Monday, April 21, 2014

Take heed and bear witness - Ishwar Pandey

I seem to have underestimated the reach of my blog, because Captain Cool MSD seems to have taken heed of my fair warning and replaced Nehra straight away, leading to a mammoth 94 run win. The fact that Dwayne Bravo sustained an injury might have helped along the decision making process, but let us not lose the big picture among the details.

Humour aside, three words made the win look so easy today : Quality Pace Bowling. Taking quick wickets up front is vital in the smallest format of the game, and Ishwar Pandey, inexperienced as he might seem, delivered to perfection. It might have been beginners' luck or the DD batsmen were in the mood for a bout of catching practice (and thank god we held on to them), but only time and few more outings for the CSK will reveal the depth of his talent.

With Dwayne Bravo out of the picture, Ben Hilfenhaus was handed the baton, and I felt he was right to play second fiddle to Pandey, keeping the pressure on the batsmen and swinging the ball both ways. An economy of 4.50 in an IPL match is most definitely one to be proud of, and with a more or less guaranteed place in the side, we can expect consistent performances from the strapping Aussie.

The testimony to the rise in the class of pace bowling is the fact that MSD didn't feel the need to hand the ball to the spinners until late into the innings. The spinners just bowled 4 and half overs among them, though picking up four wickets in the process, which bucked the CSKian trend of spin spearheading the attack, as I mentioned in my previous post. This certainly bodes well for the Chennai Super Kings, who can now depend on their strike bowlers to deliver the early breakthroughs.

Ravichandran Ashwin is always a delight to watch, with his arsenal of variations and deceptions. It was quite a lovely delivery that bowled Dinesh Karthik over, which just goes to show the constancy with which Ashwin delivers. There are no words for a man who is announced to the crease as SIR Ravindra Jadeja, but that this man has delivered time and again, for both CSK and India, with both bat and ball, and there can be no replacing him.

Lastly and most importantly, this match gave us a chance to fully understand the depth of our batting line up. As my favorite commentator, Danny Morrison said,"It's all quite well for a bowler to get McCullum and Smith out, but with the likes of Raina, Faf and MSD to come in, he's got his work quite cut out." Truer words have never been spoken. When five of your batsmen have strike rates nudging 200, I think it's safe to say that batting is the least of your concerns.

This CSK win was a complete all-round victory for the side and there is only one way to go from here and that is up. Watch out for the exciting new talent that is Ishwar Pandey and some bigger wins from the Men in Yellow. Until next time, #WhistlePodu!

Friday, April 18, 2014

11 + Nehra : CSK's IPL Conundrum

The Indian Premier League (IPL) has returned to much scepticism as to whether cricket's Superbowl will retain it's massive fan following after having it's dirty laundry aired in public. Let all such doubts perish because after three matches, it has become certain that cricket's prodigal son is back with a bang. Being a ardent fan of a team that has reached the knockout stages in every single edition of the IPL, not to mention has won the coveted trophy twice, is a matter of great pride. But post today's loss to the Kings XI Punjab, who played brilliantly, a certain doubt that arose in my mind after the IPL auction was confirmed. 
CSK’s bowling has taken a hit and the initial prognosis doesn’t look good.

(Backstory rant : CSK shocked it’s fan base when it brought in ageing fast bowler Ashish Nehra, which raised questions about the mental sanctity of the bidders. The justification for this move was the bags of international experience (GHANTA!) Nehra brings with him, which includes bowling full tosses to a well set batsman in the final over of the innings (That worked once against Pakistan, mate). CSK’s official website describes Nehra as a “fast bowler with pace, accuracy and the ability to enforce subtle variations in line and length” which couldn’t be further from the truth. On a good day, Nehra clocks 135 km/hr and leaks runs at around 8 an over. Hardly a T20 stalwart. Nehra is absolute rubbish with the bat and we witnessed a fine example of his fielding prowess with that spectacular dropped catch off Maxwell.)


                                                CSK’s *ahem* acclaimed *ahem* bowling unit

Ian Bishop made a comment during today’s match which hit squarely home, “CSK’s bowling attack is headed by the likes of Ashwin and Jadeja, backed up by Nehra and Sharma.” When your spinners are touted to be spearheading your bowling attack, Houston, we have a problem. Observing the above picture, you might wonder, why doesn’t CSK simply replace Nehra with Hilfenhaus? Seems an easy enough thing to do.

Compounding CSK’s bowling woes is IPL’s four overseas player cap, which in today’s case, was utilised to field McCullum, Smith, Bravo and Faf. Now, you see Chennai’s conundrum. With their fine display of explosive hitting, replacing McCullum and Smith at the top of the order is out of question. Bravo has proven himself to be adept at accelerating at ease as well as chipping in with some handy pace bowling. The question that now remains is whether to risk replacing Faf, and break the successful CSKian trend of batting deep, or placing your trust in the likes of Nehra and Sharma to be able to successfully defend par totals. (NOT!)

If their struggle to defend a massive total of 205, is anything to go by, the latter option seems to fly out the proverbial window. But knowing Dhoni, and his extremes of conservatism and faith in struggling players (aka Yuvraj), CSK might just be heading for a first round exit, courtesy Nehra.

Well, man lives to hope, and an injured lion is your worst enemy. Let us hope that Nehra can reproduce his dream run of 2003, where full tosses were rewarded with catches and Kenya reached the Semi-finals. (LOL). Until then, #whistlepodu!