Saturday, January 13, 2007

Loss in South Africa a 'Team Effort' – Chappell

by Anand Ramachandran, who feels that the Indians truly Test cricket's patience.





Indian cricket team coach Greg Chappell has described the sound thrashing received at the hands of Graeme Smith's South Africans as a 'complete team effort' and said that every team member contributed his bit to the result.








team


Greg Chappell and Rahul Dravid have graciously declined to take all the credit for the debacle in South Africa, giving due credit to the combined efforts of the entire Indian team (not in picture)

“All the ingredients were there – scatterbrained batting, toothless bowling and miserable fielding. We were equally hopeless in all departments, and it took a collective effort to lose initiative in every pivotal moment of the series.”, he said, showing his flair for 'lateral thinking' and Edward-De-Bono gobbledygook.

“Sachin and Rahul led the way with that dead-bat, dead-brain session on the fourth day, Laxman and Zaheer contributed vital run-outs, the tail crumbled when it really mattered. Almost all the batsmen put their hands up and played dreadful cricket at some point during the series, and often when it truly made a big difference to the game. Jaffer chipped in with that awful pull shot in the second test, Sehwag was splendidly off-form throughout. ” he pointed out to a perplexed looking group of reporters.


“Only Sourav Ganguly, as usual, didn't contribute anything of significance to the debacle.” he said with practiced ease, and a sly smile.

“And though the bowlers in general were quite good, they really came to the party when South Africa really needed them to bowl badly. I thought Kumble's contribution by bowling that ineffective leg-stump line into the rough on the final day was particularly significant. Munaf Patel came into this match with an injury, and ran in and bowled as well as you could expect a half-fit bowler to do.” he continued inexplicably.

Captain Rahul Dravid was also of the opinion that the whole team worked well together to pull off an incredible defeat. “ We can take away a lot of positives from the tour. It's not very easy to lose a three test series after being one-nil up, and especially after being 150-odd for no loss on the first session of the decisive game, but I think we've managed very well. Not every team can do this consistently, and I think we can go back home believing that we've done something truly special and hard to match.”, he said, in his trademark voice that sounds like a bamboo flute with the bass turned all the way up.

When former captain Sourav Ganguly was asked for a comment, he simply said “I prefer to let my bat do the talking.” “Yay! Dada's going to be captain again!”, said his bat, dutifully.

“South Africa rules. Asian teams are useless. I can tolerate Makhaya Ntini as long as he keeps taking wickets.”, bleated Barry Richards, delighted at the whiteness of, among other things, his unusually large teeth.

“The western countries always act too high and mighty. Who do they think they are?”, said Sunil Gavaskar, unable to steer his thoughts away from his usual anti-west ranting.

For once, Wildlife Photographer S.U.Saravanakumar was speechless. “ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . “ he said excitedly.

The general public was unavailable for comment.