Deep Backward Point

Kartikeya at A Cricketing View analyzes the possibility of a team choosing a tactical defeat in the remaining four games:

In this post, I contemplate a few tactical defeats . A tactical defeat is one in which a team which has a realistic chance of winning, chooses to lose a game by resting key players, or simply by experimenting with batting orders and bowling orders, and letting the other side win in the interest of their position in the tournament. Australia, Pakistan, India, South Africa and West Indies all have this opportunity. [..]

Tactical defeats are unlikely to be of benefit to any side over the remaining three significant games.

Even though he makes a thorough analysis, he’s wrong. There is one team that can strategically benefit from a defeat– India. They will know the result of all other matches and can choose who to face based on a win or defeat.

∞

Kartikeya is also trying to put together the top team compiled from players at the World Cup based on voting– go vote!

Sharda Ugra writes what I was going to, but better:

In the last 12 months, [..]  Harbhajan has nine wickets with an economy rate of 4.30, but an average and strike rate that has gone through the floor of his career figures.

At the World Cup so far, it’s two scalps in four games, with an economy rate of 4.07. Were his role just to contain, in this age of heavy bats, small grounds and Twenty20 attitudes, the economy rate could be something he could boast about. For a strike bowler not to be striking, though, is an indication that something is blunted.

Dhoni’s argument is that the batsmen have been content with seeing him off, and then taking on Yuvraj. Which is why Harbhajan is economical, and Yuvraj gets the wickets.

It’s a sound argument, and one that Sangakkara may be trying to make with respect to Muralitharan as well. And as long as India is winning, the argument will stand unchallenged.

As long as India is winning.