The Twenty20 World Cup has already started and the hype that existed before the ODI World cup is missing. I haven’t quite warmed up to the event yet and I am not sure whether it is just me – maybe the interest will start growing once India starts its first game. As Mohan pointed out, India’s chances in the tournament aren’t great and although I think we will get into the Super 8s(!) this time, I don’t see a future much beyond that – but Twenty20 games can be very unpredictable and lets hope India do proceed to the knock out stages. The things not in India’s favour are -
- Fielding
- Batting
- Bowling
- Lack of coach
Have I missed anything 
?? Jokes apart, India’s key strength would be its batting (in spite of the absence of the big 3) and everything rests on the shoulders of the likes of Sehwag, Yuvraj and its new captain Dhoni.
Here are the team previews from CricInfo:
| Group A | Group B | Group C | Group D |
| South Africa | Australia | New Zealand | Pakistan |
| West Indies | England | Sri Lanka | India |
| Bangladesh | Zimbabwe | Kenya | Scotland |
The Matches for India are:
| Date | Against | Venue |
| 13/09 | Scotland | Wanderers, Jo’burg |
| 14/09 | Pakistan | Kingsmead, Durban |
| 16/09 * | New Zealand | Wanderers, Jo’burg |
| 19/09 * | England | Kingsmead, Durban |
| 20/09 * | South Africa | Kingsmead, Durban |
(* likely Super8 schedule)
Here is the Indian team:
- MS Dhoni (c)
- Yuvraj Singh (vc)
- Ajit Agarkar
- Gautam Gambhir
- Harbhajan Singh
- Joginder Sharma
- Dinesh Karthik (wk)
- Irfan Pathan
- Yusuf Pathan
- Piyush Chawla
- Virender Sehwag
- Rohit Sharma
- Rudra Pratap Singh
- S Sreesanth
- Robin Uthappa
-Mahesh-
3 responses so far ↓
palambrugge // 13 September 2007 at 1:54 am |
T20 will throw up some mighty hitters. Like field Hockey, cricket is quickly entering the stage where brute force will take over. Top teams will have three or four players of outstanding physical ability, who can score at 10 runs per over. For them swing and spin will be antiquated. The day is not far when the first day score in a test match would be around 600! (Note it moved from 200 to 350 after the introduction of ODIs.) Captains may hesitate to enforce follow on with a lead of over 700 runs (scoring around 1000 runs by tea on the second day in their first innings)
sampath kumar // 13 September 2007 at 10:30 am |
Schoolboy XI from Zimbabwe has just beaten the Aussie juggernaut!! So much for atom by atom analysis of the competition by the experienced and the inexperienced commentators and analysts!!
Or is it shades of Irish win over Pakis–Ex coach John Buchanan might have had premonition of this happening and hence jumped the ship early!!!!
blogesh // 13 September 2007 at 5:18 pm |
Honestly I didn’t expect too many surprises in the tournament in the Group matches. Australia’s defeat, however is not a surprise result, it is a shock result! It was like David bringing down Goliath.
Imagine if England beat Australia in the other match – they could end up like India/Pakistan in the WC. Baptism of fire for Tim Nielsen, their new coach…