Almost 48 hours later.

After having said something innocuous and finding my wife pouting I asked: "What did I say?"

"Its not what you said, it is the way you said it." There can be no pleasing sometimes. And certainly so for a fickle cricket fan. For all said and done, it is not that we lost but the manner in which we did. Manish put is quite succinctly. I would have agreed to that yesterday, or the day before. But forty eight hours have passed since. And I think I would have been as mad had they lost by a small margin, if Sehwag, Dravid, Sachin had all scored a century each and we had alomost reached there. We still would have found someone to blame, some one to vent our anguish on.

But...

Problems remain: Prem’s post pointed out so nicely, in the test arena we seem to have a questions hanging over almost every other slot. I totally agree with him when he seems a little bewildered as to why the opening batsmen fiasco continued all through the series. I felt through out the final test there was something missing, something unexplainable. It just did not seem like the team that played the last four tests.

Something happened in between that occupied their minds more than cricket. And that's not fair to Dravid.

Some folks need to go and make way for others, not as good as they were, but just good enough. Make it a happy team again.

And hearing the exploits of Chawla, not having seen him yet, I wonder if it is not the best time to blood him. The fact that he sixteen (?) works against him but I remember one Rayudu who played like a magician and disappeared. Even if he fails, age is on his side and like Parthiv he might just be able to bounce back. If succeeds, we would have found a fine replacement for Kumble, who has maybe a couple of seasons more. And better to have him study under the master, learn the tricks of the trade, learn the mental toughness that makes Kumble great.

Laxman, sorry Prem, has to go. He just is too inconsistent to be there. It is time we looked around for new faces that will play for the next decade.

And since this is such a wide topic: Anyone considered Donald for Indian bowling coach? We have enough money and maybe...