Season begins... "BIG BANG"

This Ranji season is likely to occupy more space than usual. Thanks to the new format, thanks to all the stars taking part in the opener, by all means it is welcome sign for domestic cricket.

But the important question, “Will the Selectors take the domestic performances seriously into consideration?”

Please excuse. I’m not making a mockery of domestic cricket. It is just that, I’ve not seen a single player from Rajasthan decorating the Indian dressing room, despite the side won back to back titles in the past 2 years.

Anyways, the Day 1 of the season has brought cheers starting with Tendulkar Ton. After a long time, Tendulkar slammed a century and Rahane looks solid with an unbeaten 104. I won’t be surprised if Rahane goes on to complete double ton tomorrow. Irfan Pathan delivered a very important hundred for Baroda. Umesh Yadav bagged 5, only to route Haryana for 55. Last but not the least, the power packed Delhi line up flopped. All Gambir, Sehwag, Chand, Kohli failed to score even a half century. I chose to ignore the performances of Imtiaz Ahmed, Parthiv Patel or any others as their brevity is unlikely to impact the national selection.

Surprisingly, Tendulkar batted at No.5 for Mumbai while Kohli batted No.4 for Delhi. I may be reading too much into this, but it looks to me that both these players will be settling into these new slots starting England series. This must be a planned move (may be after the New Zealand Series) and the dress reharsal began in the Ranji opener. By all means, it is definitely a right move in the right direction.

Interestingly, Yuvraj Singh did not feature in the Punjab line up. There could be a minor injury though that might have prevented the south paw from action, but the probability is more that he already sealed his spot in the test line up and taking a little break ahead of the big series. I’ve already expressed my squad for the England series and also took a guess on selector’s choice. Again, it will only be a disappointment if selectors don’t replace Gambir, Zaheer and Chawla with Rahane, Irfan and Harmeet Singh to say the least. Ofcourse, Raina lost his place is a no brainer.

Rumors are floating that Ganguly could stage yet another come back with his appearance in IPL 6. This time it could be for Deccan Sun (the franchise has not given a name yet, until then I chose to give them a name myself). The Deccan Sun are trying to rope the duo of Ganguly and John Wright that brought big success to Indian Cricket. The odds are good that this rumor could turn true. After all, franchises make good chunk of money from the gate and the new blokes on the field wont wish to be left behind. And you need the aura of Sourav Ganguly to pull crowd to the stadium. Also the current Deccan side (based on their previous performances in the last few IPLs), lack the capacity and magic to pull crowd. Glad Maran understands the trick and ropes DADA.

Bottom line: Gearup for DADAGIRI…

Dinesh

Cricket Lover