From Karbonn Kamaal to Kamran Akmal in 5 days.

The ICC World T20 is much like the IPL's boring cousin. The one that sits in the corner of the room, studying every vacation, refuses to attend that new movie premiering at that theater near you and blinks in genuine confusion every time you bring the topic of Heavy Metal up. His only acquaintance with heavy metal is with that of the chapters in his JD Lee book, the one that he religiously carries around in that backpack of his while yours sits rotting on top of your "touch only once a year" study table.

Any person whose relationship with cricket extends beyond the asylum that is the IPL, knows that the ICC World T20 is for cricket watching ONLY. Firstly, no Lalit Modi (Wait, I think this applies to IPL as well now.). Instead, we get to watch Haroon Lorgat and his extremely unglamorous entourage comprising the ICC top brass look more bored than Sreesanth at a Rocket Physics lecture. This isn't necessarily bad as we can finally rest our eyes after having them exposed to the brighter than white pants of Shilpa Shetty and the whole Vijay Mallya clan.

Secondly, we will be rightly deprived of our daily dose of Citi Moments of Success. No more Strategic Timeouts, which back in the day were called the oh-so-drab Drinks Breaks and weren't sponsored by obscure mobile phone companies you and me hadn't heard of. No DLF Maximums. Only Sixes. It will be a delight to watch a clear sky, one devoid of a certain MRF balloon Blimp, and a complementary annoying commentator.

Indians will finally support India. Regionalism will (hopefully) cease to exist, and Harbhajan will be supported by Bangloreans and Kolkatans alike. Except me, of course.
The whole country(well, I'm being fairly optimistic here when I say whole) will celebrate Hamid Hassan's wicket and cry in agony at Yuvraj's nonexistent innings.

Afghanistan will keep Indians awake at night, and not for the obvious reasons. Once a team wallowing in the pools of obscurity, they have grabbed a flotation device and are now posing a threat to India's round 2 slot.
I'm borrowing a quote from Cricinfo here:
"When I last saw him, he asked me to explain the BMW rule. I said that the first thing he needed to know was that it was called LBW"
Kabir Khan, the Afghanistan coach, reveals what happened when he met the country's president Hamid Karzai
Talk about baby steps. David v. Goliath.

To add to the positives, the tournament also spans only 2 weeks, therefore eliminating the indescribable boredom usually reached somewhere through the IPL. While it may or may not throw up a violent scrap for semi's spots like that witnessed in the IPL, it will nevertheless hold our attention by its mere briefness. Watch out for a humdinger between Zimbabwe and New Zealand.

So while people are debating the whole Commercialism v. Cricket thing and conducting postmortems on "IPLGate"(what is WITH these people and adding -gate at the end of everything?!), the ICC World T20 will be the perfect medicine to cure our Modi OD. Throw off your Madurai Machas jersey, tune your ears to the monotone of Mike Atherton, and pray that Mandira Bedi does not host the preview show. The ICC World T20 is HERE whether we care or not, and Kabir Khan could not be more pleased.

All alone

All alone
Am I the only one????
hands on the cheek
Eyes gazing through the window
Envying the flock of birds
Jealous of the clouds which are together
Am I the only one????
Counting the drops of rain
I wonder if everything has a company in the world
But my company is loneliness
It's not when people are not around
It's when feelings don't surround
Never be tired thinking of the end
Think about the start and get charged
It's not when no one is around
It's all when YOU think no one is around!!

CSK v. SRT

IPL 3. Final. Chennai Super Kings take on Sachin. And the Mumbai Indians as well, if you wish.

But before we could bug our eyes out at the floundered run out chances, swear at Rudi Koertzen for not giving Hayden and ultimately Sachin out, shake our heads in disbelief as Keiron Pollard took Doug Bollinger to the cleaners and finally celebrate a long overdue victory, we had to endure a little something called the Closing Ceremony.

Oh yes, we did. We had to watch Bipasha Basu (that woman never seems to have enough clothes) "shake a leg". Lady, even David Warner in that Kingfisher ad looked more fluid and expressive. And he was doing the "Walk like an Egyptian" routine for God's sakes. Then there was.. Shahid. The guy's a trained dancer. We know hes got all the pops and locks in his arsenal. Why he chooses to embarrass himself by singing, is beyond me. To top it all off, there was that awful mechanical whatchamacallit, dragged in by some dudes who obviously were wishing no one would recognize them. That "thing" (im not going to insult the likes of Chris Martin by calling it a batsman) then proceeded to hit a ball, and I prayed with all my might as I watched it soar across the DY Patil stadium that it would FINALLY take that blessed MRF Balloon Blimp out. No such luck. It was STILL there during the match, and Ravi Shastri STILL stared at it in awe as a three-year-old would at an airplane.

Of course, there was AR Rahman. The Maestro was the saving grace and the only reason I decided to put myself through that monstrosity. Pity he chose to sing Jai Ho(The new Chak De India, except this has parts which sound Spanish). The rest of the set was amazing, and I felt almost obligated to stand in attention during his rendition of Vande Mataram. I couldn't help wishing that he should have been given more of a slot.

The Extraaa(did I get the number of A's right?) Rubbish bit had Gaurav Kapur(the only half-sensible one), Navjot Singh Sidhu, and a squirmy Dinesh Karthik. One wonders if he was intimidated by Sidhu's overbearing demeanor or just plain annoyed with all the unnecessary yelling. I pick the latter. Chennai won the toss and elected to bat first. Big Whoop. No changes. Yay. We are forced to watch more edges and miscues from Matthew Hayden. Will the horror never end?!

As expected, Monsieur Hayden looked like he regretted the early test retirement, and he played such a well paced, calculated innings, I'm sure the Aussie selectors are rethinking their contract announcement for Ashes '10.

Slow batting, and well placed shots from Lord Badri and Vijay saw CSK tottering at 67-3 after 11.2 overs. Raina was there. Again. To save the team. Again. Oh and so was MSD in case I didn't mention that. Again. Momento favorito: Fernando and Nayyar stare at each other as they border a landing pad for a miscued skier from Raina. Zaheer Khan is not pleased and worries Moms that Setmax should have one of them logos to cover the players mouths. Zak proceeds to cleanly drop Raina approximately 12 runs later. Who's the $%^#$!^&# now Zak?

So Chennai finally reach 168. Not bad. The highest ever for an IPL final. After that mauling of Deccan in the semis, things don't look doomed just yet.

Mumbai begin in a utterly prosaic manner as Ashwin delights us with an opening maiden. Bollinger promptly gets rid of Dhawan the next over. Chennai fields with optimism, and although the missed runouts are saddening, they ordinarily wouldn't be chances in the first place. Nayyar falls, Bhajji arrives, gets out to a ball that according to Hawkeye shouldn't have been out, and I celebrate because honestly, that's what I wanted in the first place.

Few overs later, Tendulkar falls. STRIKE ONE. I watch in sadness as he trudges off the field. He was playing with a split webbing for God's sakes. The man is a legend. Double blow for Mumbai as Raina takes an absolute stunner(blame a certain Mister Daniel Morrison) 3 balls later to send MSD-lookalike(minus the charm) back. Jakati takes an interesting catch on the boundary to dismiss Duminy, and Pollard finally arrives to unsettle all the Chennai supporters and probably kill a few birds.

A murderous onslaught ensues, the victim being Dougie Bollinger. I am practically crying at the end of that blessed over. After that unethical slashing of Bollinger's credibility, I practically pull my hair out in disbelief as Albie takes the ball. He silences me, and the entire crowd in that stadium as he bowls 4 balls with conviction. Poor Rayudu does the sensible thing and sacrifices his wicket(STRIKE TWO), only to let CSK have sweet revenge the very next ball.

               Hayden+odd fielding position=Pollard out

I'm taking back every bad thing I ever said about him. STRIKE THREE and Mumbai is finally out.

Mad celebrations take center stage as I grin at the rest of the household like a satisfied sadist. Too excited to switch off the TV, I decide to endure one more round of Ravi Shastri tomfoolery and rack my brains so as to come up with a plausible explanation as to why Harsha Bhoghle isn't the Master of Ceremonies. Some more bullshit (including an almost hysterical Lalit Modi shouting his speech like he was being held prisoner against his wishes) later and the players are felicitated. Yada yada yada blah blah blah. Ok. Enough with this shit. Raina is almost teary eyed as he is interviewed by Jackers. God bless his precious little soul. Ravi Shastri has us all wondering "What the hell is that man smoking?!" as he makes two dozen more errors and calls some players by the wrong names. Half a dozen awards later, CSK lift not only the Fair Play Award (Yes fellers, take a lesson from us Chennaiites. We KNOW how to behave) but the Big one. More screaming, confetti, and mad jumping around ensue.

To satisfy my Mad love for Mad journalists covering the Mad reactions of Mad Fans, I switch to a news channel and am heartbroken and outraged to see that there is no mention of CSK lifting the trophy. Them Nincompoops. CSK's victory is upstaged by the Modi v BCCI saga. This would never have happened if Mumbai had won. Ah Well. Journalism was never fair.

Oh, and did I mention? Danny Morrison wants to move into the MRF Balloon Blimp. Maybe we can cut him loose finally and hope some aliens find him. That would definitely discourage them from even considering coming to earth. We should probably put Ravi Shastri in as well for good measure. And Maybe Samir Kocchar too.

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