Third time was charm for India, and Sachin in the Chandigarh ODI which saw the hosts beat the Aussies by 8 runs. A good show indeed, but as MSD said, the opening partnership did set the stage; what he didn’t say is that it almost didn’t set the stage, with Sachin getting two lives (perhaps in exchange for each of the centuries that missed on the Ireland/England tour). It was rather sad to see Sachin, struggle for the first 10 overs of this ODI; what was heartening was to see, later in his innings, flashes of his good old brilliance.
There were many heartening things for India in this match; it was nice to see Ganguly back; Dhoni and Uthapppa showed the way to attacking the Aussies. Zaheer, although not impressive with the bowling for the day, did his bit with the fielding; RP Singh, gave away runs after spraying the ball, but came back with vengeance to get the match-winning wicket of Andrew Symonds. Murali Karthick on his comeback trail bowled beautifully at the death, and Dhoni showed his adeptness behind the stumps with two ‘quick-as-lightning’ stumpings. If there was one person who was missed, I think it would have been Sreesanth: the only guy who gets some respect from Hayden.
All in all it was a good performance by India. However, they musn’t bank on more of the same type of luck in the next few ones. Go MSD! We know you can!
Posted by vmminerva 
VM\'s Random Ramblings 