Christmas wishes and wraps

Firstly, may I wish a Merry Christmas and a happy New Year to everyone.

It’s been an eventful few weeks in the world of cricket. India has secured the series against England, South Africa has claimed a monumental win in Perth, and New Zealand and West Indies were forced into a stalemate.

Test cricket has been revitalised by some thrilling wins in the previous few weeks, only to be taken back a peg by some selfishness in the Mohali test. The epic win in Chennai was a victory of will, winning a test when they had been decisively outplayed in all the previous innings.

It featured a truly masterful Tendulkar century, sheltering his lesser partner Yuvraj from some determined England bowling, and featured strong showings from Virender Sehwag. India then followed up with the wrong way to finish the series.

India has a bad recent history of trying to draw remaining tests of a series when they reach the lead. In England in 2007, they seemed completely uninterested in going for the win once they took the lead in the second test.

Against Australia, they won at Mohali and then never looked like attempting to win another game on the highway-like pitches, leaving it to an Australian collapse to secure a 2-0 series win. It was not attractive test cricket in the same way as Australian over aggression is not attractive test cricket.

Don’t get me wrong. India was the better team in every occasion and deserved a series win. My qualm is that they do not treat the fans to entertaining cricket. Australia lost in South Africa but neither team can hardly be blamed for any poor cricket, it was absolutely riveting. As was the Chennai test.

Effectively India’s captain MS Dhoni summed it up by saying he wanted Yuvraj and Gambhir to score second innings centuries, which shows how India’s attitude to winning the game was completely out of whack. With conditions also limiting the amount of time played, this selfish attitude does not bode well for a team striving to be number one (And not far off from that tag).

South Africa proved their worth and new steel with a crushing victory in Perth. India completed a great chase in Chennai only prior to this, but without dampening India’s achievement, this was probably the more monumental considering the state of the series, the opposition, and the journey it took to get there.

South Africa has always been a classy team. Since readmission, they have had top quality players throughout the 90’s and naughties. However, their readmission came also during the period of Australia reaching its zenith in cricketing power. They have never beaten Australia in a test series and have folded easily at times when they had the personnel to give Australia a real shake.

This time now, is a different South Africa. Young players such as AB De Villiers and Dale Steyn have reached their prime after years of struggle, Graeme Smith has reached the emotional maturity needed for the captaincy, and has discovered the warrior within himself. Old veterans such as Ashwell Prince, Jacques Kallis and Mark Boucher are contributing well, and there is a unity and confidence that reminds me of the Australian team of 2001/2002.

The win at Perth was vital for the Cricketboks, they have a series lead against a demoralised Australian team and now have the chance to prove they are the premier team in the game. Australia is not a team that will surrender their long held number one spot lightly, but this team looks like it can do it.

2008 has been an important year, at year’s end Australia is no longer the top team in the world, with India showing its strength (And cash) and South Africa reaching their long-awaited peak.
2009 promises to bring more riches and woes as 2008 did. Let’s hope that when next year ends, test cricket is still the number one form of cricket.