by Sajed Ahmed India has always been criticized for underperforming in away test tours. But the first two tests of the 2014 India’s tour of England shows that all of that has just changed. We had a captain who was being criticized for being too defensive in away tours, a very fragile batting line-up and a very ordinary bowling line-up. With an inexperienced side, MSD has managed to do something that had only been done once before by Kapil Dev in 1986, a test victory at Lord’s.
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by Sajed Ahmed We’ve been invited to each and every single ODI cricket WC. We’ve won two ODI WCs and one T20 WC. With every passing generation our cricketers keep getting better and better. So what makes us good at this sport? Here's what we think.
by Sajed Ahmed Every sport has two components to it, the mind and the body. I know this might sound like a dialogue off a Chinese martial art movie but if you master your mind you master your body. Sledging is a strategy employed in almost every sport to unsettle the opponent. As described by Steve Waugh, a form of mental disintegration. There has always been constant debate on whether sledging represents poor sportsmanship or as Darwin put it, survival of the fittest.
The Aussies adopted a rather unconventional approach to unsettle their opponents. Sledging got attention in the early 60’s although the reason behind the term remains unclear. Over the years it has evolved from a man losing his temper to a full scale strategy in team meetings. So the question is, do the Aussies have bad sportsmanship? I say, no. Hell no. We don’t call it test cricket for no reason. A test of mind and body that’s what the test in test cricket means. Many successful cricketers in the International ODI scene haven’t been successful in test cricket. Players like Yuvraj Singh, Mohd Hafeez haven’t really fired in test cricket. The reason being, Test cricket involves a lot of patience, resilience, fitness both mental and physical, composure, concentration and mental integrity. Everything else comes with practice, but mental integrity depends on the present situation. The human mind is amazing. A man’s performance is greatly affected by whether or not he believes in himself. An attempt to attack this part of the mind is smart. Not poor sportsmanship. |