Sports : life magnified

Whats comes of Dhoni in the future, only time can tell.

But no one can take this knock away from the jat who drinks 1 litre of milk a day!

Chasing 6 an over, the guy devastated the Lankan attack to make the score look like a 220. Usually when chasing such large scores, teams would scrape through in the very end overs. The fact that India won it comfortably shows exactly how brutal the inning was.

It is not as great as the inning played by Kapil Dev with India struggling versus Zimbabwe in 1983. Srikkanth compared the inning to innings which Viv Richards used to play.

One thing is for sure, the inning will be looked back upon as one of the great one day innings of all time.

Neil Pickup, one of the young cricket writers I like reading wrote this fine piece.

This is highly concerning indeed. Adam Gilchrist replacing Ian Healy will be looked at as a landmark selection move. A move which looked cold hearted as it denied Healy a record but Gilchrist proved his value in no time in the longer version. Players have played that role before too but that move was specially on the face as Healy is one of the finer keepers of the generation.

There was an article in Wisden years back worrying about the dilemna of a specialist keeper or a good keeper who can bat.

Where will the great keepers come?

How did Shane Warne come about when no one expected some one like him to turn up?

In test matches, the keeper can find a place if he can bat a bit. He does not have to be a great batsman. In one day cricket the role of the keeper is becoming more and redundant. This aspect is visible in test cricket as well but to a lower degree.

A keeper to inspire people to take up keeping seriously is tough to come by though if we look at it mechanically. But cricket has shown the greats prop up without much mechanism. Shane Warne as mentioned, Wasim Akram and the ilk.

We can only hope.