India's Tour Of Sri Lanka Jul-Aug 2012

[Sahil 7]

well bowled irfan to get 3 big wickets also virat doing a great part time bowling role by not giving to many run

 

[SaiSrini]

Extraordinary stuff from Irfan... He keeps cementing his comeback trail bigger and bigger with every game this series. I would still keep fingers crossed on Irfan, but so far he has clicked big.

 

[Fenil]

23 balls since last boundary. Spinners tightening the things up. So, I won't be surprised if the ball is tossed to Manoj Tiwary.

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And here you go. As I mention the lack of boundaries, batsman pick up four.

 

[Sahil 7]

yes mathews gone that's a big wicket for us now we have great chance of wrapping up this match

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first of all that was a funny reaction from dhoni to tiwary really funny. secondly umesh dropped the lolipop irfan could have got his 4th wicket but not be in the end

 

[SaiSrini]

Pretty poor capitulation by Sri Lanka there.... Gifting Dinda with 4 wickets there in the end. Anyways, Dinda would love it and he would take it gleefully. Utter domination by India in this series or I should say Sri Lanka are completely inept at facing India. They were lucky to reach the CB series final ahead of India. No captain can help Sri Lanka without them re-inventing their system and bringing in new and aggressive players like Jayasuriya, Aravinda, Ranatunga, etc. Anyways I am happy that a few other teams are in worser position than us.

 

[Sahil 7]

good win for india really wonderful series comes to the end on a high 4-1 in odi and 1-0 in the t20 dinda bowled really well in the end to get 3 wickets in an over. overall superb performance from india

 

[Gurjot95]

There was a match today..?

 

[Epic]

Yeah, only the people who don't care for the Olympics got to see it.

 

[Aalay]

Well Irfan proved me wrong this time. He bowled with decent control allthough he still had the wide problems. Good win for India yesterday. Kohli can be an excellent all-rounder for us if he focus a little more on his bowling.

Good tour for India overall.

 

[Prithvi]

Pretty poor capitulation by Sri Lanka there.... Gifting Dinda with 4 wickets there in the end.

good win for india really wonderful series comes to the end on a high 4-1 in odi and 1-0 in the t20 dinda bowled really well in the end to get 3 wickets in an over. overall superb performance from india

Well, the wickets of Dinda aren't because of his extra ordinary talent. If Sri Lanka were in the game, I'm sure he would have been the bowler who was going to suffer. Sri Lanka lost the game right when they lost the early wickets. And in that last over Dinda bowled, they were in a hit out or get out stage, where unfortunately, there wasn't any support for lone fighter Chandimal.

Also, Kohli was lucky enough- Sri Lankans didn't keep the wickets. Kohli is a good batsman, but when it comes to bowling, he can deliver only if the opponents cannot risk a wicket. Sri Lanka were in a position where they couldn't afford to lose a wicket when Kohli was bowling. If they had Dilshan batting, Kohli would have been easily hammered.

 

[AnshtheDj]

Irfan has made good impact as a pace-bowling all-rounder in this short Sri Lanka tour, he has been among wickets and amongst runs as well..
I'm sure he has pretty cemented his place in the playing XI for the next T20 WC to be held in Sri Lanka in September.
Conditions in SL are more bowler-friendly than in India and Irfan's swing and his aggressive batting at no.7-8 will give India much needed balance in upcoming T20 WC.

One thing to note here was the coach Fletcher said about Irfan after ODI series.. he said that Irfan is doing well at the moment
and we'll have to look how he bowls and bats in India.. this is a very valid point indeed.

While a slightly more bowler-friendly condition in SL helps Irfan with his swing and allows India to have much-needed balance in its Limited overs line-up,
truth to be told, pitches in India are more on the abrasive side where the captain might want a spinning all-rounder more than a pace-bowling all-rounder.
This is where case of having the infamous Ravindra Jadeja in the playign XI strengthens.

So while Irfan, armed with 2 new-balls from 2 ends rule in Limited overs, gets some purchase with new ball, he tends to fall flat towards the end
i.e. during batting powerplays taken from 35-40 overs or during death overs from 40 to 50.
This is what we saw from Irfan in CB series in Australia earlier this year and also in Asia Cup in Bangladesh..
once new ball lost its shine, his late-120s death bowling was nothing to write home about.

Not taking anything away from Irfan, who seems to have got his swing back and has had a decent outing as opening bowler in IPL-2012 for DD,
what I think he needs to work upon is his death bowling, especially yorkers & slow-bouncers, developing reverse-swing with the old ball,
which work fantastically well in terms of containing the run flow as well as taking wickets in abrasive sub-continent pitches of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.
And for this he doesn't need to look any further than Zaheer Khan, who is a master craftsman of this death bowling expertise.
This will add another dimension to his bowling repertoire and help India in the long run as well.

Currently Irfan doesn't seem to be in selectors scheme of things for Test matches.
So next opportunities for him will be mostly T20 features.

1. 2 T20s in India against NZ
2. T20 WC in SL in September
3. playing for DD in CLT20 in October in South Africa.

Here all of us have high hopes from him going by his recent showing.

Next up after October are England, who will come to India for 4-match test series where Irfan is most unlikely to find any place in the squad.
Irfan will certainly be back in the reckoning for next 3-ODI, 2 T20I series against Pakistan in December followed by 5-match ODI series against England in January.
Then again he will have to cool his heels till IPL 2013 in April as he will again out of selection for 4-match home test series against Australia in Feb-March'13.

So while the Indian team will certainly find themselves at 'home' at home in this current 2012-13 season, same can't be said about Irfan.
Tougher challenges lie ahead of him and we can only hope he utilizes whatever breaks he has from International duties,
in playing Ranji matches for Baroda to make his case stronger for a permanent India selection.

 

[icyman]

I was a wee bit surprised when we managed to defend 155 successfully. The bowling we had was not at all strong. Irfan -undoubtedly has been the pick of the series, but the other two were far from convincing. Dinda did pick up 4,but the outcome could have been different had SRL played each bowler on merit.

What this does- hypes up expectations of the Indian public for a great World T20. We need to bear in mind that we still lack a quality spinner and a good all-rounder other than Irfan. Tiwary and Kohli can bowl, but they would be hammered easily in the WT20 matches by stronger opponents. Thats where we have always failed in the WT20. An over-reliance on part-timers is just not the way forward.

I also wish to point out the curious cases of Sehwag and Zaheer- why do they still form a crux of the Indian T20 team when they cannot be match fit for the WT20. Other than the first one in SAF, I do not recollect Sehwag playing for us. Though ,he would definitely be selected for the tour-his inclusion in the team would not shock me as much as Zaheer's.

Yet again ,Zak has been found at the other end of 'fit team mates'. Is he going the Ashish Nehra way ? And I believe we did have a long lay-off between the SRL tour and the one before that. Kicking him out on pure cricketing grounds and going with a new attack is better than thrusting the responsibility of the attack on his shoulders.

 

[SaiSrini]

Irfan has made good impact as a pace-bowling all-rounder in this short Sri Lanka tour, he has been among wickets and amongst runs as well..
I'm sure he has pretty cemented his place in the playing XI for the next T20 WC to be held in Sri Lanka in September.
Conditions in SL are more bowler-friendly than in India and Irfan's swing and his aggressive batting at no.7-8 will give India much needed balance in upcoming T20 WC.

One thing to note here was the coach Fletcher said about Irfan after ODI series.. he said that Irfan is doing well at the moment
and we'll have to look how he bowls and bats in India.. this is a very valid point indeed.

While a slightly more bowler-friendly condition in SL helps Irfan with his swing and allows India to have much-needed balance in its Limited overs line-up,
truth to be told, pitches in India are more on the abrasive side where the captain might want a spinning all-rounder more than a pace-bowling all-rounder.
This is where case of having the infamous Ravindra Jadeja in the playign XI strengthens.

So while Irfan, armed with 2 new-balls from 2 ends rule in Limited overs, gets some purchase with new ball, he tends to fall flat towards the end
i.e. during batting powerplays taken from 35-40 overs or during death overs from 40 to 50.
This is what we saw from Irfan in CB series in Australia earlier this year and also in Asia Cup in Bangladesh..
once new ball lost its shine, his late-120s death bowling was nothing to write home about.

Not taking anything away from Irfan, who seems to have got his swing back and has had a decent outing as opening bowler in IPL-2012 for DD,
what I think he needs to work upon is his death bowling, especially yorkers & slow-bouncers, developing reverse-swing with the old ball,
which work fantastically well in terms of containing the run flow as well as taking wickets in abrasive sub-continent pitches of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.
And for this he doesn't need to look any further than Zaheer Khan, who is a master craftsman of this death bowling expertise.
This will add another dimension to his bowling repertoire and help India in the long run as well.

Currently Irfan doesn't seem to be in selectors scheme of things for Test matches.
So next opportunities for him will be mostly T20 features.

1. 2 T20s in India against NZ
2. T20 WC in SL in September
3. playing for DD in CLT20 in October in South Africa.

Here all of us have high hopes from him going by his recent showing.

Next up after October are England, who will come to India for 4-match test series where Irfan is most unlikely to find any place in the squad.
Irfan will certainly be back in the reckoning for next 3-ODI, 2 T20I series against Pakistan in December followed by 5-match ODI series against England in January.
Then again he will have to cool his heels till IPL 2013 in April as he will again out of selection for 4-match home test series against Australia in Feb-March'13.

So while the Indian team will certainly find themselves at 'home' at home in this current 2012-13 season, same can't be said about Irfan.
Tougher challenges lie ahead of him and we can only hope he utilizes whatever breaks he has from International duties,
in playing Ranji matches for Baroda to make his case stronger for a permanent India selection.

Good post on Irfan. I pretty much agree with this analysis. He has made a good comeback in the limited overs format, but he still needs to work on his game to develop into a better overall bowler. The thing with him is, he needs the perfectly right advice as he tends to go astray when people give him advice from all ends. Hope this time, he turns this comeback into something really big. If Irfan can perform upto his promised potential from here on till he turns 34 or 35, India would have found the replacement to Zaheer for the future. But as you said, Irfan still isn't ready for test cricket and he needs to iron out his flaws soon. Hope this exile from international cricket has helped him mature and be on his toes.

 

[Gaurav_7]

Kohli can be an excellent all-rounder for us if he focus a little more on his bowling.

 

[jacobfelix]

Yeah, only the people who don't care for the Olympics got to see it.

Thank God! That stupid thing is ending this Sunday. Good. From hereon all newspapers, all media will be behind cricketing news...especially next month...it will be Cricket celebration out there....

Olympics...Come to think about it....India winning a Gold medal....would have happened if Cricket was also included ....Imagining....A gold medal falling on Dhoni's neck ....ooooohhhh....