Captain Cool:Mahendra Singh Dhoni - Achievements as Captain

Mahendra Singh Dhoni, the poster boy of Indian Cricket has seen everything in his life. From being taken to his house in a police van after India's exit from 2007 World Cup to being adored by the whole country for leading the team to victory in the Inaugural World T20. From then on there was no looking back. He has transformed the Indian team into an World beating one and his understanding with coach Gary Kirsten is also one of the reasons for this success. But the most important aspect of the current Indian team is "they don't panic under tough situations and they enjoy each others success". When he was appointed captain for the world T20 many eye brows were raised and only later that all came to know Sachin Tendulkar himself had recommended Dhoni for the captaincy. Here are some the feathers in Dhoni's cap thus far. You could also get some Small Business Loans here. Check it out.



Dhoni's Achievements:

• Team India went on to win the inaugural T20 cricket World Cup 2007
• First ever trilateral ODI series win in Australia versus Australia and Sri Lanka CB Series of 2007-08.
• First ever bilateral ODI series win in Sri Lanka (IDEA CUP) in August 2008.
• He captained Team India to win the Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2008 at home versus Australia. India went on to win the coveted 4 match Test series (2-0).
• Also Team India to win the RBS Cup 2008 at home versus England. India went on to win the coveted 2 match Test series (1-0) and the 7 match ODI series (5-0) with the rest of the remaining two ODIs being abandoned.
• Under his captaincy, India beat Sri Lanka for the second time to clinch the IBDI Fortis Wealthsurance Cup ODI series 2009 (4-1) and the only Twenty20 International, the first Twenty20 International match held in Sri Lanka. This is the second straight series win for Team India in Sri Lanka.
• On the Indian tour of New Zealand in 2009 under his captaincy Indians created history by clinching their first ever ODI series in New Zealand, the National Bank Series 2009 . Before this, Indians had just won a Test series in New Zealand 41 years ago. Team India have comfortably won the 5 match ODI series (3-1) with an ODI being abandoned due to rain.
• M.S. Dhoni is the first Indian Captain to achieve nine consecutive ODI wins (between 14/11/2008 and 05/02/2009). Earlier the record of having eight consecutive ODI wins were owned by Sunil Gavaskar (5)- Kapil Dev (3), Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid.
• Previous captains Anil Kumble and Sourav Ganguly have said that under Dhoni India will reach greater heights and even all time great Richard Hadlee said that "Under Dhoni, India will become the world no.1 team" and he also said that by this 2-0 win that the Australian dominance in the cricket world had finally come to an end.
• As a farewell gift to former Indian captain, Sourav Ganguly who was set to retire after the Nagpur test against Australia, Dhoni asked Sourav Ganguly to lead the team for one last time towards the end of the Australian innings in the last test at Nagpur.
• Dhoni has already been compared to Australia's Steve Waugh for his captaincy skills. In the battle of nerves, the mental toughness accompanied with the cool temperament exhibited by Dhoni just resembles the times of Steve Waugh’s leadership.
• During the ODI Series 2009 in Sri Lanka, Dhoni had equalled the record of Zimbabwe's Andy Flower who has also played 46 ODIs in both roles of Wicket Keeper/Captain.
• Out of the 6 Test matches Dhoni has captained, the Indian Cricket Team has won 5 of them

This is just the begining. More to come from Mahi. The message from the Indian team to the rest of the cricket world is very clear - "Watch out we are coming at you"

IPL Season 2:Final Schedule

After lots of delays and speculation about the second edition of the Indian Premier League, the tournament is set to kick off on April 18th. The final date decided is a week later than the first decided dates. Here is the schedule for all the matches. The timings given here are in IST(Indian Standard Time).

Complete Schedule:
April 18: Mumbai Indians (MI) v Chennai Super Kings (CSK) (4 pm) in Cape Town
Rajasthan Royals (RR) v Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) (8 pm) in Cape Town
April 19: Delhi Daredevils (DD) v Kings XI Punjab (KXIP) (4 pm) in Cape Town; Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) v Deccan Chargers (DC) (8 pm) in Cape Town
April 20: RCB V CSK (8 pm) in Port Elizabeth
April 21: KKR v KXIP (4 pm) in Durban; RR v MI (8 pm) in Durban
April 22: RCB v DC (8 pm) in Cape Town
April 23: CSK v DD (4 pm) Durban; KKR v RR (8 pm) in Port Elizabeth
April 24: KXIP v RCB (8 pm) in Durban
April 25: DC v MI (4 pm) in Durban; KKR v CSK (8 pm) in Cape Town
April 26: RCB v DD (4 pm) Port Elizabeth; RR v KXIP (8 pm) in Cape Town
April 27: CSK v DC (4 pm) in Durban; KKR v MI (8 pm) in Port Elizabeth
April 28: DD v RR (8 pm) in Centurion
April 29: KKR v RCB (4 pm) in Durban; MI v KXIP (8 pm) in Durban
April 30: KKR v RCB (4 pm) in Durban; RR v CSK (8 pm) in Centurion
May 1: MI v KKR (4 pm) in East London; RCB v KXIP (8 pm) in Durban
May 2: RR v DC (4 pm) in Port Elizabeth; CSK v DD (8 pm) in Johannesburg
May 3: KXIP v KKR (4 pm) in Port Elizabeth; MI v RCB (8 pm) in Johannesburg
May 4: DC v CSK (8 pm) in East London
May 5: KXIP v RR (4 pm) in Durban; DD v KKR (8 pm) in Durban
May 6: MI v DC (8 pm) in Centurion
May 7: RCB v RR (4 pm) in Centurion; KXIP v CSK (8 pm) in Centurion
May 8: DD v MI (8 pm) in East London
May 9: DC v KXIP (4 pm) in Kimberley; CSK v RR (8 pm) in Kimberley
May 10: RCB v MI (4 pm) in Port Elizabeth; KKR v DD (8 pm) in Johannesburg
May 11: DC v RR (8 pm) in Kimberley
May 12: RCB v KKR (4 pm) in Centurion; KXIP v MI (8 pm) in Centurion
May 13: DC v DD (8 pm) in Durban
May 14: CSK v RCB (4 pm) in Durban; MI v RR (8 pm) in Durban
May 15: KXIP v DD (8 pm) in Bloemfontein
May 16: CSK v MI (4 pm) in Port Elizabeth; DC v KKR (8 pm) in Johannesburg
May 17: KXIP v DC (4 pm) in Johannesburg; RR v DD (8 pm) in Bloemfontein
May 18: CSK v KKR (8 pm) in Centurion
May 19: DD v RCB (8 pm) in Johannesburg
May 20: RR v KKR (4 pm) in Durban; CSK v KXIP (8 pm) in Durban
May 21: MI v DD (4 pm) in Centurion; DC v RCB (8 pm) in Centurion
May 22: Semi Final 1 in Centurion
May 23: Semi Final 2 in Johannesburg
May 24: Final in Johannesburg

Cricket:Sreesanth out of IPL Season 2

Shanthakumaran Sreesanth will miss this year's IPL due to a stress fracture in his back. He was one of Punjab's key bowlers last season with his 19 scalps making him the tournament's second highest wicket-taker. And his infamous slap gate controversy with Harbhajan Singh cannot be forgotten easily. So with Sreesanth out of this season's IPL we can assured that another Bhaji-Sreesanth row won't erupt. His injury comes as a serious setback for the Kings 11 team whose premier fast bowler Brett Lee is not in best of forms and also down with injury. Coach Tom Moody too said it was a huge blow to his team. It's been a year since Sreesanth last played for India and a string og injuries have kept him out of the national side. Whatever may be IPL Season 2 will be without the energy and enthusiasm of Sreesanth!!!

IPL:Squads for Season 2

The squads are as follows:

Royal Challengers, Bangalore:

Overseas players: Jacques Kallis, Mark Boucher, Dale Steyn, Dillon Du Preez, Cameron White, Nathan Bracken, Ross Taylor, Kevin Pietersen, Jesse Ryder and Roelof van der Merwe.

Indian players: Rahul Dravid, Anil Kumble, Robin Uthappa, Praveen Kumar, Virat Kohli, Wasim Jaffer, Manish Pandey, Srivats Goswami, R Suteesh, Pankaj Singh, Vinay Kumar, Bhuvanesh Kumar, Karan Sharma, Saurav Bandekar, Tinu Yohannan, Bharat Chipli, B Akhil, Devraj Patil, J Arun Kumar, KP Appanna, Sunil Joshi, Gaurav Dhiman, Jitendra Patil, Udit Patel, A Mithun, S Aravind, Kedar Jadhav, C M Gautam, Raju Bhatkal, Rajesh Bishnoi, Ishank Jaggi and Rohit Sabharwal.

Chennai Super Kings:

Overseas players: Muthiah Muralitharan, Matthew Hayden, Michael Hussey, Albie Morkel, Makhaya Ntini, Jacob Oram, Stephen Fleming, Thilan Thushara, Andrew Flintoff and George Bailey.

Indian players: M S Dhoni, Parthiv Patel, Suresh Raina, S Badrinath, L Balaji, M Vijay, Joginder Sharma, Manpreet Singh Goni, Sudeep Tyagi, Viraj Kadbe, Shadab Jakati, R Ashwin, Abhinav Mukund, Anirudha Srikkanth, Vidyut Sivaramakrishnan, Palani Amarnath, K B Arun Karthik, N Einstein and Suresh Kumar.

Delhi Daredevils:

Overseas players: A B de Villiers, Daniel Vettori, Owais Shah, Paul Collingwood, David Warner, Andrew McDonald, Dirk Nannes, Glenn McGrath, Farveez Maharoof and T Dilshan.

Indian players: Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Dinesh Kartik, Manoj Tiwary, Rajat Bhatia, Mithun Manhas, Avishkar Salvi, Ashish Nehra, V Yo Mahesh, Pradeep Sangwan, Umesh Yadav, Yogesh Nagar, Tejashwi Yadav and Amit Mishra.

Deccan Chargers, Hyderabad:

Overseas players: Adam Gilchrist, Herschelle Gibbs, Scott Styris, Andrew Symonds, Ryan Harris, Fidel Edwards, Dwayne Smith, Chamara Silva, Chaminda Vaas and Nuwan Zoysa.

Indian players: VVS Laxman, Rohit Sharma, RP Singh, Pragyan Ojha, Venugopal Rao, D Ravi Teja, T Suman, Arjun Yadav, D Kalyankrishna, P Vijay Kumar, Manvinder Bisla, Jaskarandeep Singh, Harmeet Singh, Sarvesh Kumar, Halahar Das, Syed Mohammed and Shoaib Ahmed.

Mumbai Indians:

Overseas players: Lasith Malinga, Jean Paul Duminy, Graham Napier, Ryan McLaren, Dilhara Fernando, Sanath Jayasuriya, Dwayne Bravo, Mohd Ashraful, Kyle Mills and Luke Ronchi.

Indian players: Sachin Tendulkar, Zaheer Khan, Harbhajan Singh, Shikhar Dhawan, Abhishek Nayar, Dhawal Kulkarni, Jude Singh, Jaydev Shah, Rahil Shaikh, Yogesh Takawale, Pinal Shah, Ajinkya Rahane, Chetanya Nanda, Rohan Raje and Saurabh Tiwary.

Rajasthan Royals:

Overseas players: Shane Warne, Graeme Smith, Shane Watson, Dimitri Mascarenhas, Morne Morkel, Robert Quiney, Tyron Henderson, Shaun Tait, Shane Harwood and Lee Carseldine.

Indian players: Mohd Kaif, Munaf Patel, Yusuf Pathan, Sidharth Trivedi, Swapnil Asnodkar, Niraj Patel, Mahesh Rawat, Anup Revandkar, Ravindra Jadeja, Dinesh Salunkhe, Naman Ojha, Sidharth Chitnis, Paras Dogra, Amit Singh, Ahad Malek, Raphi Vincent Gomez, Kamran Khan, Ashraf Makda, Paul Valthaty, Srideep Mangela, Mohd Arif, Gajendra Singh, Atul Sharma, Pratmesh Salunkhe and Pushkarraj Chavan.

King's XI Punjab:

Overseas players: Brett Lee, James Hopes, Shaun Marsh, Luke Pomersbach, Simon Katich, Kumar Sangakkara, Mahela Jayawardene, Burt Cockley, Ravi Bopara and Jerome Taylor.

Indian players: Yuvraj Singh, Irfan Pathan, S Sreesanth, Ramesh Powar, V R V Singh, Piyush Chawla, Karan Goel, Uday Kaul, Wilkin Mota, Ajitesh Argal, Tanmay Srivastava, Sunny Sohal, Ryan Ninan and Yash Gandhi.

India win maiden ODI series in New Zealand

India ended the ODI on a losing note after going down to the home side by 8 wickets but there was no denying them of a series win. This team his surely gonna go places. They lost the twenty 20 series and suddenly everyone started to raise their eyebrows but those were put to bed by some fierce performance in the ODI series. Had it not been for the rains, India would have sealed the series by the 3rd ODI. The top order functioned with precision with Sehwag taking the bowlers to the cleaners and when he missed out in the 3rd ODI Sachin Tendulkar took centre stage mauling the Kiwis all over the park. And the bowling department which could not perform that well in the first few ODI's did really well in the fourth match. And one of the reasons for India's truimph is also due to the performance of the part timers. New Zealand found Bhaji and Yuvraj quite tough to get away. One aspect which India were below par was their fielding. Ground fielding was quite Ok but catching was terrible and it was captain who lead in that by dropping some sitters and also few stumpings. Something for the team to really work on. One clear star of the series was Virender Sehwag, who hit first three balls he faced for sixes. He killed the bowling attack with atmost ease and the bowlers found impossible to bowl at him. And to cap a great ODI series, Viru also got the record for the fastest century by an Indian in ODI's. Now comes the test series, India have the experience of Dravid and Laxman coming into team and the Kiwis might find it difficult in the longer version also.

India - New Zealand 3rd ODI: India win by 58 runs

Sachin Tendulkar scored his first century in New Zealand and helped India take an unbeatable 2-0 lead in the series with two matches left to play. Sachin was the real star on the day which nearly saw over 700 runs being scored. India lost Sehwag and Gambhir early but Yuvraj took control of the game with some hard hitting. He set the tone for Indian innings. India took the batting powerplay in 23rd over, a move that really paid off with India scoring 69 runs in those 5 overs. After Yuvi got out, Sachin took complete control and hit his 43rd ODI hundred. He and Dhoni pulverised the Kiwi attack. Sachin retired hurt on 163* and Raina took off as soon as he came and India ended with a massive 392 in 50 overs. Tim Southee had a terrible day as he conceeded 105 runs in his 10 overs. When New Zealand batted, Ryder and McCullum put on 166 for the first wicket before a flurry of wickets shifted the balance towards India. Ryder hit his maiden ODI century. Just when it seemed India would close the match, Mills and Southee took the Kiwis within striking distance. When Munaf Patel was removed from bowling by umpire Rudi Koertzen for bowling 2 waist high full tosses, the Kiwis would have been very upset as Munaf had totally lost the plot and was leaking runs. Yusuf Pathan, who came to finish that over picked up Mills' s wicket. And in the very next over Southee was picked up by Praveen to bring and end to the match. The small ground(combined with pitch) in Christchurch provided us the match which saw the maximum number of sixes hit. Next match is at Hamilton on Wednesday.

Brief Scores:
India 392 for 4 (Tendulkar 163*, Yuvraj 87, Dhoni 67) beat New Zealand 334 (Ryder 101, McCullum 71, Mills 54, Harbhajan 2-56) by 58 runs

Kid named after Sachin in New Zealand

When you hear that kids are named after Sachin Tendulkar one might think those kids are Indians but it isn't the case in New Zealand. Sachin Austin, a 9 year old New Zealand kid has been named after the great Indian batsman Sachin Tendulkar. This indeed confirms Sachin's stature as one of the most respected and admired sports persons only in India but across the globe. And one must recollect that Sachin Tendulkar himself was named after the legendary music composer Sachin Dev Burman. And the name "Sachin" has crossed land, religion and countries. I happened to know about this today while watching the third ODI between India and New Zealand. Sachin Austin was asked who was he named after with Sachin Tendulkar standing near him and the kid said it was the greatest moment in his life. And it was on a day when Sachin had scored his first century in the country. I'm not sure how many of them are named after the Little master but the count will certainly be increasing.

IPL:Tournament to go on

The IPL will be held as scheduled from April 10 to May 24 but with a revised itinerary and, if necessary in additional venues within the country, Lalit Modi, the IPL commissioner, has said. The changes will accommodate the blackout dates in specific venues on the days there is polling in that city or that state, and on May 16, the day of counting across the country. Modi suggested that, if necessary, the IPL may be held in additional venues - it was originally scheduled to be held in nine venues - and said a detailed meeting on the tournament's security would be held next week.As per the revised schedule, the opening match will now be held in Mumbai, instead of Jaipur, sources said. Nagpur, Indore, Cuttack and Rajkot are the new venues under consideration apart from the nine original venues.

IPL 2009:Mumbai to host Finals, semifinals in Chennai

The IPL fever has started to set in and IPL commissioner Lalit Modi, who is also president of Rajasthan Cricket Association, is finding himself in the news for all wrong reasons. He has been charged of funds misappropriation, something that is strongly denied by Modi saying the charges were politically motivated. And Modi has also gone on to say that matches of "Rajasthan Royals" might be moved away from Jaipur if the government did not co-operate. It must be recalled that Shane Warne had earlier said that he would not play if the matches were moved away from Jaipur. Meanwhile defending champions Rajasthan Royals who had the right to host the finals of this year's IPL have opted to host them in Mumbai. Runners up Chennai Super Kings had the rights to host the semifinals and they have opted to host both the games in Chennai. The finals may either be held in Brabourne Stadium(first choice for Royals) or D.Y.Patil Stadium.

West Indies v England, 1st Test

Jerome Taylor produced a spell of his life time and condemned England to a humiliating defeat by an innings and 23 runs at Sabina Park,Jamaica. England's second innings lasted just 33.2 overs and spanned little more than two hours. Flintoff was the only batsman to cross the double figures. England started they day brightly as they bowled out Windies for 392 but their misery started when they began batting for the second time, they were 11 for 2 before lunch and after that they crumbled. A simply astonishing end to a test match that had its share of controversies regarding the "Referral of decisions". In the end, its fair to say West Indies had the measure of England and emerged deserving winners.

Brief Scores:
West Indies 392 (Sarwan 107, Gayle 104, Broad 5-85) beat England 318 and 51 (Taylor 5-11) by an innings and 23 runs.

IPL Auction:List of players sold

Seventeen slots were filled in over two hours of the 2009 IPL auction in Goa. Here is a list of the players who have been bought at the auction (base price in brackets; all numbers in US$):

Pool A
Shaun Tait to Rajasthan Royals 375,000 (250,000)
JP Duminy to Mumbai Indians 950,000 (300,000)
Andrew Flintoff to Chennai Super Kings 1.55 million (950,000)
Kevin Pietersen to Bangalore Royal Challengers 1.55 million (1.35 million)

Pool B
Fidel Edwards to Deccan Chargers 150,000 (150,000)
Owais Shah to Delhi Daredevils 275,000 (150,000)
Paul Collingwood to Delhi 275,000 (250,000)

Stuart Clark, Brad Haddin and Chamara Kapugedara were unsold.

Pool C
Tyron Henderson to Rajasthan 650,000 (100,000)
Ravi Bopara to Kings XI Punjab 450,000 (150,000)
Thilan Thushara to Chennai 140,000 (100,000)
Jesse Ryder to Bangalore 160,000 (100,000)
Kyle Mills to Mumbai 150,000 (150,000).

Ashwell Prince, Phil Jaques, Andre Nel, Luke Wright and Nuwan Kulasekara were unsold.

Pool D
Dwayne Smith to Deccan Chargers 100,000 (100,000)
Jerome Taylor to Punjab 150,000 (150,000)
Mohammad Ashraful to Mumbai 75,000 (75,000)

Samit Patel, Shakib Al Hasan, Morne van Wyk, Steven Smith, Ashley Noffke, Gulam Bodi and Daren Powell were unsold.

Pool E
Tamim Iqbal, Jon Moss, Bryce McGain, James Franklin, Aiden Blizzard, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Michael Klinger, Kaushalya Weeraratne, Prasanna Jayawardene and Dominic Thornley were unsold.

Pool F
Mashrafe Mortaza to Kolkata Knight Riders 600,000 (50,000)
George Bailey to Chennai 50,000 (50,000)

Yusuf Abdulla, Daniel Harris, Kemar Roach, Aaron Bird, Michael Dighton, Michael Hill and Brett Geeves were unsold.

IPL:Second Auction, Chennai get Flintoff, KP lands in Bangalore

Even before the second auction of the IPL began, there was lot of talks that Kevin Pietersen was in talks with Bangalore and had met owner Vijay Mallya regarding the same. And rumours floated that Chennai was in talks with Flintoff, when he came to the city for the first test against India. And these talks were vindicated when both these players headed in the mentioned directions. Chennai got Flintoff for a whopping $1.55million and that made him the most expensive player in the IPL and he was joined by Kevin Pietersen who was purchased by Bangalore for the same price and they both have become the most expensive players in the IPL surpassing M.S.Dhoni's tag of $1.5million. There were little doubt concerning the buying of they both unlike Michael Clarke, who pulled out fearing that he may be not be bought. And when Flintoff came under the hammer, Chennai who had the full $2 million purse went all out and got their man. Though there wasn't much talk about Flintoff's destination, Chennai team later revealed that they had targeted Flintoff long back. I cannot wait to see Flintoff teeing off for my Chennai side!!!!!!!!!!!!

IPL Auction:List of players available

List of players for second auction
Australia: Brad Haddin, Michael Clarke, Nathan Hauritz, Stuart Clark, Brad Hogg, Beau Casson, Mark Cameron, Peter Forrest, Lee Carseldine, Doug Bollinger, Michael Dighton, Jason Krejza, Nathan Reardon, Chris Hartley, Shaun Tait, Ashley Noffke, Bryce McGain, George Bailey, Travis Birt, Michael Hill, Chris Swan, Michael Klinger, Ben Edmondson, Aiden Blizzard, Mark Cosgrove, Adam Voges, Shane Harwood

England: Kevin Pietersen, Andrew Flintoff, Steve Harmison, Ravi Bopara, Monty Panesar, Robert Key, James Foster, Sajid Mahmood, Matt Prior, Ian Bell, Paul Collingwood, Owais Shah, Darren Gough, Ryan Sidebottom, Graeme Swann, Luke Wright, James Anderson, Ed Joyce, Dominic Cork

Bangladesh: Shakib Al Hasan, Mohammad Ashraful, Mashrafe Mortaza, Tamim Iqbal, Junaid Siddique, Mehrab Hossain jnr, Rajin Saleh, Ziaur Rehman, Mahmudullah, Mushfiqur Rahim, Raqibul Hasan, Nadif Chowdhury

New Zealand: Mark Gillespie, Tim Southee, Jesse Ryder, Jeetan Patel, Kyle Mills, Chris Martin, Jamie How, Peter Fulton, James Franklin

Pakistan: Asim Kamal, Mohammad Hafeez, Yasir Hameed, Danish Kaneria, Yasir Arafat

South Africa: Gulam Bodi, Rory Kleinveldt, Charl Langeveldt, Ashwell Prince, JP Duminy, Martin van Jaarsveld, Roelof van der Merwe, Andre Nel, Neil McKenzie, Yusuf Abdullah, Paul Harris, Johan Botha, Morne van Wyk, Tyron Henderson

Sri Lanka: Thilan Thushara, Nuwan Kulasekara, Mahela Udawatte, Dammika Prasad, Thilina Kandamby, Kaushalya Weeraratne, Jehan Mubarak, Dilhara Lokuhettige, Malinga Bandara, Malinda Warnapura, Michael Vandort, Prasanna Jayawardene, Upul Tharanga, Kaushal Lokuarachchi, Jeevantha Kulatunga

West Indies: Sylvester Joseph, Darren Sammy, Andre Fletcher, Kieron Pollard, Kieran Powell, Fidel Edwards, Dwayne Smith, Kemar Roach

Zimbabwe: Vusi Sibanda

First ODI:India beat Sri Lanka by 6 wickets

India won the first match of the 5 match ODI series with a comfortable six wicket victory. Before the match India had a big setback when Sehwag injured himself in the training and Rohit Sharma came in place of him. Sri Lanka went with the unchanged line up that beat Pakistan. Winning the toss, Dhoni opted to field. India got off to a dream start when in-form Dilshan was run out without score on the board. But Jayasuriya teed off from there and reached his 28th ODI hundred and in the process completed 13000 ODI runs and also became the oldest man to score an ODI hundred. When it looked like the home team might get a huge score, India kept taking wickets and restricted the Lankans to 246. When India batted, Sachin was on the wrong side of an umpiring error from debutant umpire Dharmasena but Gambhir and Raina took charge scoring freely, Mendis was negotiated with ease. As Raina & Gambhir fell, Dhoni took control and India took the batting powerplay in 43rd over and reached the target with 11 balls to spare. Sanath Jayasuriya was Man of the Match.

Brief Scores:
India 247 for 4 (Gambhir 62, Raina 54, Dhoni 61*) beat Sri Lanka 246 for 6 (Jayasuriya 107, Ishant 3-51) by six wickets

KFC Big Bash Finals:New South Wales beat Victoria

What a match for a T20 finals. The finals of the KFC Big Bash between defending champs Victoria 'Bushrangers' and New South Wales 'Blues' went till the last ball and in the end it was the Blues who took home the trophy in a nerve racking thriller and ended Victoria's stronghold over the trophy. Victoria, batting first made 166 for 4 thanks to some clean hitting by Rob Quiney who hit a 91 from 56 balls including 8 sixes. Bird took 3 wickets for the Blues. And in reply the Blues appeared to be cruising at 85 for 1 but they lost 3 wickets for 7 runs and made things complex for themselves but then came Ben Rohrer. His brutal innings of 44 came off 20 balls as he took them nearer to the target. And with a single needed off the last ball, Rohrer scampered for a bye and the bowlers throw hit the stumps. But the Blues were celebrating while the third umpire was called for. And replays showed Rohrer's bat in the air while the bails were removed but his dive meant that his hands were inside the crease!!!!!! After a few anxious moments Blues erupted again. Both these teams will take part in the Champions League t20 coming October.

IPL:England players set to play

All the roadblocks for the English players participating in the second edition of the IPL have been removed with The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) agreeing to allow England players to play in the Indian Premier League (IPL) for a three-week period. Ealier it was said that KP and Flintoff would be available for 2 weeks only, which made the franchises think about buying but after this finals resolution we can see a host of English players including Andrew Flintoff, Paul Collingwood, Kevin Pietersen and few more in the IPL. And the players have struck a deal with the counties and it means they will give 10% of whatever they get from the auction. But once they are put on auction, there is no doubt that they will attract high bids and its been rumoured that KP is in talks with the Bangalore team while Chennai are in dialogues with Flintoff. Lets wait and watch as all of them will come under the hammer and have no say in deciding they play!!!!

Cricket:IPL transfer news

The transfer market of the IPL has hardly seen any activity yet it saw the second transfer, which was a direct swap between Zaheer Khan(Bangalore) and Robin Uthappa (Mumbai). and similar to the ealier swap, this deal did not involve any cash dealings. After this swap, both the players will be appearing for their respective state teams. Vijay Mallya, during the IPL last year had said he would have been more happier had to got Uthappa also in the auction and now he has had his wish. Along with Uthappa, Bangalore have also signed Leicestershire all-rounder Dillon du Preez. It must be remembered that Delhi have signed up Australian dasher David Warner even before he made his smashing debut in the international arena.

Cricket:IPL Transfers

The first ever trading window of IPL is set to end on January 22nd but there has not been much activity among the teams. Players like Afridi and Akhtar were put on sale but there were no buyers for them given the current situation between India and Pakistan. Some of the teams like the Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals were happy with their current squad and they did not put any player on the market. The first and the only transfer till this second was the straight swap between Nehra (Mumbai Indians) and Shikhar Dhawan (Delhi Daredevils). Now there are serious talks that Zaheer(Bangalore) and Robin Uthappa (Mumbai) are set for a similar swap without any cash dealings. Apart from this one there hasn't been any news (not even rumours) regarding the transfers and the teams have started to release fringe players to cut the costs!!!!! Next trading season migh see a bit of activity as teams are not sure of whom they require now. Now, I'm waiting for the player auction in February. If you are checking this post after January 20th, click here for the transfers before the window closed - IPL TRANSFERS.

IPL:Asif quits Delhi Daredevils

Mohammad Asif has been released from his IPL contract by the Delhi Daredevils after 48 hours of meetings between the player and the franchise. Asif is enduring some tough moments of his life after he was banned by IPL for using some banned substances. His bad times continued as he was detained for possession of Opium in Dubai Airport. And above all he was banned by PCB, pending the hearing of the IPL tribunal. Delhi bought Asif for US$650,000 on a three-year contract, making him the second-most expensive Pakistan player in the league. With his hearing set for January 24th, Asif's pull out comes as a surprise to many. He has said he wants to concentrate on winning back his place in the Pakistan national squad and he had quit due to personal reasons, which is understandable. Hope he comes back a better person.

Pietersen & Moores quit Strauss named skipper

Kevin Pietersen has stepped down from the post of England captain just 6 months into the job and following him resigning was the England head coach Peter Moores, whom KP din't have a good working relationship. And as a result of their rift they both have resigned and Andrew Strauss has been made the captain. Though he is likely to captain only the test team it remains to be seen who will be the ODI captain. Pietersen was not happy with Michael Vaughan's omission from the tour to West Indies and that prompted him to speak up against his coach. And the ECB found that KP did not have the backing of his players, something that will make KP feel let down as he backed the players a lot. And before ECB could hit the nail on his head, he walked away from the job. He is England's best player by some distance and the team needs him badly but I feel they also need the aggressive captaincy of Pietersen, something Strauss doesn't have. Terrible times for English cricket which is in total chaos.