LET US START FROM
The match fixing scandal in 2000. A Scandal which shook the beliefs and hurt the sentiments of thousands of cricket fans all around the world. Many ,to name a few like our own Mohammed Azhar, Ajay Jadeja, Nayan Mongia got caught in this chaos while there are whispers till date that a few lucky ones were left untouched, just the lack of evidence being in their favour.That scandal marked the turning point in the history of Indian cricket.
THE BEGINNING OF A NEW ERA
Welcome to the era of the Sourav Ganguly.With Azhar out of the equation and Sachin denying to take responsibility ,the onus came upon Sourav Ganguly ,who thanks to a certain Mr.Dalmiya was honoured with the highest prestige which they say is leading the Indian cricket team. This miffed up a few people in the ranks of the BCCI, the governing body of Indian cricket but to me was the right decision coz there weren't too many people who had the capability to lead the team at that moment.And lead he did and very well at that.
He unearthed the talents of Yuvraj singh ,Mohhd. Kaif ,Dinesh Mongia, Harbhajan Singh etc. Under his glorius captaincy India won test matches in Australia, England,WestIndies along with winning a test series against the Aussies , and defeating Pakistan in Pakistan.
It did not end there , the juggernaut rolled on and on bringing with it ODI success as well.
India won the Natwest trophy as well as came very close to winning the World cup ,
losing to the Aussies in the finals. Ganguly brought with him unparalleled success as he went on to become the most successfull Indian captain in the history of the game.
But with success comes controversies..........................................
THE CONTROVERSIES
1. He made Rahul Dravid to keep in one dayers and made him bat at no.7 which did not go well with many.
2. He was almost regularly pulled up by match refrees for slow over rates ,bad behaviour ,ball tampring and what not....
3. Eventually his slump in form meant that his position in the team got questioned.
HERE COMES THE BIGGEST CONTROVERSY
----------GREG CHAPPEL -------------------------
AAfter the great success of coach John Wright ,it was only unfortunate that he had to leave the country as his contract had expired. With his exit came the biggest controversies of Indian cricket that is the search for the national coach.Even though many people had spent great time and interest in getting this job it was eventually given to a gentleman called Greg Chappell.
Of the many qualities of this gentleman ,one was that he was still a tough cookie to crack .
As it was to be seen it did not take time for him to clash horns with the Indian captain over his form.Both being aggressive personalities ,they could not handle each other and it eventually lead to one being ousted of the team courtesy a leaked email.
This lead to one gentleman by the name of Rahul dravid to be handed the captaincy, and to the pleasure of both the new coach and the captain they got instant success by defeating srilanka and southafrica emphatically in the ODI series in India. In the course of the time we got some new young players like Suresh raina.....who set the new policy of indian cricket -----which was to pick youth over experience. This meant that a few senior players like Zaheer Khan, Laxman,Kumble .. were shown the door. But they say that the true character of a team comes through when on a foreign tour.
At this point of time came along the trip to West indies .A depleted and inexperienced WI team looked to be easy money for the Indian team. So after winning the first ODI our tough coach commented that the windies had forgotten how to win. This comment seemed to be like a tonic for the ailing windies team which came back strongly in the rest of the series to win both the odi and test series.
Then came the South Africa series and after the miserable performance in the ODIs
the think tank finally realised that it wasnt too smart to risk the teams chances of winning by favouring youth over experience.Today we once again have the old team as it is with us along with few new faces that of Sreesanth, VRV Singh. But the core is the same which defeated the aussies in their den.They have proved wht they are capable of by winning the first test in emphatic fashion.But just when they looked confident enough of finally having an away series win, they have again thrown away the advantage by losing the second test.
THE HOPE------------
Like a true cricket fan we can only hope that they win the Capetown test and create history once and for all.
