Monthly Archives: January 2009

When to Take the Batting Powerplays

The most recent innovation in one-day cricket has turned matches upside down. I am referring to the new Batting Powerplays which can be taken by the batting team at any time they want. Before that, as we all know, the … Continue reading

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Cricket Fiascos: England v. South Africa, 1992 World Cup Semifinal

You don’t get a lot of games when the team you have been supporting for the entire match wins, but suddenly you don’t feel like cheering for them anymore. The 1992 World Cup semifinal between England and South Africa was one … Continue reading

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Book Cricket

Book cricket was a form of cricket that was very popular for a time in the Indian sub-continent, mainly the main Test playing nations of India and Pakistan. As Krish Ashok explains, The classic version of this game a involved … Continue reading

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Australia Bested by South Africa Again

A mini-resurgence by Australia in the T20 matches turned out to be a mirage, as South Africa wins the ODI series with one match still to go. Echoes of how they won the Test series by the second match itself. … Continue reading

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The Not Out Man

Michael Bevan was one of the best ODI batsmen ever. During his career, he repeatedly pulled Australia out of the fire, sometimes playing with the tailenders, and dragging them over the finish line. Bevan ended up with almost 7000 runs … Continue reading

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The No Runners Game

Continuing on our posts on irregular cricket (tennis ball cricket and street cricket), we explore a specialty of such games: In many games, only one batsman will be playing and there will not be any runner at the other end. … Continue reading

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Lankan Passenger Hits Some Rare Form

The difference between the top teams and the rest is how many passengers they have. Some teams have genuine match-winners, but because they don’t have enough quality throughout the team, they do not sustain any winning form. West Indies and … Continue reading

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Why ODI Statistics are Worse Than Useless

Statistics are the bread-and-butter of sportswriters. Sports fans love how we can analyze the best players and teams in different conditions and times. Games like soccer provide very limited opportunities for statistical analysis. But cricket with its ball-by-ball action has … Continue reading

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Tennis Ball Cricket

As a follow-up to my post on street cricket, let me elaborate a bit on tennis ball cricket. As you would guess from the name, it is played exactly like cricket except that a tennis ball is used instead of … Continue reading

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Who will Retire this Year?

Last year, we saw a slew of retirements: Sourav Ganguly, Anil Kumble, Adam Gilchrist, Matthew Hayden, Brad Hogg, to name a few. India was able to handle the retirements well as they were already winning matches without the contributions of … Continue reading

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