Champions League Twenty20 & Australia tour of Sri Lanka Updates

In my last post about retirement of Rahul Dravid from One day international cricket matches, it felt like that I'll have to wait for a long time to watch him play cricket as team India next test match series yet have few months to go. Perhaps he will be available for the India Vs Australia matches in December.

Since Dravid is not a part of Royal Challengers Bangalore this years other wise we can have him watch playing in Champions League Twenty20 series that began today. However I am sure he will be available for another season of IPL at least.

Today in Champions League Twenty20 qualifiers two matched were played i.e.:

1. Auckland v Kolkata Knight Riders - KKR pulled out a win by just 2 runs defending a small total of 121 runs. Perhaps it was hard luck of Auckland who were once looking as they were win the match bu huge margin and thus can get big net run rate advantage. But few runo outs and inability to play slower bowlers well turned the match in KKR's favor.
   
2. Ruhuna v Trinidad & Tobago - T&T wun the match against Sri Lanka's team Ruhuna by 5 wickets. Trinidad & Tobago had a good Champions League Twenty20 season last time also and it seems they will do well this time as well. May be some players from this team will play in IPL next year as well.
   

Now coming to Australia vs Sri Lanka test match the match seems to be headed towards a draw. Australia lead by 52 runs with 7 wickets remaining at stumps on day 4 thus only one days play left we can expect an early close of the match if both captain agree.

The Wall Rahul Dravid - ODI cricket career highlights

The current tour of India cricket team was a night mare for team India but one man showed all the youngsters and experienced cricketer all over the world that class players like him performs in any format of the game and in any conditions.

England where are all the Indian batsmen failed to stand against the short pitch and swinging deliveries of England fast bowlers, it was Rahul Dravid who not only scored multiple centuries in the 4 test matches despite being given the burden (I'll not say it role as he is not a opener batsmen) of opening in the test matches. I bet if only one to two other batsmen in the Indian team have batted like Rahul Dravid in the test series India must have managed to draw at least 2 test matches of the four they lost.

It was Rahul Dravid's performance in the test match series that they selectors of the team India were forced to call Dravid back to the ODI team and also make him debut in the T20 match. Dravid has been recalled in the one day team in the past also when India team travels outside to swinging and bowler friendly conditions.

Thus after the recall Dravid announced his retirement he played one and only T20 match and scored three consecutive sixes, that was a delight to watch and Dravid is not known for hard hitting but as I said class players performs in every format and every situation.

In his last ODI series we cant enjoy full batting of Dravid in earlier matches due to rains and he was unable to capitalize the starts in some however in his last ODI appearance Dravis made stunning 69 of 79 and made a100+ runs partnership with Virta Kohli that helped India reach 302 runs score. However bad luck of team India continued and India lost that match as well.

No matter what fans and critics say about Rahul Dravid the fact is that he has played very important role in buiding team India. The face of team India has been different without his contribution.

Here are some of his career highlights:

• At present he is 7th highest run scorer in ODI cricket
• Michael Bevan of Australia is said te be best middle order batsmen, Dravid has more man of the match awards in ODI than him.
  
• He agreed to kept wickets in ODI and his batting changed from there. In 73 matches he kept wickets he scored 4 centuries and averaged more than his career average
• Dravid is labeled as slow run getter and slow starter but only one Indian batsmen has score faster half century than him, he remain second Indian batsmen to score a fastest half century
• Only person to be involved in two 300 runs partnerships.
  
• Involved in maximum number of high scoring partnership for India
• More than 10000 runs in ODIs
• A streak of 17 wins chasing a score was under his captaincy.

India Vs England Second ODI Match

For the first time since team India landed in England it looked like they gave a team performance and team India was in a strong position in the match at the time rain abandoned the match resulting both teams will head to the second one day international match 0-0.

Debutant Rehane played a nice knock of 40 runs and this guy may be part of the dressing room for a long time. Parthiv Patel may not be a regular members of the Indian cricket team now a days but if you look at his performance in the last couple of series in which he has played around 11 matches this once wicket keeper batsmen for team India has played 4 50+ inning and a couple of 30 and 40+ innings all in the opening slot. Perhaps he is a good alternate in case M. S. Dhoni got injured or ruled out of the team due to poor performances. Also it was a sad to see this batsmen falling 5 runs short of his maiden century, perhaps there is a more better time for it to come.

Parthiv Patel during his knock of career best 95 runs.

Injuries are consistent for India and now Sachin Tendulkar and Rohit Sharma got injured and its not sure if any of them will feature in the second ODI tomorrow.

Cricket Updates for today - Current Matches

Today cricket lovers can enjoy three matches on the weekend i.e.

1. Australia Vs Sri Lanka Test Match Day 4 - Australia is just 1 wicket away to win the first test match of the series. Whereas Sri Lanka need 130 runs. Thus all Sri Lanka can hope for a century of .... nothing Its a matter of one ball while I was updating the blog. Australia has won the match by 129 runs.
   
   
2. Pakistan Vs Zimbawe Test Match Day 3 - This is the only test match to be played between two teams and Zimbawe is once again on the track to improve their cricket. They scored 412 runs in first innings. However Pakistan batsmen are quick in scoring runs and scoring runs quickly. So far result for this match seems to be impossible untill we see some magical spell by Zimbabwe bowlers. Even a drwa would be satisfactory for Zimbabwe.
   
   
3. India Vs England Frist ODI - India lost test series 4-0, they also lost only Twenty twenty match and now they have to play the five match one day series. If India get defeated here then this means the bad phase on Indian cricket has begun. But as India are the world champions one can expect them to win this series, one must not forget they were number one test team in the world before the our of England.