India Culture, Business, Sports and Food. Get all the buzz in India now

The Indian Shuttler: Anup Sridhar

ANUP SRIDHAR’S inability to keep his nerves in a tight decider has been a constant concern in the past. So much so that his coaches following the match on the net at the Prakash Padukone academy in Bangalore felt that everything was lost once the Indian conceded a tight second game to former champion Taufik Hidayat in the second round of the Proton World Badminton championship in Kuala Lumpur.

But the world number 41 was determined to prove his detractors wrong and came back from the brink with an all out attacking strategy to beat the eight seed Indonesian 21-14, 24-26, 22-20 in one hour and 13 minutes and advance to the third round. The 24-year-old now had to face the winner of the match between 13th seed Mohammad Hafiz B Hashim of Malaysia and Scott Evans of Ireland.

“Yes, I used to choke in the decider and have lost many matches like that. But now I feel the results have started to come and that has done a world of good to my confidence,” said Sridhar, who had lost to the same opponent in the Asian Badminton championship semifinal in two close games.

Earlier, National women’s champion Saina Nehwal celebrated India’s Independence Day with a 21-16, 21-10 thrashing of 13th seed Juliarre Schenk of Germany in just 26 minutes to set up a third round date with fourth seed Hongyong Pi of France.
However, the day definitely belonged to Sridhar who accomplished an enthralling victory, after trailing 18-13 in the decider, over one of the most talented shuttler in the world. This was the third time meeting of the duo and on both earlier occasions, Hidayatl1ad got the better of the Indian.

Anup adopted an attacking approach from the start and made the most of the wind inside the arena to clinch the first game with ease. But after the change of ends, it was the Indians turn to be affected by the wind and though he managed to save six game points he could not avoid the tie from going into the decider.
“At this point, I felt like I was once again losing my focus. But I told myself not to think about the second game and concentrate on individual points,” Sridhar told. The loss in concentration had allowed Hidayat to take a big lead in the decider but the Indian unleashed an array of smashes and was also helped by two net chords to catch the world number 10 at 19-all. He did wasted one match point but kept his nerve to clinch the tie on the second.

The only disappointing result for the Indians .came in the men’s doubles where national champs Sanave Thomas and Rupesh Kumar lost to 14th seeded Indonesian pair of Hendra A Gunawan and Joko Riyadi 21-13, 21-14 in the second round.

THE GOOD, THE BAD, THE UGLY

A Saturday in Bristol was one of those rare days. It brought forth that perfect one-day match - and as we tend to look at everything from a batsman’s perspective in the shorter versions of the game, this perfection was obviously from that same viewpoint. Bowlers, be damned. The team batting first scored well over six runs an over and still won the game by the skin of their teeth.

This is a familiar tale in most ODIs played on decent tracks throughout the year. Tracks are made to suit the batsmen and more often than not, we witness a run feast for 100 overs.

So under these circumstances, with lives getting busier and attention spans getting shorter, the advent and interest in Twenty20 cricket made perfect sense. After all, why should someone wait for seven hours to get to know the result of a game when you can have it all jam-packed into three hours or so, plus, of course, with the accompanying entertainment - music, mini-contests, cheerleaders etc that doesn’t exist for the most in more serious cricket?

T20 had all the ingredients of an entertaining 50-over game, it is played on flat tracks, the boundaries are brought in to ensure mores hits to and over the fence and, to top it all, as the games are basically eveningers, you don’t have to take off from office or school to watch the game.

It seemed like an advertiser’s dream and was manna from the heavens for cricket’s organizers. So it is little surprise that less than a year or so after India. played their first Twenty20 international and the BCCI thumbed its collective nose at this bastardised version of the game, they are the first ‘official’ board that is preparing to jump on to the T20 bandwagon in a mega way with the concepts of the Premier Cricket League and the Champions Cricket League.

If the BCCI, as it says, has been thinking about this for a while, why is it any surprise that Texas billionaire R. Allen Stanford or Essel group head Subhash Chandra see Twenty20 cricket as the way to bullion bank? While the ICC, itself having got itself a T20 World Cup, is keeping mum on so-called "domestic" events, it’s high time people started looking at T20 (the cricketing part) more seriously. Straight off, the proposed events will add to an already cramped international schedule. If the BCCI’s corporatised domestic calendar takes off, they will of course say that it is up to the players to choose to be "bought" by a corporate and play even more cricket.

But two things here, if a company wants to cash in on buying the franchise for a team, it will obviously want some stars to add value and will throw megabucks at that star. Two, which player, however starry, will refuse a few crore (the cap is expected to be between $1-2 million)?

The face of the game is changing too, as time progresses we’ll doubtless see more and more T20 specialists, people who can hit the first ball they face out of the ground and bowlers who can keep the economy rate under 7/over.
The pundits have -argued that there’s no time to showcase your skills in a 20-over dash, that there’s no time to build an innings or set up a dismissal but well, that’s what’s happening in countless Onedayers today. Thirty overs (20 overs of power plays and 10 at the death) of every 50 over game are made for pure innovation (or slogging) for batsmen and containment for bowlers. T20 has taken it a step further by removing those relatively sluggish 20 overs from the 21st to the 40th.

Wickets aren’t at a premium as even if you lose a wicket every 12th ball, you can last the innings. Bowlers of course, don’t have time to get their line or rhythm right as most will get 12-ball spells.

Many also say that it would kill Test cricket, but it might have the completely opposite effect. Interest in Test cricket, interestingly, has shot up dramatically of late and the true fan would logically be more inclined to watch a real battle of skill, character and nerves over tough sessions of play. If anything, it might damage the popularity of One day cricket.

The flip side of T20 could be the influence on youngsters, as kids who will grow up watching slam bang cricket would find it difficult to relate to the technique and subtleties of this game. Will they be the casualties of war? We’ll have to wait and watch.

Fur from the madding crowd

Kaafila
Cast: Amitoj Maan essentially
Direction: Amitoj Maan unfortunately
Rating: AVERAGE

All noise, no poise. This tummy-turner is a fusion of Russian salad, a Titanic watery soup, a jungle jilebi and even a Shootout at Afghani Asparaguswalla. If you wander into it, you may leave brain-dead.

Cripes, Just in case you do, wander in that is, hold on to your helmets. An enormous group of desperadoes from all over the countryside is holed out in a Moscow log cabin. It seems they’re seeking illegal entry into England.

Fake visas, scowls and shut-ups-shut-ups are organised by a bad guy wearing a skyscraper tall furry hat. Howzzat!

Next: The wannabe immigrants’ grunt-grunt or just turn into pools of sauce. Among the survivors do note a Pakistani fakir who mimics Michael Jackson, dear Amitoj Mann who isn’t sure whether he’s acting or directing or neither, a South Indian who’s called ‘Idli Sambhar’, a Kolkata professor who tries to imitate Mrinal Sen and assorted scientists (?) who pass off a tube of pea khichdi as ‘plutonium.’ Such delirium.

In addition, there’s a woman who’s so (unintentionally) hilarious that she could be Charlie Chaplin’s Angel. Last but not the least, say hello to Sunny Deol — as a mercenary; he shoots with both his hands, going bang-bang-bang-bang, till you check your own body for bullet wounds.

Incidentally; Deol utters the most side-splitting line of dialogue in centuries. Says he seriously to the grunt gang, "Boys don’t get emotional. Eat because food has nothing to do with emotions." Profound.
Indeed, Kaafila (official spelling) is so awful that you don’t know whether to laugh, cry or migrate to the chemist’s for a pain reliever.