Flatulence, as you know, kids, is the expulsion through the rectum of a mixture of gases that are a byproduct of the digestive process of mammals mainly. The noises commonly associated with flatulence are caused by the vibration of the anal sphincter and occasionally This mixture of gases is known as flatus or informally, as a simple fart. Apparently, someone who farts for a living — a professional farter is called a flatulist. Apparently.
An air-biscuit is another name for flatus, that is far nastier, but a lot funnier too. Air-biscuits are undoubtedly the source of much mirth and hilarity. They’re not, you say? Then how do you explain the fact that the business of whoopee cushions is still booming? Maybe it isn’t. I don’t know for sure. But I do know they’re sold all over the world. I also know that they have remote-controlled devices that can emit the sounds of a flatus symphony... on demand.
I also know something that might be an urban legend but here goes... some weird girl, well known to a few friends of mine, allegedly goes around saying, “Oops! Came out!” every time she drops an air-biscuit, the frequency of which I’m told is alarmingly regular. Could be a flatulist for all we know. Anyway, the comedy value of farts is not something I intend to discuss here.
It’s the timing that I’m more concerned about. Only a couple of hours ago, I attended a meeting of the mayor of Stuttgart and his Mumbai counterpart. I would’ve thought the occasion would bring out the best behaviour from Mumbai’s representatives, who in an ideal world, would want to show their city in the best light. Wake up and smell the moonshine, I later found me saying to myself. When it wasn’t a reporter burping or slurping tea uncomfortably close to my ear, it was a senior councillor unleashing his volley of burps. When that wasn’t the case, it was Mumbai’s mayor who had no idea of what to say or do, leaping at the snacks on offer, almost as if it was the last plate of sandwiches (and some other junk) left in the world.
Then, as the discussion between the Stuttgart mayor and the commissioner of Mumbai (because the mayor of Mumbai had nothing to say) got to the topic of water management, I hear one of the peons — as he walks past me — let out a low, bass-heavy rear blast. I watched on incredulously as he continued walking nonchalantly past the dignitaries. Ok,... that happened, I said to myself as I tried to pay attention to what this dude from Deutschland was talking about.
Then it happened. That final switch. That last thing that told me loud and clear — Citizens of my city have absolutely no regard for manners, courtesy or even appropriate behaviour.
<I had an inkling about this when I first started living in Mumbai in 2005, when I noticed how people could not stop staring... at anything... anyone. A number of people I know have ranted about this staring thing, some have blogged. In fact, I know a few of these starers too.>
Staring, though was the least of my concerns. That final switch was the realisation that people believe it to be their God-given right to have their mobile phones on Ultra Loud mode at the most idiotic times. I’ve known this for a while, but it all came together today. I’ve seen mobiles ringing loudly in hospital wards, theatres during plays, cinema halls, press conferences, college lectures and even at a small meeting with the Nation’s Prime Minister.
The worst offenders are cameramen and photographers, who for some reason live under the belief that vibrate mode has not been invented and such a concept does not even exist. In fact, talking softly is a concept that’s alien to them as well. Aside from a couple of exceptions, most people I know in these categories are the loudest and most obnoxious people alive. To top it all off, they have the most annoying ringtones on the planet. Criminally irritating stuff.
Today’s photographers were no exception. Loud jangly and oppressive ringtones. In the middle of the meeting. What took the cake was that the deputy public relations officer, for whom (on a side note) food is a fulltime occupation, also did not have the sense to keep his phone silent, because sure enough, his phone began ringing loudly, throwing the mayor of Stuttgart off for a moment, in the middle of a sentence.
The deputy PRO merely glances at his phone... in the process, allowing it to ring for a while longer and then as nonchalantly as the farting peon, proceeds to slip the phone back into his pocket, as his eyes track another plate-load of food travelling across the room.
It wouldn’t be right to pass judgment, I know. And I’ve always been taught that being rude to someone rude, isn’t the right way to do things. The fact that I disregard those teachings most of the time is a different story altogether. Telling someone something politely... that serves no purpose. Yelling at them... even worse as you’ll probably get beaten. Ignoring them... hard to do, very hard to do and in a way, it shows that you accept what they’re doing.
So what have we learnt? Nothing.
What changes will we make in the future? None.
Where will all the knowlege you’ve gathered through this post, take you? Nowhere.
And yet, the sheer degree of catharsis from having vented all this, compels me to quote Lt. Aldo Raine who said, “You know somethin’, Utivich? I think this might just be my masterpiece.”
Saturday, January 30, 2010
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Get your hands off my tune, mothertruckers
(Note: The subject of my Republic Day rant has me so befuddled and confused that I’ve spent the last 23 minutes and 42 seconds of my life trying to work out an intro that makes sense. And I’ve come up with nothing. That’s how disoriented I am by this whole thing. I’ll give it a shot anyway)
I don’t understand and never have completely grasped why Mainstream Hindi Cinema (MHC for short) and its proponents have always been completely at ease with their industry being called “Bollywood”. So much so that for a while, there have been tags like “Kollywood”, “Tollywood” and even urghh... even “Lollywood” being thrown around to describe different industries.
I refuse to go into the etymology or nomenclature of those bastardised phrases, suffice it to say that despite overtaking the American film industry in the 1970s, people were still so in awe of phoren maal, the West (most notably Amreeka) and aping them in every way that they decided that it made perfect sense to take the fact that a city called Hollywood happens to house a set of film studies and turn into “Bollywood” as a catch-all for MHC.
In the 2000s with spiralling film budgets and MHC films/actors being recognised across the world, the “Bollywood” fraternity has decided that it hates the name. It hates the fact that as a result of Hollywood, the MHC’s name is forever going to be known as this shitty portmanteau of Hollywood and Bombay (which is now called Mumbai. There, I said it. Now don’t you dare come and wreck my blog, you shit-for-brains. You know who you are).
And so, the MHC as a whole went on this killing spree of sorts. Let’s take everything nice and pleasant in the world and ruin it. Switzerland was first on their hit-list and courtesy Yash Chopra, they succeeded with aplomb. The Maldives, the Seychelles, Sun City (South Africa), Singapore, New York and London were the next targets. Countries across the world began shaking in fear.
Calls were frantically made from one nation to another. “Listen pal, I know you guys and us guys got issues,” said a Palestinian diplomatic to an Israeli one, “But this is bigger than all that. We need to protect ourselves from a bigger threat.” The Mexicans told their Cuban “ese”s to “Relax meng, cuz joo know we gotta save ourselves and our families, joo know”. Meanwhile over in Far East Asia, “people be tripping” just like “when Godzilla be coming, they be all ‘Gaica! Gaica!’.”
Damn. Meandered off the path again.
Anyway so once all those nations safeguarded themselves, these filthy MHCers set their crosshairs on what was once a sacred institution. A rite of passage. A test that separate the boys from the... bigger boys. The game of cricket. With a saboteur-in-chief on the inside, the MHCers tore apart the institution that once was cricket. Cricket turned to a three-letter acronym shared by a club called the Irish Protestant Ladies. That crushing last attack left most people reeling, bleeding and gasping for air, while all along praying, “Please Lord, let this be the end of their reign of destruction.”
Meanwhile, the good people in Marathi Cinema put out one brilliant movie after another to try and save the world from these MHC-mothertruckers, but the shittiest (there really is no better word) films ever made (so bad that they make Hiroshima Mon Amour look like a great film... I didn’t think it was possible either) by the MHC still drew bigger crowds. By this point one would believe that the MHC had made its point against the world. The whole world wanted to just forget all about that name “Bollywood” that had angered the MHC so.
The MHC was having none of it.
Finally, today, drunk with the power the MHC did the unthinkable. It attacked a major Indian institution that wasn’t a sport. It was a part of all our histories. If you ever watched Doordarshan (in the days when we had only one TV channel... and DD-Metro), you will know what I’m talking about and maybe you like it, perhaps you love it... shit, you may even hate it or find it cheesy. But you respect it.
Combining elements from most parts of India, with some eminent personalities of the time, this six-or-so-minute capsule carried by a song that translates literally to “When your tune meets mine, the tune becomes ours”, was first aired on Independence Day in 1988. Written by ad-man Piyush Pandey, this little segment often played between shows to make up time that hadn’t been bought by advertisers. Or there were no ads about upcoming shows. I don’t know. All I know is that if a certain show got over and there were 7 or 8 minutes left till the next one, BANG! This would play. Watch it for yourself, if you haven’t a clue about what I’m saying.
Seen it? Like it? I like it too. A lot. Especially the part at 5 minutes and a second that sounds like it was written by Europe (of The Final Countdown fame, if you weren’t sure that is).
Which is why I was highly pissed off to see the new version they were playing on some shitty channel. I refuse to put up the videos here so if you are curious to see why I’m so piqued, go here and here. It’s so damn long that it’s divided into two parts. It runs at a whopping 16 minutes, gets boring in no time, has a few flashes of brilliance — Sivamani, Gino/Louis Banks, Anoushka Shankar and Ustad Amjad Ali Khan and sons.
The rest of it is the most heinous act ever carried out by the MHCers. EVER. While a sportsperson like Baichung Bhutia — who has given nearly as much time to Indian football as Sachin has to Indian cricket — gets barely a couple of seconds onscreen, these MHC floozies-posing-as-actresses get nearly 30-40 seconds EACH. These flavour-of-the-month idiots who are obviously lip-syncing prance around like idiots and we’re supposed to believe this shit is “the new generation’s Mile Sur Mera Tumhara”?.
Sorry bub, go back to the drawing boards because this shit don’t fly. This is one institution that those — screw it, I don’t care — Bollywood boneheads will not ruin for me. Who’s with me?
I don’t understand and never have completely grasped why Mainstream Hindi Cinema (MHC for short) and its proponents have always been completely at ease with their industry being called “Bollywood”. So much so that for a while, there have been tags like “Kollywood”, “Tollywood” and even urghh... even “Lollywood” being thrown around to describe different industries.
I refuse to go into the etymology or nomenclature of those bastardised phrases, suffice it to say that despite overtaking the American film industry in the 1970s, people were still so in awe of phoren maal, the West (most notably Amreeka) and aping them in every way that they decided that it made perfect sense to take the fact that a city called Hollywood happens to house a set of film studies and turn into “Bollywood” as a catch-all for MHC.
In the 2000s with spiralling film budgets and MHC films/actors being recognised across the world, the “Bollywood” fraternity has decided that it hates the name. It hates the fact that as a result of Hollywood, the MHC’s name is forever going to be known as this shitty portmanteau of Hollywood and Bombay (which is now called Mumbai. There, I said it. Now don’t you dare come and wreck my blog, you shit-for-brains. You know who you are).
And so, the MHC as a whole went on this killing spree of sorts. Let’s take everything nice and pleasant in the world and ruin it. Switzerland was first on their hit-list and courtesy Yash Chopra, they succeeded with aplomb. The Maldives, the Seychelles, Sun City (South Africa), Singapore, New York and London were the next targets. Countries across the world began shaking in fear.
Calls were frantically made from one nation to another. “Listen pal, I know you guys and us guys got issues,” said a Palestinian diplomatic to an Israeli one, “But this is bigger than all that. We need to protect ourselves from a bigger threat.” The Mexicans told their Cuban “ese”s to “Relax meng, cuz joo know we gotta save ourselves and our families, joo know”. Meanwhile over in Far East Asia, “people be tripping” just like “when Godzilla be coming, they be all ‘Gaica! Gaica!’.”
Damn. Meandered off the path again.
Anyway so once all those nations safeguarded themselves, these filthy MHCers set their crosshairs on what was once a sacred institution. A rite of passage. A test that separate the boys from the... bigger boys. The game of cricket. With a saboteur-in-chief on the inside, the MHCers tore apart the institution that once was cricket. Cricket turned to a three-letter acronym shared by a club called the Irish Protestant Ladies. That crushing last attack left most people reeling, bleeding and gasping for air, while all along praying, “Please Lord, let this be the end of their reign of destruction.”
Meanwhile, the good people in Marathi Cinema put out one brilliant movie after another to try and save the world from these MHC-mothertruckers, but the shittiest (there really is no better word) films ever made (so bad that they make Hiroshima Mon Amour look like a great film... I didn’t think it was possible either) by the MHC still drew bigger crowds. By this point one would believe that the MHC had made its point against the world. The whole world wanted to just forget all about that name “Bollywood” that had angered the MHC so.
The MHC was having none of it.
Finally, today, drunk with the power the MHC did the unthinkable. It attacked a major Indian institution that wasn’t a sport. It was a part of all our histories. If you ever watched Doordarshan (in the days when we had only one TV channel... and DD-Metro), you will know what I’m talking about and maybe you like it, perhaps you love it... shit, you may even hate it or find it cheesy. But you respect it.
Combining elements from most parts of India, with some eminent personalities of the time, this six-or-so-minute capsule carried by a song that translates literally to “When your tune meets mine, the tune becomes ours”, was first aired on Independence Day in 1988. Written by ad-man Piyush Pandey, this little segment often played between shows to make up time that hadn’t been bought by advertisers. Or there were no ads about upcoming shows. I don’t know. All I know is that if a certain show got over and there were 7 or 8 minutes left till the next one, BANG! This would play. Watch it for yourself, if you haven’t a clue about what I’m saying.
Seen it? Like it? I like it too. A lot. Especially the part at 5 minutes and a second that sounds like it was written by Europe (of The Final Countdown fame, if you weren’t sure that is).
Which is why I was highly pissed off to see the new version they were playing on some shitty channel. I refuse to put up the videos here so if you are curious to see why I’m so piqued, go here and here. It’s so damn long that it’s divided into two parts. It runs at a whopping 16 minutes, gets boring in no time, has a few flashes of brilliance — Sivamani, Gino/Louis Banks, Anoushka Shankar and Ustad Amjad Ali Khan and sons.
The rest of it is the most heinous act ever carried out by the MHCers. EVER. While a sportsperson like Baichung Bhutia — who has given nearly as much time to Indian football as Sachin has to Indian cricket — gets barely a couple of seconds onscreen, these MHC floozies-posing-as-actresses get nearly 30-40 seconds EACH. These flavour-of-the-month idiots who are obviously lip-syncing prance around like idiots and we’re supposed to believe this shit is “the new generation’s Mile Sur Mera Tumhara”?.
Sorry bub, go back to the drawing boards because this shit don’t fly. This is one institution that those — screw it, I don’t care — Bollywood boneheads will not ruin for me. Who’s with me?
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Mockery, insult and humiliation
A while back, not too long ago, on a dusty, hot and grimy day, I recall seeing a Mercedes S-Class at the intersection of two major roads, stuck just like everyone else, in traffic. At the time, I remember thinking to myself what a great leveller traffic was. Motorists from all walks of life — from all demographics, psychographics and econographics — have to spend a few hours a day stuck in grid-lock traffic. Just like everyone else.
It was then that I peered into the lightly tinted windows of the Merc and saw two kids in the backseat with some adult, whom I could only presume was their mother. Outside the tinted window was a little street urchin-beggar type who was probably no older than the two kids in the vehicle. His palm outstretched, he stood at the window asking for alms. The window, to my surprise, rolled down and a hand no bigger than that of the beggar’s appeared, clutching a chocolate bar.
Soon another hand appeared and unwrapped the bar and the kid inside sat there eating the chocolate bar in front of the beggar. The window, it turns out was rolled down merely to tell the beggar to shoo off away from their vehicle.
Why is this random tale of urban decay relevant, you ask? Well, because it’s a metaphor for some of the ugliness that transpired yesterday at the auction before the Indian Premier League’s third season.
Before delving into it. Let’s get a few points out of the way:
1) With the present tension in Indo-Pak ties, especially after the 26/11 attacks and the governments of both nations not seeing eye-to-eye on investigations, perhaps it may be prudent that sporting ties are suspended between both nations.
2) With the IPL, perhaps certain quarters feel that the Indian board paying Pakistanis after their countrymen wreaked havoc in India, verges on the ridiculous and is certainly out of order. Perhaps.
3) Maybe, it’s uncertain how long the Laskhar-e-Tayyaba or any of those other terror groups can wait before they start attacking the holy beejezus out of India again and so, team owners don’t want to risk buying a Pakistani player, who may not be able to get a visa after further attacks.
4) Finally, maybe they just feel that the political climate is unsafe for Pakistanis to play in India, as it may be risky for them. (Yeah right)
None of these points for my argument. I’ve just put these on the table as givens. I will not be debating these.
The first name on the auction block was Pakistani Shahid Afridi, who if we’re being honest, is a bit of a irresponsible cricketer, but is enjoying some of the best form of his life. Major cricket pundits had tipped Afridi as one of the most sought after players in this auction. Not a single bid. “Shahid Afridi is unsold,” announced the auctioneer. Slowly, other Pakistani names came on the auction block and it became clear.
Poker-faced team owners sat and waited for the auctioneer to call time and it became abundantly clear that none of the franchises were going to buy a Pakistani player. By the auction’s end, the question on most people’s lips was, “If you weren’t going to sell them in the first place, why did you include Pakistanis in the list of auctionees?”
Fair question. Owners of all teams tried to deflect the query, stating “availability” or “we didn’t need a bowler” or some other bull-honkey. When cornered, each and every one of them came up with the lame “well, it’s ultimately the captain’s decision and not ours”. Convenient. Meanwhile, and quite understandably, cricketers from Pakistan were fuming at the snub. Can you blame them?
Amid some of the over-the-top hysterics like “the tournament won’t be as good because of the lack of Pakistanis” and “Indian fans will demand their money back because they won’t get to watch quality players”, one point stuck out like a sore thumb. The most obvious one. Why keep them in the list, purely to humiliate them with no bids? If you, Lalit Modi, had the slightest inkling that something like this could happen, shouldn’t you have held a meeting with owners beforehand to spare the Pakistanis this insult?
That’s a foolish query because as is common knowledge, Modi’s only in it to fatten his own wallet — a point I’ve discussed at length in an earlier post. So far, while politics and relations between India and Pakistan were strained, the sight of the two teams on a cricket field often brought a tiny bit of joy to the harrowed citizens of both nations. A good friend of mine was telling me yesterday that sport holds the answer to most world problems. If that is the case, what now? What if they’re scared to send a team to the Commonwealth Games, thinking, “You never know with these Indians, they might stick our team in Delhi’s slums, while the others stay at the official Games Village”?
Will the Pakistani players and sport administration ever trust us again?
It was then that I peered into the lightly tinted windows of the Merc and saw two kids in the backseat with some adult, whom I could only presume was their mother. Outside the tinted window was a little street urchin-beggar type who was probably no older than the two kids in the vehicle. His palm outstretched, he stood at the window asking for alms. The window, to my surprise, rolled down and a hand no bigger than that of the beggar’s appeared, clutching a chocolate bar.
Soon another hand appeared and unwrapped the bar and the kid inside sat there eating the chocolate bar in front of the beggar. The window, it turns out was rolled down merely to tell the beggar to shoo off away from their vehicle.
Why is this random tale of urban decay relevant, you ask? Well, because it’s a metaphor for some of the ugliness that transpired yesterday at the auction before the Indian Premier League’s third season.
Before delving into it. Let’s get a few points out of the way:
1) With the present tension in Indo-Pak ties, especially after the 26/11 attacks and the governments of both nations not seeing eye-to-eye on investigations, perhaps it may be prudent that sporting ties are suspended between both nations.
2) With the IPL, perhaps certain quarters feel that the Indian board paying Pakistanis after their countrymen wreaked havoc in India, verges on the ridiculous and is certainly out of order. Perhaps.
3) Maybe, it’s uncertain how long the Laskhar-e-Tayyaba or any of those other terror groups can wait before they start attacking the holy beejezus out of India again and so, team owners don’t want to risk buying a Pakistani player, who may not be able to get a visa after further attacks.
4) Finally, maybe they just feel that the political climate is unsafe for Pakistanis to play in India, as it may be risky for them. (Yeah right)
None of these points for my argument. I’ve just put these on the table as givens. I will not be debating these.
The first name on the auction block was Pakistani Shahid Afridi, who if we’re being honest, is a bit of a irresponsible cricketer, but is enjoying some of the best form of his life. Major cricket pundits had tipped Afridi as one of the most sought after players in this auction. Not a single bid. “Shahid Afridi is unsold,” announced the auctioneer. Slowly, other Pakistani names came on the auction block and it became clear.
Poker-faced team owners sat and waited for the auctioneer to call time and it became abundantly clear that none of the franchises were going to buy a Pakistani player. By the auction’s end, the question on most people’s lips was, “If you weren’t going to sell them in the first place, why did you include Pakistanis in the list of auctionees?”
Fair question. Owners of all teams tried to deflect the query, stating “availability” or “we didn’t need a bowler” or some other bull-honkey. When cornered, each and every one of them came up with the lame “well, it’s ultimately the captain’s decision and not ours”. Convenient. Meanwhile, and quite understandably, cricketers from Pakistan were fuming at the snub. Can you blame them?
Amid some of the over-the-top hysterics like “the tournament won’t be as good because of the lack of Pakistanis” and “Indian fans will demand their money back because they won’t get to watch quality players”, one point stuck out like a sore thumb. The most obvious one. Why keep them in the list, purely to humiliate them with no bids? If you, Lalit Modi, had the slightest inkling that something like this could happen, shouldn’t you have held a meeting with owners beforehand to spare the Pakistanis this insult?
That’s a foolish query because as is common knowledge, Modi’s only in it to fatten his own wallet — a point I’ve discussed at length in an earlier post. So far, while politics and relations between India and Pakistan were strained, the sight of the two teams on a cricket field often brought a tiny bit of joy to the harrowed citizens of both nations. A good friend of mine was telling me yesterday that sport holds the answer to most world problems. If that is the case, what now? What if they’re scared to send a team to the Commonwealth Games, thinking, “You never know with these Indians, they might stick our team in Delhi’s slums, while the others stay at the official Games Village”?
Will the Pakistani players and sport administration ever trust us again?
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
What happened to the likely lads?
This one’s a little technical, I must warn you in advance.
This is an issue that’s been sitting latently in the back of my head for a while now. I never realised it had taken a comfortable seat in that last row in my head, until last night when I was watching some cricket show on TV called err… I can’t remember but it showcased old matches interspersed with historians and former players waxing eloquent about some particularly profound moments in the match.
Fairly pedestrian stuff, if I’m to be absolutely honest. Hearing some old bat (no pun intended and none needed) warbling on about how 1996 was a defining year for Indo-Pak cricket (when India was in no way even connected to the match) is not my idea of analysis. And neither is a former cricketer whose one claim to fame is as old as time itself, telling me exactly what I just saw. No kidding. He described the ball bowled and the stroke played. “And it went all the way to the boundary!” That’s great, halfwit… But so what?
The match on show last night was a 1996 Wills World Cup - Group B match between New Zealand and Pakistan. The refreshing lack of reverse pulls, power plays, free hits, “Dilscoops” or whatever the fuck they’re called and reams of advertising running across the screen, gladdened my heart. Also, the game seemed to be played at a less frantic pace, but seemed to be just as intense. As Denzel once said, “The shit’s chess… It ain’t checkers”, cricket is best played as a slow-burning mind game. This new brand of “boom boom” cricket just turns this delightful sport from chess to checkers.
Sure, the game back then had its own problems, with dodgy rain laws, no mechanism as such to replace spoiled white balls and… well, I can’t think of any more. That’s probably why the televised game had me captivated far more back in 1996 than it does today. Nevertheless, we’re not going to discuss which era of cricket was better or whether Twenty20 is the death of real cricket. Instead, we’re going to look at a character that for some reason or the other, has been sidelined from world cricket and for which, the sport is poorer.
We’re talking bowling here. And you have your express pace bowlers, you’ve got your fast medium or medium fast guys, who can once in a while get the ball right up your nose. Then you’ve got the medium pacers, who can’t really be called “fast” at all, but the wicketkeeper still shows them a bit of respect by standing back. Leggies, offies, Chinamen, left arm orthodox etc. etc. make up the spinners.
I was watching Pakistani Salim Malik and Kiwis Gavin Larsen, Roger Twose and Chris Harris display their skills with the ball, when it suddenly hit me. What the hell has happened to the slow medium, dibbly-dobbly (as some commentator used to call them) liquorice allsorts bowlers? Apart from the four I mentioned already, there was Ajay Jadeja for India, Arjuna Ranutanga for Sri Lanka, Akram Khan from Bangladesh and a ton more that aren’t really coming to me right now. These guys could be gamebreakers on their day.
You would think that a bowler capable of using the shine of the ball to extract lateral movement in the air, who can use the seam and bowl with the guile and flight of a spinner would be a lethal commodity in world cricket. You would think that a bowler like this would be a real force in the death overs. You would think that someone who could bowl like that could really make use of flatter tracks where pace, bounce and spin aren’t on your side… only your brains are.
You would think so. I would think so. Sadly, the people running the game these days don’t think so. This Twenty20 mentality actually makes people shake in their little boots when they imagine playing such a bowler in their team, worried that he could be smashed all over the park because he isn’t quick and he doesn’t spin the ball much. What’s wrong with plain simple smarts? Don’t those count for something?
What Messers Harris and Larsen had by the bucketload was smarts. They knew they weren’t quick or particularly big spinners of the ball, but that’s where subtle variations of the same ball earned them scalps. Today it’s hard to imagine anyone other than a frontline quick or frontline spinner bowling the final over of a match, whether to contain the opposition or dismiss them. Back in the early 90s, a couple of matches were won for India by a similar dibbly dobbly bowler who took the ball from his captain and bowled the final over. (NOTE: There will be claims that he is a leg-break bowler and not technically a slow medium bowler, but in 1993, Sachin was a slow medium who could bowl balls that spun square)
In today’s batsman-friendly setup, where bowlers are largely accepted as being mere props, fast bowlers get their pace used against them and spinners who lack pace see mishits go for six. In this system, could you imagine a short stout(ish) slow medium bowler bowling the final over of a game to protect something like 3 runs? ‘Fraid not! Throw it to Sreesanth instead. Oh crap! Four off the first ball. Well played, lads.
It is my honest belief that the re-emergence of the dibbly dobbly bowler will bring bowlers back in a huge way into a game that is slowly turning so batsman-centric, that you may as well set up a bowling machine and play 11 batsmen on your team. That’s it. I’m done. Toldja it was a little technical. Nooch!
This is an issue that’s been sitting latently in the back of my head for a while now. I never realised it had taken a comfortable seat in that last row in my head, until last night when I was watching some cricket show on TV called err… I can’t remember but it showcased old matches interspersed with historians and former players waxing eloquent about some particularly profound moments in the match.
Fairly pedestrian stuff, if I’m to be absolutely honest. Hearing some old bat (no pun intended and none needed) warbling on about how 1996 was a defining year for Indo-Pak cricket (when India was in no way even connected to the match) is not my idea of analysis. And neither is a former cricketer whose one claim to fame is as old as time itself, telling me exactly what I just saw. No kidding. He described the ball bowled and the stroke played. “And it went all the way to the boundary!” That’s great, halfwit… But so what?
The match on show last night was a 1996 Wills World Cup - Group B match between New Zealand and Pakistan. The refreshing lack of reverse pulls, power plays, free hits, “Dilscoops” or whatever the fuck they’re called and reams of advertising running across the screen, gladdened my heart. Also, the game seemed to be played at a less frantic pace, but seemed to be just as intense. As Denzel once said, “The shit’s chess… It ain’t checkers”, cricket is best played as a slow-burning mind game. This new brand of “boom boom” cricket just turns this delightful sport from chess to checkers.
Sure, the game back then had its own problems, with dodgy rain laws, no mechanism as such to replace spoiled white balls and… well, I can’t think of any more. That’s probably why the televised game had me captivated far more back in 1996 than it does today. Nevertheless, we’re not going to discuss which era of cricket was better or whether Twenty20 is the death of real cricket. Instead, we’re going to look at a character that for some reason or the other, has been sidelined from world cricket and for which, the sport is poorer.
We’re talking bowling here. And you have your express pace bowlers, you’ve got your fast medium or medium fast guys, who can once in a while get the ball right up your nose. Then you’ve got the medium pacers, who can’t really be called “fast” at all, but the wicketkeeper still shows them a bit of respect by standing back. Leggies, offies, Chinamen, left arm orthodox etc. etc. make up the spinners.
I was watching Pakistani Salim Malik and Kiwis Gavin Larsen, Roger Twose and Chris Harris display their skills with the ball, when it suddenly hit me. What the hell has happened to the slow medium, dibbly-dobbly (as some commentator used to call them) liquorice allsorts bowlers? Apart from the four I mentioned already, there was Ajay Jadeja for India, Arjuna Ranutanga for Sri Lanka, Akram Khan from Bangladesh and a ton more that aren’t really coming to me right now. These guys could be gamebreakers on their day.
You would think that a bowler capable of using the shine of the ball to extract lateral movement in the air, who can use the seam and bowl with the guile and flight of a spinner would be a lethal commodity in world cricket. You would think that a bowler like this would be a real force in the death overs. You would think that someone who could bowl like that could really make use of flatter tracks where pace, bounce and spin aren’t on your side… only your brains are.
You would think so. I would think so. Sadly, the people running the game these days don’t think so. This Twenty20 mentality actually makes people shake in their little boots when they imagine playing such a bowler in their team, worried that he could be smashed all over the park because he isn’t quick and he doesn’t spin the ball much. What’s wrong with plain simple smarts? Don’t those count for something?
What Messers Harris and Larsen had by the bucketload was smarts. They knew they weren’t quick or particularly big spinners of the ball, but that’s where subtle variations of the same ball earned them scalps. Today it’s hard to imagine anyone other than a frontline quick or frontline spinner bowling the final over of a match, whether to contain the opposition or dismiss them. Back in the early 90s, a couple of matches were won for India by a similar dibbly dobbly bowler who took the ball from his captain and bowled the final over. (NOTE: There will be claims that he is a leg-break bowler and not technically a slow medium bowler, but in 1993, Sachin was a slow medium who could bowl balls that spun square)
In today’s batsman-friendly setup, where bowlers are largely accepted as being mere props, fast bowlers get their pace used against them and spinners who lack pace see mishits go for six. In this system, could you imagine a short stout(ish) slow medium bowler bowling the final over of a game to protect something like 3 runs? ‘Fraid not! Throw it to Sreesanth instead. Oh crap! Four off the first ball. Well played, lads.
It is my honest belief that the re-emergence of the dibbly dobbly bowler will bring bowlers back in a huge way into a game that is slowly turning so batsman-centric, that you may as well set up a bowling machine and play 11 batsmen on your team. That’s it. I’m done. Toldja it was a little technical. Nooch!
Sunday, January 3, 2010
The numbers game
2010... Big whoop!
2011... Cricket World Cup
2012... The world ends
2046... Wong Kar Wai something or the other
2050... End of the world as we know it?
I say, “Big deal” and yet there’s enough people hell-bent on hammering into my skull the fact that I’m cynical... allegedly. I’m a killjoy... supposedly. And I’m just boring... apparently. None of which is to say that I haven’t had my fair share of fun at the end of a year. This year was fun. Relaxed. Chilled out. 2007 to 2008 was bloody horrible, being dragged as I was to a nasty club. 1990 to 91 was awesome as it marked the first time I got to stay up so late. But 2003 to 2004 was by far and a long way, the best New Year’s ever as I (chest puffs up) was one of the two hosts of what was by all measures, a party that was off the Richter Scale in terms of fun and sheer stupidity.
For the first time this decade, I digress.
It’s the accusations of me being boring that got me thinking along these lines. And I asked myself, “Why is it that us, humans are so damn obsessed with statistics?”. Look around you and you’ll see this for yourself. From the time you’re a little kid, you’re inundated with fools asking you how old you are. That carries on later as you try and sneak into an adult film, bar, or 18+ music show, with people always asking your age and you coming up with a response. Later in life, you try and downplay your age, but you’re always asked for that number. How many years has it been since you were born?
It gets worse. People are interested in how many marks you got in a certain examination. What year you graduated. How much you earn. What’s the size of your waist? How many runs did Sachin Tendulkar score? How many miles till I get home? How many fingers do you see?
Everywhere you look, it’s statistics. I understand the practicality of statistics... to an extent. I understand certain calculations need to be done. But the point of keeping a track on how many years it’s been since a certain man — that half the world doesn’t believe existed — was born is lost on me. Why, to me, it looks like we’re watching milestones fly past as we break all speed limits and rush headlong to our graves, pyres, towers of silence or whatever the hell else there is.
It is 4.20 in the morning and this is my sub-conscious speaking. Ernie, as my sub-conscious sometimes likes to call himself, hopes this rant makes some sense. His host is far far beyond the realms of sleep-blogging to know. He’ll probably realise in the morning. Ernie and his host however, both hate the human preoccupation with statistics. Happy New Year, all ye Viewphiles!
2011... Cricket World Cup
2012... The world ends
2046... Wong Kar Wai something or the other
2050... End of the world as we know it?
I say, “Big deal” and yet there’s enough people hell-bent on hammering into my skull the fact that I’m cynical... allegedly. I’m a killjoy... supposedly. And I’m just boring... apparently. None of which is to say that I haven’t had my fair share of fun at the end of a year. This year was fun. Relaxed. Chilled out. 2007 to 2008 was bloody horrible, being dragged as I was to a nasty club. 1990 to 91 was awesome as it marked the first time I got to stay up so late. But 2003 to 2004 was by far and a long way, the best New Year’s ever as I (chest puffs up) was one of the two hosts of what was by all measures, a party that was off the Richter Scale in terms of fun and sheer stupidity.
For the first time this decade, I digress.
It’s the accusations of me being boring that got me thinking along these lines. And I asked myself, “Why is it that us, humans are so damn obsessed with statistics?”. Look around you and you’ll see this for yourself. From the time you’re a little kid, you’re inundated with fools asking you how old you are. That carries on later as you try and sneak into an adult film, bar, or 18+ music show, with people always asking your age and you coming up with a response. Later in life, you try and downplay your age, but you’re always asked for that number. How many years has it been since you were born?
It gets worse. People are interested in how many marks you got in a certain examination. What year you graduated. How much you earn. What’s the size of your waist? How many runs did Sachin Tendulkar score? How many miles till I get home? How many fingers do you see?
Everywhere you look, it’s statistics. I understand the practicality of statistics... to an extent. I understand certain calculations need to be done. But the point of keeping a track on how many years it’s been since a certain man — that half the world doesn’t believe existed — was born is lost on me. Why, to me, it looks like we’re watching milestones fly past as we break all speed limits and rush headlong to our graves, pyres, towers of silence or whatever the hell else there is.
It is 4.20 in the morning and this is my sub-conscious speaking. Ernie, as my sub-conscious sometimes likes to call himself, hopes this rant makes some sense. His host is far far beyond the realms of sleep-blogging to know. He’ll probably realise in the morning. Ernie and his host however, both hate the human preoccupation with statistics. Happy New Year, all ye Viewphiles!
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