Blogging While Watching the 6th ODI ...

It is 2.39 A. M. I am watching the 6th ODI live. The tension is mounting. Mighty Symonds again hit a brilliant century. What an innings!

Sachin and Saurav have yet again delivered the dream start. 140 runs for the first wicket. India are chasing 317. Volumes can be written about the way these two young players played as opening partners. Guys, it's not easy. Aussies are the best cricket team, excelling in all the departments. Playing against them always needs more than 100%. Winning against them needs best performance and good luck.

When India were on 140/0, the duo had hit only 14 fours and 3 sixes amounting to 74 runs. They had run 66 runs in that staggering heat. This is a very subtle point. Against a team like Australia, who hate to lose, conventional techniques and emotional outbursts don't help. You have to be playing your best cricket all the time, 50 overs, close to 300 deliveries. Ultra-cautious, ultra-tenacious, ultra-sensitive (to marginal possibilities of run) -- you need to be all of that at the same time. Even though people remember only the scores and stats, this commitment, athleticism, improvisations, often go unnoticed. Not all of that can be attributed to

• Money they get
• Being used to it

Getting on the nerves of Aussies is an incredibly hard task. (Just now an Aussie or two mis-fielded. Can you believe it?) India team are doing it. Performance (and longevity) is all you need. Leave the age factor to those best of 1.2 billions.

Tonight I am very happy, independent of result of match. At least a friend of mine is going to eat his own words. I pity him.

400 Just Happens to be a Number!

That's true. He doesn't care that he's played that many ODI's. He doesn't care the only other player who has played more ODI's than him (Sanath Jayasurya, another all-time great) has actually got more than 3000 runs less than him :).

We lost that ODI to Aussies. He should have carried on to make yet another century, but Lee got the better of him when he was on 47.

Kudos, yet again and yes, I hope Dilip Vengsarkar (the BCCI chief) gives importance to performance and not age, while choosing the team.