A wrong sentence certainly, one that my grammar teacher would have a fit over, but precisely the sentiment. We don't care if you have spent a decade and a half giving to cricket what no one before you have done. We don't care because we have given you in return even more than that. We gave you sleepless nights watching you play at all the odd hours, we have had marital tensions for that. We have at times neglected our families, our jobs. We have postponed our grocery shopping, lived off pizza.

So when we ask that our team respect our love, we are not asking much. We are in fact asking what is our due. We are not fair weather friends too. Far from it, we have seen you with strings of bad scores before and we have still said you are the best.

When it is time to go, don't pout like Ganguly did, don't have that hurt expression on face like Laxman as if we have committed an unbearable crime against you. We have not.

Yesterday you did. Not for being out, but for the manner in which you were.

Yesterday before the match you said you have been playing well, it is not that there is anything wrong with your batting, that it was an odd good ball.

Odd good ball?

I don't know if am sad or angry, maybe a little bit of both. I don't watch cricket and analyze it like some of my friends here do, I just watch it, I fall into the pits of despair when my team shows no spine, I stand tall, grim faced when we lose but after have fought tooth and nail for it, I jump up in jubilation when we win.

VVS is gone. And as much as we liked him in full flow, as much we knew he was the magician with a bat, we also could sense that his time had come. He was living the past season on borrowed time, he was a shadow of player he had been.

There is a little ruthlessness to the words: And as a lover of the cricket team and the sport, I believe that Team India is not a place for placating egos and helping fading careers. Strategically keeping a player who you believe is not past his prime is a different matter. But for a while we have seen Laxman struggle. There is a Kaif waiting, there are Venugopals and Rainas.

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Have we found the equivalent of the two W's in the Two P's? Pathan and Patel should compliment each other. One a fast bowler who likes to crush toes and doesn't seem to mind going for the helmet now and then. The other swings.

Pathan though needs a little time to think over his bowling. It is not as accurate as one would have hoped. But I daresay he is better than going back to Zaheer and Agarkar.

And by the way, are the days of falling back on Agarkar over? I hope so.

Watching him bowl with the broken jaw, we my friends and I stood up to salute the soldier. We sang the National Anthem. A few times he frustrated us, a few times our heart went for him, at the luck that seemed to elude him, but never, ever has he fallen short on trying.

Seldom has such a committed cricketer worn the Indian cap. Only a handful will even reach the touching distance of his lion-hearted spirit.

I have been unfortunately following the game thru Circinfo's radio commentary. Have tried the video feed earlier but it is ,more exasperating than not. At least the radio commentary si relayed with the interminal delays of buffering.

It was a draw and it was not a tame draw.

And we got to see a lot of firsts in the test too. I got to hear of them. Was it the first ever in International cricket history that a Sardar bowled to Sardar? And was it the first that unraveling of a turban cost one the catch?

My friends find fault with Dravid, say he left the charge for too late. Yeah right! Any sooner and it might have gone sour. There was really no chance of of victory march there on the day five. That India managed to dampen all the English hopes of a victoy wasin itself noteworthy. And like any leader in the interest of his team should, Dravid first made sure they would not lose, having done that a late charge was in fact quite a statement.

Many have bought into the premise that Sachin should in fact play the elder statesman, not give himself to the rush of adrenalin and play a long patient game. But the fact is whenever he has tried that he often fallen on his face. When he takes the battle to the opposition he rises and succeeds more often than not.

Yesterday's cameo was, well, an attempt to do open heart surgery on Flintoff's heart. That the match was called off must have been a relief to the English captain. Even a full quota of the overs might not have taken India to victory but would have taken them perilously close.

I really do. I was wishing, if not a win for Pakistan but at least a decent fight-back. I know she feels, I have been there myself. But, man, not being there does feel great, better than the supreme dominance over Sri Lanka at home.

A funny newsbyte caught my attention, trying to flit from website to website, soak in the afterglow of a clinical exhibition of brilliance. The wicket of Kamran Akmal was specially satisfying. Batsmen make mistakes, but to set a trap and catch them in it is more satisfying than sending the stick cart wheeling.

Oh, the funny report on HTCricket. Must read it in full. If Woolmer knows all the tricks in the world and all the ways to get them out, one wonders why didn't he use it.

Wanna know how to get Tendulkar's goat, or pierce Dravid's fortress? Wanna know what makes Yuvraj un-tick, or how to rob Dhoni of his day's litre of milk? The coach with a 'county-bred defensive mindset' has got it all. Would have liked to spent a neat hour and three thousand words ripping fraud apart but, as Ruchir in a post below says, who give's a rats behind what he thinks, with all his insight we got them three times in a row. Fair and square, black and blue, pink and purple.

Now for a good night's sleep.

Leadership, after all, begins with ideas. Ideas that catch on and are subscribed to.

For long I have lamented that India, being the superpower that it is in world cricket, has not taken the leadership position. Not been at the forefront of excellence. Given the money and craze we generate it would seem not that implausible that we should also be leading in the areas of stadium, pitches, technology etc. etc.

Well a step has been taken forward. Lets hope the next one is not too far off.

He is too young to be given the mantle of representing India.

Sometimes, you get a rare talent, a rare young fella you just feel you need to take a chance with. We did with Sachin and reaped rich rewards and there are many instances when player made their debut when very young and went on to become greats.

The Mohammad brother both Hanif and Mushtaq come to mind. Our own BS Chandershekar was I think 18 when he made his debut. Although there are those that fail to live up to the promise, like L Sivaramakrishna, there are many to prove the selectors right.

When a player is at the top of his game, specially young ones, it is better to give them a chance and keep their spirits up. There are always ways to keep them motivated and keep them from going astray.

When playing England in India there might not come the opportunity. Harbhajan will by then be back to full fitness and we might need anyone else either.

All said and done, Murali Karthik given precedence over Chawla seems a shame. But then Murali over anyone is a shame.

But his performance has been shoddy most of the time, with patches of brilliance now and far between then.

Thirty matches and twenty seven wickets are not a happy reading.

Where is Piyush Chawla?

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...