waqar Younis (’93-’03)
Moin Khan (’95-’01)
Saeed Anwar (’95-’00)
Aamer Sohail (’96-’98)
Rashid Latif (’98-’03)
Inzamam-ul-Haq (’02-’07)
Mohammad Yusuf (’03-’10)
Younis Khan (’05-’09)
Shoaib Malik (’07-’09)
Shahid Afridi (’09-’11)

That’s fourteen captains in nineteen years. To contrast, Pakistan had played ODIs for nineteen years before Imran retired. In those years (’73-92), they only had ten captains— and only four that captained more than 5 matches, which has been our criteria so far. Four captains for the first nineteen years, fourteen for the next.

Compare with the rest of the teams in the same (’92-’11) period:

Australia: 8
India: 7
South Africa: 6
England: 11
New Zealand: 9
West Indies: 9
Sri Lanka: 6
Zimbabwe: 10

England comes close, mostly due to their post-Vaughan, pre-Strauss dithering.

And we haven’t even started to talk about Test cricket yet.

Except for short periods of stability, Pakistan has always had a captaincy crisis. The problem is even worse in Test cricket, where captaincy is generally a long-term anointment. Even in the long form of the game, Pakistan has had fourteen captains since Imran, while England has had seven, NZ and Australia five, Sri Lanka and India six. [Criteria for test captains is more than three tests as captain.]

And now, the Pakistan Cricket Board has announced a team, but no captain for the World Cup next month. Will it be Shahid Afridi? Or the third ul-Haq of our tale– the plucky Misbah? Perhaps, the PCB will decide they need a break from captains. Who could blame them?

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Deep Backward Point

Category: Column

February 20, 2011