1) BBC http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/cricket/other_international/india/6376707.stm
actually predicts that there is a good chance of India winning the world cup (author is not an Indian). Being an Indian I just hope that it comes true. I seriously feel that Tendulkar deserves a world cup trophy to his credit and India owes him one. This might well be Tendulkar's last world cup appearance.
Australia and South Africa are going to be tough teams to beat but so was the case in 1983 (India one the world cup). West Indies was invincible at that time. Perhaps many people wrote of India in that world cup when India slumped to 17/5 and then Kapil walked in to bat with Kirmani and scored 175 (it is a pity that there is no recording of this match) .
The web site talks about the top 8 teams their strengths and weaknesses/injuries. India seems, at this moment, to be a very well balanced team(at least on paper). If only they click this time. Pitches in West Indies are not going to be fast. It might help the slower bowlers and India has plenty of them (even the fast bowlers are at max slow medium according to international standards !!!). Tendulkar might be very handy with the ball in the world cup. Ganguly has found his touch hope Sehwag does the same.
May the best team win.
2) Discussion on Super 8
This is seriously ridiculous..ICC has already predicted the results of round one...and have also put it in their official website..Rediff.com - Super 8s : India vs Pakistan, April 15
3) Sportstar Starspeak
I was reading this in the Starspeak column of Sportstar where veteran Indian players have put their bets on different teams. One thing that caught my eye was the views of 3 former Indian cricketers (Srikanth, Maninder Singh, Kirti Azad) who were not in favor of having the minnows for the world cup stating the following reasons that:
it might devalue the game in the initial stages of the world cup
the world cup goes on for too long
it tends to affect the fitness of the players
if it rains it might hurt the better teams
I myself am a little confused about which side to take in this debate but I tend to incline towards allowing the minnows in the world cup. My point is that if the teams have cleared the criteria for the world cup then what is the problem in having them. Granted that the initial stages of the world cup would be a little boring but this is a way for the weaker teams to experience the adrenaline rush. Even Soccer world cup has strong and weak teams. How much ever you play international cricket, world cup has it own charm and its own pressure.
Also a consistent thing, which pretty much every one is saying, is that India might have a good chance (given all other things) at the world cup because the pitches in West Indies are pretty much like the Indian subcontinent. Out of this, one funny thing I read was Maninder Singh actually giving England (Rank: 7) and New Zealand (Rank: 3) a go at the cup just because they have 2 good spinners in each team. Has he forgotten that even India (Rank: 5) has 2 great spinners in Kumble and Harbhajan (270 and 147 ODIs resp). New Zealand’s Jeetan Patel is just 17 ODIs old. England’s Panesar is just 9 ODIs old.
4)Duckworth-Lewis method of adjusting targeted scores
http://www.icc-cricket.com/icc/rules/d-l_method.pdf
http://www.icc-cricket.com/icc/rules/d-l_table.pdf
4 comments:
Vishwa Wrote:
Well, this is actually not as ridiculous as rediff makes it out to be... they are NOT predicting results.. they are just using the seeding numbers for the super 8s... This is infact very well thought out by ICC.
Basically, A1, A2 etc are not the winner/runnerup of each group...they are the seeding order of the group... that is the basic difference if we compare it to the soccer world cup. If we remove that mental block, it will not be that weird:-)
Each team in a group is assigned a number depending on their seeding.. This is directly from the ICC page that rediff points us to:
Team names for the Super Eight stage are indicative based on the top two teams from the Group Stage qualifying. If these two teams do qualify they will be seeded in position 1 or 2 as specified regardless of whether they finish first or second in their group. For example, if South Africa wins Group A and Australia comes second, for the purposes of the Super Eights, South Africa will still be A2 and Australia will be A1. If, for example, Scotland qualifies instead of Australia, Scotland will become A1
I felt that this was very intelligent because it gives pple an option to buy tkts in advance... if an indian is flying to West Indies, it will obviously be to watch the india games, and if b1/b2 is decided after the first round of games, he has to wait till after the first round to buy tkts.. this will put pple off, and the sales will go down...
So, I felt that this was a very intelligent sales scheme - and it helps everyone - sponsors, viewers, spectators etc.
The only problem with this scheme is the very unlikely event of 2 minnows qualifying from one group... then, again, I guess they will be seeded acc to their rankings.. for example, in our group, SL is seeded 2, india 8, bangladesh 11 and bermuda 15. If bangladesh and bermuda qualify, bangladesh will be b1 and bermuda will be b2.
I think they already have numbers for all teams, not just the top ones... like SL and Bangladesh are B1, while india and bermuda are B2... If two B1 teams qualify for the super 8s, the higher seed will keep its number...
same is the case for B2.. if india and bermuda qualify, india will keep its B2, while bermuda will be B1...
Hats off to you for writing such a long email explaining the stuff in detail. But I am still having problems understanding it. May be it has lot of business sense but I think it lacks logic. I kind of guessed that the numbers would be the seedings. So they r right away writing the minnows off (ofcourse we also do so) but donot you think, to be politically correct ICC shouldnot be officially saying this. Would the match be less interesting if srilanka plays pakistan (if we go by the standing after the first rounds are over and India tops the list)
Do you think people will feel happy once they have bought the tickets and they end up seeing bermuda vs ireland. So my feeling is people will buy tickets irrespective of who would be playing in super 8 (by making their own guesses) and thats how it should be. ICC should not be telling people "come see the match because there is a high prob of Ind vs Pak in super 8".
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Vishwa says....
I think they already have numbers for all teams, not just the top ones... like SL and Bangladesh are B1, while india and bermuda are B2... If two B1 teams qualify for the super 8s, the higher seed will keep its number...
same is the case for B2.. if india and bermuda qualify, india will keep its B2, while bermuda will be B1...
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why would india keep B2 and bermuda B1 in this case(this is where i think it is flawed*). where did you find out that higher seed would keep its number. My understanding is 1st and 3rd seed in any group is A1, B1,C1 or D1. I think thats why if scotland qualifies in place of Australia scotland remains A1 and assuming south africa qualifies then it remains A2. this is my understanding.
*I thought for a minute that may be ICC wants to eliminate the luck factor of a team to be first in their group whereas their actual ranking in the world is low. So for example a team like Aus may be second in the round robins but they still wanted to give them more weightage because of their ICC rankings. but even this seems flawed because as per the rule if scot and south Africa qualify scot take A1 and south africa A2. so it is also not purely on rankings either.
My feeling is game should be played in the spirit of the game and not trying to set up teams for super 8 to sell viewership or sponsorship. But I guess at the end of it everything is commercial these days.
Vishwa Wrote:
kya yaar.. unfortunately, today i have a lot of work, and ur giving me more imp work to do ;-)
first of all, i dont think ICC is writing off minnows... they have in the schedule: A1 vs B1 (and in bracket they say Aus vs SL)... and they do have a disclaimer down saying that the teams are indicative based on the top 2 seedings.. im not sure if i understand that line correctly, but i think it means they named the teams in brackets, that mite come if everything worked acc to seedings.
secondly, I think the main idea of ICC is to make sure that they can decide the super8 schedule as much as possible... taking ur example, the SL-pak match wud not be less interesting than india-pak, but for an indian fan/spectator, it does make a difference... we all wud like to know wen india plays pak, rather than wen SL plays pak and book tkts accordingly...
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Do you think people will feel happy once they have bought the tickets and they end up seeing bermuda vs ireland. So my feeling is people will buy tickets irrespective of who would be playing in super 8 (by making their own guesses) and thats how it should be. ICC should not be telling people "come see the match because there is a high prob of Ind vs Pak in super 8".
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acc to the schedule now, u can buy tkts to watch india games right now. as all days of india games in super 8 are fixed... the only way india will not play on those days is if they do not qualify at all... and this is true for all top 8 teams.. taking ur example above, we will end up seeing bermuda vs ireland ONLY if india does not qualify for super 8... ICC is telling that if ur team (from top 8) qualfies for super 8 (irrespective of the standing in the group), it will play these teams on these days (if they qualify)..
if scotland and SA qualify, scotland will be A1 and SA will be A2... but if Aus and Scotland qualify, Aus will be A1 and scotland will be A2... the minnows' number is not fixed, but the top 8 teams' numbers are fixed.
lastly, i think there has been no change in the spirit of the game... there has been no change at all from a cricketing sense.. and to add to it, it helps on every side.. if ICC is doing everything for our convenience (spectators, viewers etc), why do we crib abt the commercialization ?
For games like soccer/hockey etc once a group round robin is over, the ranking within the group matters a lot since the next round is a knockout.. so, a team wud want to top its own group becos it plays the second best of another group in the next round.. but this world cup is different... The most important difference is that after the group qualfiying, the second round again is a round robin.. so, it really does not matter if ur team finishes first or second in ur group since its going to play against all teams in the next round.... so, ICC is just trying to capitalize on this difference...
the reason why im so much in awe of wat they have done is simple.. wen i first looked at the schedule, i felt that it wud be great if india finished second in the group since most of our games wud be on weekends only if we finish second (that time, i had assumed B2 means the team finishing second in the group)...
then wen i realised i was wrong, i was veri happy since i am getting most of indias games on weekends irrespective of how india qualifies to the second stage.. that made me real happy...
and instead of the rediff writer criticising the commercialization, he shud really be thankful for wat hes getting.. or maybe he works on weekends?? ;-)
yeah they have written kind of a disclaimer that these names are just indicative.
Since the super 8 is also a round robin, so it all the more makes sense to rank the one who tops the group as 1and so on (less confusion) and also since it doesnot matter. Also out of 6 super 8 games that India is going to play 3 of them are on weekends(but all big matches).
I agree that given the top 8 teams qualify for super 8, they have tried to reduce the speculation as to who will be playing against one another and on which days. By doing this they have fixed the teams and their games as per the seedings which helps the spectators in planning their trips. May be in case of India it helps us, because had India been B1 we would have got 1 game on the weekend (which would be the case with SL now). So from India's perspective it is good. But what about other teams and their supporters.
Actually thinking from the other teams perspective, this is what I came up with..the weekend games for super 8 teams..
Team Fri-Sun Sat-Sun
Ind 3 3
Aus 4 2
Eng 3 2
Pak 3 1
SL 1 1
WI 2 2
SA 2 2
NZ 2 0
So basically it is just like having 8 teams and playing against each other as per the schedule. Just what throws you off is that it seems like predicting the results. This was a very interesting discussion.
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