Indian Cricket Fan =)

Am just wondering how all the posts, photos, and video links on facebook would have been if India had lost terribly to the Aussies in the quarter finals with the batting order totally collapsing after Dhoni's dismissal

• Indian Team sucks and its because of Yuvi's terrible running between the wickets which costed Gambhir's wicket - otherwise India would have won.
• Mahendra Singh Dhoni has to take the full responsibility along with Gary Kirsten for having made the bad decision of not choosing Yusuf Pathan who had a played much more number of games in the tournament than Suresh Raina - Well, Dhoni this ain't the time of testing your team in a Knockout game against Arch Rivals Australia in a World Cup where India is one of the host nations
• Indian Bowlers seemed to be so ineffective in giving the extra 20 odd runs which ultimately led pressure build up on the Indian batsmen on a surface like that

Well, thats not all . Some solid Team India fans would go to the extent of saying the following -

• India's defeat against the Australians is solely because of the no good Indian Seemer " Ashish Nehra " , as it was he who made India lose to the South African side in the Group Stages which ultimately pushed India to position # 2 and thus we had to face and lose to the Defending Champions

Surely Team India has one bizarre fan Following =)

Musing On The News

I've been keeping tabs on the Japan situation over the last few days. For obvious reasons, this is on the front page of every news paper. There are lots of disturbing pictures, stories etc.

Those didn't really 'disturb' me as much as 1 piece of news did. The cyber scam industry has boomed post disaster. Suddenly all domains with 'japan' and 'tsunami' on them have been taken and millions of dollars of 'donations' have basically been whisked away by scammers.

It disturbs me that this is the extent to which people can go to for easy money.

- Suddenly, the many dying in Bahrain and Libya don't seem to matter as much

- God save the Japanese. The nuclear reactor situation looks bad. My prayers are with them..

- As I read the news papers every morning on the tube, I can clearly see why I decided to go for a newspaper less diet for many months. Life seemed more positive without pictures of amputated people and the like. That isn't to say there is NO positive press but hey, positive press is not 'sensational' and that doesn't make money.

- Money.. scams, bad press, banks, recession. Root of all evil? That, I can't say but definitely the cause of many evils.

- This disaster has reminded me once again that there are so many things that are just WAY beyond our control.. and has reminded me of the quote -

'Do what you can with what you have where you are'

True, so true.

Sachin Tendulkar-The GOD!

Sachin Tendulkar can get it right even with his eyes wide shut.

The Chennai heat was unbearable, most of the players had wrapped up the practice proceedings, but not Tendulkar. He put a couple of fielders within the net, asked bowling coach Eric Simons to give him throwdowns, and kept finding the gaps with his "eyes closed."

"He asked us to stand at short cover and short point and closed his eyes right at the moment of impact. We were supposed to say 'right' if the shot pierced the gap and 'wrong' if it didn't," one of the fielders who represented Tamil Nadu in the U-16 level and was fielding within the nets, told the TOI after the practice session. The player sounded really amazed when he said that Tendulkar kept getting it right, more often than not. "I don't know how he was doing it...But we couldn't believe our eyes as the ball went between us over and over again," the player added.

The pitch on which Tendulkar was batting was pretty similar to the Chepauk track, on which the match would be played on Sunday. "The ball was stopping and coming...The pace at which he asked the bowling coach to throw the balls, it appeared that he was getting ready to play Kemar Roach. And he is certain that there will be two fielders in short cover and short point to snap him up. That's why he was trying to play the shots along the ground and looked to find the gap with his eyes closed," the young player added.

When Tendulkar had started practising, some of the drives that he tried went into the air, which annoyed the Little Master. He had a talk with Simons and then asked the fielders to stand in those close in positions.

"It's an education watching him from so close. How on earth can a player get the shot right even with his eyes closed? Probably, it was a practice to ensure that he doesn't play a shot in the air on reflex on such tracks where the ball was stopping," the player added.

The 100th international century can very well come here, but the Little Master just doesn't want to talk about that milestone. The instruction was given strictly to all the practice bowlers that no one should ask him about the record for which the whole country is waiting.


-------

The man is 38 and has 20 years of experience. Yet,even after every single person in the team stops training,He continues practicing and does it with his eyes closed.
Its truly proved that NOTHING IS IMPOSSIBLE FOR GOD! :D

Letter From A Daughter To Her Mother...

A teenager's mother was passing by her daughter’s room when she saw, to her shock, the bed was nicely made and everything was picked up. Then she saw an envelope propped up prominently on the center of the bed. It was addressed, “Mom.”

With the worst premonition, she opened the envelope and read the letter with trembling hands. It went:

Dear Mom,

It is with great regret and sorrow that I’m writing you. I had to elope with my new boyfriend because I wanted to avoid a scene with Dad and you. I’ve been finding real passion with Ahmed and he is so nice-even with all his piercings, tattoos, beard, and his motorcycle clothes. But it’s not only the passion Mom, I’m pregnant and Ahmed said that we will be very happy. He already owns a trailer in the woods and has a stack of firewood for the whole winter. He wants to have many more children with me and that’s now one of my dreams too. Ahmed taught me that marijuana doesn’t really hurt anyone and we’ll be growing it for us and trading it with his friends for all the cocaine and ecstasy we want. In the meantime, we’ll pray that science will find a cure for AIDS so Ahmed can get better; he sure deserves it!!

Don’t worry Mom, I’m 15 years old now and I know how to take care of myself. Someday I’m sure we’ll be back to visit so you can get to know your grand children.

I love you, Mom.

- Judith

Just as the mother was about to pass out from shock and horror, she noticed the PS. It read:

PS: Mom, none of the above is true. I’m over at the neighbor’s house. I just wanted to remind you that there are worse things in life than my report card that’s inside my desk center drawer. Call when it is safe for me to come home.

Oh No,Yet Again...

The problem for Arsenal is that the longer this continues - this run of nearly, of almost, of what might be - the harder it becomes to rebuff the claim of Patrice Evra that Arsenal have mutated into no more than football’s greatest finishing school.

There has to be an end product, measured in trophies won, if this is not to be another season of useless beauty. At times, Arsenal’s football is so exceptional it feels almost sacrilegious to question the direction of Arsene Wenger. Yet this was not one of those times.

Arriving at Old Trafford top of the League, Arsenal failed to put it up to Manchester United, forcing barely a save from goalkeeper Edwin van der Sar. The margin was small but the best team won. Had Wayne Rooney scored his penalty, two goals would have separated the teams, a more accurate reflection of United’s superiority.



In this way, it was a depressing evening. The same old failings may pull Arsenal up short again, and that is a source of continued frustration. Whatever Wenger might think, his team could do with a major signing in the transfer window, they could do with the match-winning quality an outlay of £30million might bring, and they could do with a world-class goalkeeper.


Evra’s words were disrespectful considering Arsenal’s wonderful contribution to the Premier League, but he is not alone in regarding Arsenal as a college rather than a challenge. Jose Mourinho is perhaps the most openly disparaging of Wenger’s project, but others are equally dismissive, if not publicly.

Here is one theory, advanced to me by a senior football man only recently. Wenger does not buy big because then he will have to deliver a trophy. While he chooses to build his team on a self-imposed budget, based on youth development, there will always be mitigation for nights like this.

The moment he throws money at it, like Sir Alex Ferguson, Carlo Ancelotti and Roberto Mancini at Manchester United, Chelsea and Manchester City, there will be no excuses. He loses at Old Trafford then and there is no hiding place.

We seem to spend each season highlighting the same deficiencies at Arsenal. How many times has the pedigree of the goalkeepers been debated? And here we go again. Arsenal did not lose to Manchester United because Wojciech Szczesny, a 20-year-old from Warsaw, was in goal, but even so, should he have been?

Wenger’s refusal to address an obvious weakness in his squad is nothing if not curious. Szczesny has talent and potential and made two excellent saves in the second half, but he should not have been exposed to this.

Wenger should have secured a world-class goalkeeper for Arsenal long ago; instead they were reduced to bickering over the fee for Fulham’s Mark Schwarzer in the summer. The difference in valuation between the clubs was said to be as little as £1million. Winning the league is worth at least 30 times that; hardly makes sense, does it?

True, Manchester United’s winner looped into Arsenal’s goal as much by luck as judgment and, for any other team, that would be dismissed as just one of those things. But this is not any other team. This is Arsenal and these players are on the brink of delivering on all of Wenger’s most fanciful predictions. They just need one last push.


So, when they go down by one goal at Old Trafford and surrender the summit of the Premier League, we look for clues. And there in Arsenal’s goal is Szczesny — a fine prospect and yet to concede in the Carling Cup this season, but this is Manchester United away, and it is his Premier League debut. He is half the age of Van der Sar at the opposite end. Is this any way to win a title?

Arsenal had rotten luck with injuries prior to this game, no doubt about that. Manuel Almunia is out of favour and, when his understudy Lukasz Fabianski picked up a knock, Wenger had little option but to relegate him to the bench and pick the third choice instead.

Yet, looking along that cast list, is there anyone in Arsenal’s goalkeeping roster with the pedigree of a title winner? Think Van der Sar, Petr Cech, imposing figures who have long been regarded among the best in the world. Then consider that Arsenal’s first choice is not even a squad player for Spain, and their second conceded a goal last season when he turned his back on the play to argue a decision with the referee.


Then there is Szczesny: a callow reserve thrown into one of the biggest matches of the season. He made a fine save when Anderson was put in by Wayne Rooney early in the second half and denied a vicious chip from Rooney, but his positioning for the goal was unfortunate and his distribution nervous in the extreme.

His first kick went straight to a red shirt 30 yards from goal and in the first half he did a better job picking out United’s forward line than some of Ferguson’s midfield.

For the goal, he was in no man’s land, not far enough off his line to influence the play, not back protecting his goal. The ball arrived with Park Ji-sung courtesy of a fortuitous deflection, which did not help, but any header that goes in soft and loopy will be a frustration to a goalkeeper.

It was not Szczesny’s fault that Arsenal lost, but whether he should have been in that predicament is another question, A recurring one, unfortunately.

Is It Me...?

" Is it me or does that girl really look good?!"

I am sure if you are a guy this question would have crossed your mind, in some cases if you are a girl . The point I want to share is, I have seen girls who at one point of time doesn't make an impact on you. By impact I mean impression. There are girls who has an "oomph" factor in them, and there are girls who gains respect on the first look, and there are girls who never comes to your notice(no offense).

Being in a school which has more than 1000 students in a particular academic year, I have come across girls who belong to all the 3 categories. In college the "oomph" factor girls are like celebrities! If they talk to you or if they walk on the other side of the road in the same direction, your mind automatically start playing a heroic background music!! From what I have noticed in my life , mostly through the social networks(read face book ) available, how else do you think one could be in touch with so many people … yeah from what I have noticed is that these "oomph" factor girls totally disappear, is it cause they are dumb? Not knowing how to use a computer? Married early? I can't put my finger on it!!

Now comes into picture the girls of the respect and unnoticed category! What happened to them?! Well, they get into a good job, uses the social networks to stays in touch. And guess what they start look good!! I'm not sure how many of you will agree but I can voice for 70% of the guys I think. Now you start wondering what happened to them in college?! Seriously?! In college she would have been just another girl and now If you see her profile picture you start cursing your eyes for betraying you! This is the story of how a "unnoticed becomes a oomph(at least at an extent oomph)", She joins the social network with a profile picture of an actress or a baby or a flower, and sends request to friends who she knows, next step she uploads a picture which shows her face from side angle, the best of picture she ever had so far! Well you know guys, she starts receiving friend request from guys who she knows only by name. She then realizes that she has more that 300 friends in the account and has not changed her profile picture in months, she walks into a beauty parlor and straightens her hair! Next go to a branded shop get a nice pair of jeans and a designer t-shirt/tops. Goes to a nice coffee shop/restaurant/picnic with friends gets her photo clicked!! She also learns to do "touch ups" before leaving home! . You must have noticed I have mentioned "hair straightening" as first point, I strongly believe it is the first step towards getting "oomph" factor! It is becoming a common weapon used to get guys attention! Straighten your hair and leave a strand of hair fall on your face, guys will look at them for sure! And heights is when you have a girl as good friend from college who doesn't fall into "oomph" category and when she tells you about proposals she is getting!! You start believing that 2012 is the world's end! You look her photo twice and realize that she has become pretty, but she will always remain as the one who gained your respect on first look!

All being said, another important point is that, when guys are out of college they know what their potential/reach/capability is. May be, when a guy is out of college he reduces his standards/bars out of frustration? Realization? Or both? for the good? I guess these are questions even "Google" cannot answer!

How To Name It...

As I was talking to a very good friend of mine..I shouldn't call her a friend,She's more like a mentor or an advisor or something. But yeah,we were having this talk about todays teens and their aspirations,dreams and goals..

She was very intrigued in asking me what my ambition in life was, I told her that ever since I was very very young, Flights and Jets have been my ONLY Love affair and I told my dad that I'm going to be in a field of work with Planes when I was pretty young.
And to this day,To my surprise,I've been working towards it.. Flights make me go crazy and I refer to Flights as 'her' or 'she' because they are my first 'wife' :P

I know it is weird but deal with it.. When you love an object, you treat it like it has been a part of you for quite sometime now.
And yes, Flights and Jet Planes have been a part and parcel of my life since I was a toddler. I still remember the first flight toy I got. It was Yellow in colour and with the words 'Comfort Airlines' or something.
And since i've been flying for quite some time ,My love for it hasn't reduced but just gone high in the past few months.

And as me and her were talking,we started talking about kids aspirations and goals. I know this is embarrassing to say out,but come on..I've outgrown it. When I was like 13, I wanted to be a pimp because I considered it the COOLEST JOB IN THE PLANET! But I didnt understand the intricacies of the job until my teacher cared to explain it to me.
My parents told me "Be what you wanna be, Just give 110% in anything you do" and I appreciate that. My dad has been with me in every step of my life. And I am in my last step of schooling, To be honest, My final year is already over. It ended 4 days ago. Its just gonna be grinding,grinding and more grinding in the next few months because of the finals. I'm not gonna attend school but just write exams and come back home
That is gonna be one hell of a hectic schedule but lets hope its for Good.

We were talking about parents wanting their kids to be something and they getting disappointed when the kids dont become what their parents wanted to be.
To all those parents: Its your kids life, give them the best of education and environment to study,but its upto them to actually do it. You can bring a horse to the river,but can NEVER make it drink the water unless its thirsty.
Understand that your child needs to be hungry inside for the education and goal you set for him,because if he doesn't want to be what you want to be..Dont be disappointed!!

I chose what I wanted to be. And I am sure I will let my kids to choose what they want to be.