in our 20's

It ended recently and about to begin yet again !
At least for next few years, till the time our patience weakens to the level that we demand a 10-10, 20-20 will score high on and off the field !
Long ago, "Cricket" meant a 5 (6 befoe that) day game where the technique and skill of the player was put to test. Though these factor still count,One day games (50-50's)demanded speed and strength.The first ODI was played between Australia and England on 5 January 1971. World cricket,probably for the first time came into limelight thanks to Kerry Packer of the Nine network(his Australian television company)when a rebellious private cricket competition was held between 1977 and 1979for the widespread view that players were not paid sufficient amounts to make a living from cricket, and that Packer wished to secure the exclusive broadcasting rights to Australian cricket, then held by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). The Australian cricket board refused to accept Channel Nine's bid to get exclusive televsion rights to Australia's test matches in 1976,Packer went on to set up his own series secretly signing yhe likes of Tony Greig, Clive Lyoyd,Greg Chappel and Ian Chappel. World Series Cricket drastically changed the nature of cricket, and its influence continues to be felt today.
For 21'st century, this was not enough. In order to make 50-50 more interesting,new rules like "Power play" were introduced. As more money and glory kept coming to cricket (thanks to Asian nations),ICC held 20-20 Cricket world cup,in 2007.
Meanwhile another storm was taking shape in India's cricket world.
Subhash Chandra, after consistently failing to gain broadcat rights (despite of highest bids)for his Zee TV ( 2003 Cricket World Cup,court battle in 2004 and 2006 ICC Champions Trophy),followed Packer's path. (For our daddy's generation who grew up watching Test Cricket, it was Deja Vu). He responded by creating the Rs. 100 Crore ICL. “They denied us the cricket content,” said Himanshu Mody, business head of ICL and Zee’s sports, “so, we had to create our own content.”
However, ICL could not make it to peole's heart probably because it lacked resources and was not dear to all mighty BCCI. Even Kapil Da failed to cash his aura! See ,how times change....
One (good ?)thing ICL did wad to challenge and awaken BCCI. For the fear of losing it's monopoly, BCCI came back hard and rocking under Lalit Modi - the mind behind Indian Premiere League (IPL).
Fans saw everything. Teams based on geographic area, bidding of players,Celebrity owners,Iconic international players, money that would make a player compromise for his national team, cheerleaders,fireworks after matches (oh..) and breathtaking cricket action. Many local players got a chance (a 20-20 chance)to be acknowledged at international level.
Modi had luck with him, for sure. As India had recently won the 20-20 world cup, all fans vociferously welcomed this similar piece of game. Seeing our Indian mentality, had Shreesanth dropped that last catch, Modi's fate would be no different than Chandra's !!
IPL has took off and we have accepted it with its odds.It has not been all rosy for the owners for their money is at stake. Be it Malya last year or Shah rukh this year, there have been clashes with the players over performance. Maybe now cricket is to India what Football is to Europe - larger than life. IPL has provided for everyone: businessmen, actors,media,models,cheer-leaders and ofcourse cricketers, the cricket, the South African Economy (lols..).
Warne's lowest priced tean winning the first tournament and last years two back-benchers fightng for the crown this year : next year I bet on Knight Riders!!!

20-20 emerged when One day cricket is in it's late 20's. Hopefully, it won't die young.May all three generations of cricket live (or play) happily forever. And we don't need any future new-borns now (the 10-10s ,possibly).
The reader's of this blog are also in (or about)their 20's !! At our 20, we are seeing an incredible world! Let there be money in cricket as well as economy !!!
Meanwhile, 20 cheers for Cricket!


Silly Points: 1:Dhoni uses facebook on his Aircell when he is not modelling and playing. Someone needs to verify the truth.

2:Vodafone's Pug (the Doggy) is jealous of the Zoo-zoos for apparent reasons.

3:How many of you know, whats happeing in ICL?


4: Guess the smallest possible form of cricket and comment !! Let your imagination "Toss".....

We , the people !

We, the Citizens of world's largest democracy have elected our leaders for the 15th time !! At least, we can show off to the world by forcing these lines. Slightly more than half of us did not turn to vote, is just a statistics!!
There is an old joke : If pro is opposite of con, what is the opposite of progress? Still, (less than half)Indians did not dare take chances. One of the media-dear word "anti-incumbancy" did not show up ! Citizens (less than half, please remember)of India preferred to err on safer side. (Not taking any chance is habit in current economic crisis). Another good thing that happened is all the exit polls were proved false amd many "experts" were exposed, hushhh.. at least no tv channel can now hammer us with how accurate it's predictions were and how it alone can catch India's nerve.
Also, many icons will now be sitting at home, our beloved lalu, for example.And "Rahul baba" (as Shobhaa De put it) is in form.We are now sure to see more of him.(Hopefully, at personal level too!).
This time the government looks more stable with many hurdles "left" out! Whether it should not have been Congress is a different story, the best thing about the results is that a single party( with fewest pets) is going to be in power! Hopefully, that would make decision making easier at the government level. (who will take decisions, is open secret !!!).

Confession: I did not vote. (Actually , i wanted to, but I was not authorized to vote in Pune.By the next election, I don't know where I will be!! Is there any solution to this?)

Pessimism never won any battle. Like we are hopeful admist current economic crisis,let's hope for India Shining!

Though, nothing much will really change by this so called historical victory.
I loved this joke:

Mr. Singh, you're quite a charmer,
Looks like india has good karma,
This is better than obama !

Sorry, but you're gonna say "karma" with american accent [:p]

Silly Points :1: Because of elections and for the fact that IPL is moved out of India,no one cheers for cheerleaders !

2: Knight Riders are having nightmares. The owner, the coach and captain(s !!) scored only outside the ground. For them its now "Radalo, Haralo, Chalalo Re" (in Marathi) rather than "Korbo Lorbo Jitbo Re"(in Bengali) [:p]

Shahrukh, tu sprite pi !!!



(photo from TOI)