It is a well-known fact that the proprietor of this blog is Royal Challengers Bangalore supporter, so perhaps the proper colour to mention this afternoon is neither red nor white, or for that matter yellow, but black.
According to a possibly apocryphal anecdote, Napoleon once asked about a well-merited general up for promotion: But is he lucky? Last night, MS Dhoni had all that luck Napoleon wished for. The RCB, on the other hand, were a star-crossed XI. Virtually all the commentary I've read so far has mentioned Murphy's Law. A few has also mentioned how catches win matches, except in this one: two of the fallen wickets probably cost the RCB far more than they did the CSK. The batsmen were out all right, but so were the catchers: Steyn had to leave the field altogether without bowling a single ball; Kohli managed one over and, later, not very many more than that with the bat. These Pyrrhic catches left the Royal Challengers with a bowling challenge.
Which leads us to Cameron White. There was a time ... oh, circa 2003, when I was actually fairly excited about White: he was a young, soon-to-be-Victorian-Captain, bowling all-rounder then. He was fresh, he was entertaining to watch, he took wickets and when he didn't he seemed to contain. There was something there. And then there wasn't. I don't know what happened, but nothing much good came of it. One memorable, nightmarish ODI, he was taken for about 100 runs (or at least it felt like that many) by a New Zealand chasing down a monster score. PS. New Zealand won. He was taken to the Centre for Excellence to tweak and improve his bowling, which apparently only made things worse. He went from being a bowling all-rounder to a batsman all-rounder to a part-timer to not bowling at all really. Listed by cricinfo as bowling 'legbreak googly', last night he apparently tried his hand at seamers. The giggly tweets that appeared in my timeline told me all I need to know of the quality thereof. Whither White? I honestly don't know. Worse: I don't know if anything can be done about it.
Having to rely on such bowling (or should one write 'bowling') made it almost impossible for the RCB to win. I don't know if they were beaten by a better team; they were certainly beaten by a luckier one.
Looking forward, the Warriors and the Redbacks will meet in the second semi-final tonight. I am, of course, very much hoping for a repeat of the team colours of the first semi-final in the final. Go Redbacks!
4 Comments:
Exactly, it's so ironic that the 'phenomenal' catch Steyn took would be detrimental to Bangalore's chances of winning.
There was also the disadvantage of Raina being in wonderful form, and boy, did he hit the ball.
Blogrolled you folks.
Cheerio!
Wicket or not, Steyn's catch was disastrous on so many levels. And Kohli's almost as much. Apart, possibly, from an Australian point-of-view: surely even our clueless selectors will understand now that Cameron White IS NOT an all-rounder, or even a part-timer for that matter, and stop selecting him for that reason at least. (Not that I'm holding my breath or anything.)
Thanks for the blogroll. :)
It takes a long while before sense is knocked into selectors, it happens so with most teams.
Tbh, I've always considered White to be a handy player, but that's probably because all the bad innings might have come whenever I haven't checked out the scorecard or watched him on television.
He didn't make it to the squad to India though I think, isn't it so?
'It takes a long while before sense is knocked into selectors [...]'
Ah yes, you are, of course, right. But the last few years I have begun to despair: can any sense be knocked into them?
I forget now: will the India v Australia series consist of only two Tests or are there still some ODIs in there as well? White hasn't been in the Test squad for a while now, but as far as I know, he still retains his spot in both the ODI and T20 XI. I might be totally wrong. I just can't remember hearing anything about his being dropped. I also can't remember anything but the Australian Test squad for India being announced; I don't know if additional squad is to be selected if there are any ODIs or if they'll just use the same people for those as well. In which case you're right: White is not in it.
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