Ind-SA 2nd Test : India Wins, Series Is Drawn

It took some great batting from Sehwag, Tendulkar, Laxman and Dhoni to post the imposing total which finally got us the innings win. But Amla, the one man whose committment almost thwarted India's chances of victory, almost achieved the impossible. Winning a test match in the last two overs was nothing short of a one-day experience. Harbhajan held his nerves to bowl that delivery.

India won the match, drew the test-series and retained the No.1 ranking in tests with that last wicket of Morkel. Great win!

Ind-SA 1st Test : Tendulkar's Century In Vain

As India lost the first test to SA, that too on home soil in Nagpur, the only thing to cheer about was Sachin's century. Sachin has scored 34 centuries in 1st innings and 12 in the 2nd innings. Of these 12, India have drawn 5 matches, lost 4 and won only 3 of them. Which means, more often than not, his century has been in a losing cause.

 

Tendulkar's 2nd Innings 100s in Indian wins

Score	Match Innings	Opposition	Venue	Date
104*	3	Sri Lanka	Colombo (SSC)	27-Jul-93
155*	3	Australia	Chennai	06-Mar-98
103*	4	England	Chennai	11-Dec-08

Tendulkar's 2nd Innings 100s in Indian defeats

Score	Match Innings	Opposition	Venue	Date
122	3	England	Birmingham	06-Jun-96
113	3	New Zealand	Wellington	26-Dec-98
136	4	Pakistan	Chennai	28-Jan-99
100	3	South Africa	Nagpur	06-Feb-10

Tendulkar's 2nd Innings 100s in drawn matches

Score	Match Innings	Opposition	Venue	Date
119*	4	England	Manchester	09-Aug-90
124*	3	Sri Lanka	Colombo (SSC)	24-Feb-99
126*	3	New Zealand	Mohali	10-Oct-99
176	3	West Indies	Kolkata	30-Oct-02
100*	3	Sri Lanka	Ahmedabad	16-Nov-09

But Sachin is not to blame for the loss because we have always been defeated due to a weak bowling attack. To win a test match, its imperative that you get the opposition out in both innings, 20 wickets to be claimed. We could not even get 10, hence proving that the bowlers were neither effective in taking wickets nor in curtailing the runs. Even Sachin had stayed long enough he would have run out of partners because we had one more day of play left; too much to ask.

Hopefully we will do better in other matches and at least try to draw the series.

Hillary Clinton Lands In Mumbai

Late last night Hillary Clinton landed in Mumbai amidst heavy downpour. She is on a 5-day visit to India to strengthen the Indo-US relationship.


She would be staying in Hotel Taj to show her solidarity with the people of Mumbai and do her bit to reduce the pain of the 26/11 attacks. She will be in the city till Sunday, and her next stop would be Delhi.

The agenda for today is a corporate event hosted by Ratan Tata. And later in the day she will be taking part in an event in Xavier's College along with Aamir Khan.

The kangaroos have been tamed, at last ...

Though we don't find kangaroos in India, we have finally learnt how to tame them. There were no coaching manuals, no 'dummies guide' and definitely no study material on this; but the sheer mental strength, tenacity to claw out of tough situations, a whole lot of hard work and a little bit of luck has finally helped us achieve this feat. The land of snake charmers has finally produced kangaroo hunters.

If you still did not get what I am driving at, then do read my last post. I had ended that post on a positive note and my last few words were 'Go India, Go.....Jeetenge Hum'. I had an intuition that we would beat the Aussies in the 2nd finals and bring home the cup. But the manner in which it was done was emphatic. It was a tale that could not have been scripted better. It had drama, emotions, humour, character and a fantastic climax.

This was a retribution of sorts. And the credit of this series victory does not go to any particular player, it was a team work. All the guys played their part well. Sachin fired in both the finals and helped India put-up great opening partnership as well as steered the innings, Gambhir had played well in the first few matches, Yuvi did his bit, Sreesanth and Pathan bowled superbly, while Pravin and Ishant were a revelation. But best of all was Harbhajan's performance, he did so well under pressure. After all the flak he drew and all abuses that were hurled at him, he showed everyone what he is made of......steel. And I don't have enough words of praise for our captain 'courageous'. His captaincy was outstanding and the way he kept the team together was really laudable. This is a famous win and we shall be talking about this for many years to come.

Now that we have beaten the world champions, we have to bring consistency in our games. We need to win consistently and beat all the other teams as well. We need to win in style and get the juggernaut rolling. Getting to the top is not as difficult as staying on top is, and we have to stay there for a while......hopefully, a long while.