Saturday, January 22, 2005

Oh What A Joy !!!

It is indeed a great pleasure to see the West Indies perform as a quality team again at least as far as the ODIs are concerned. The win in the Champions Trophy received unfairly little credit and although they lost to Pakistan last week they gave Australia such a terrible scare that one finally can state with some degree of confidence that a revival is very much on the way.

The only issue being that on numerous occasions in the last decade the West Indies have flattered to deceive similarly. However the big difference this time is that it is not just the brilliance of Lara that is contributing to the revival. It features all-round contributions from the team members. In fact, Lara has personally done precious little in victories in the Champions Trophy and the good performances in the couple of matches here - it is Hinds, Gayle, Sarwan, Bradshaw, Collins - and a very talented young all-rounder Bravo who are doing it.

This can only be good news for World Cricket - ODI cricket in particular, that is in serious danger of either dying out due to its drab nature or killing the spectators with it.

The West Indies are one team who I love to see do well - even if it is agianst India - and I wish them all the best in the next couple of years leading to the WC at home

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