Sachin tendulkar should retire

so says Ian Chappell. He writes an article titled "Look into that mirror, Sachin" and goes on to write:

If Tendulkar had found an honest mirror three years ago and asked the question; "Mirror, mirror on the wall who is the best batsman of all?" It would've answered; "Brian Charles Lara." If he asked that same mirror right now; "Mirror, mirror on the wall should I retire?" The answer would be; "Yes."

Maybe, he wanted to imply that the writing was on the wall for Sachin and he preferred not to be so harsh on the little master.

But, is it really time for Sachin to retire ? I don't mind that he doesn't score hundreds like before or even that he doesn't tear into the opposition like he used to do. Even if he spends a short time at the crease, the shots he plays and the strokes he makes are a connoisseur's delight. But, I am worried that one day he might just disappear like Mark Waugh. I would definitely love to see him walking off, for the last time, with a 100,000 indian fans giving him a standing ovation. So, i hope that he chooses a forthcoming big series in india to take this big decision.

Technorati Tags: Sachin Tendulkar Ian Chappell Sachin Tendulkar retire Mark Waugh cricket ICC Cricket World cup Little Master

Making money online from blogging

Many people use blogs as a way to earn money online. Blogging has been proven to be a money-spinner as can be seen from the likes of people like problogger, who are the "professional" kind and make a huge amount of money from blogging on various blogs.
One such relatively new entrant to this money making option is kumiko suzuki, a japanese-american girl, who has entered the world of blogging with the sole purpose of making money as is evident from the title of her blog which reads "Make Money Online at Kumiko's Cash Quest".
I am impressed by her progess. I earned 1.8 USD in the first month i implemented adsense, and have improved a little bit now. But, she has already crossed the threshold of more than a hundred dollars a week, just after a few months of blogging.

Okay, my blog's primary purpose is not to make money, but to pen down whatever i can pen down. So, i can't compare and complain.

She writes well, the best thing being that her writing is original and not copy-paste work which many bloggers aiming to make money do. The article on what Britney Spears could could teach you about blogging was excellent.

She has a contest going on her blog which asks readers to predict her Google PageRank when the next update happens. I guess that her blog should get a PR of 4, judging by the links she has from other blogs. Lets hope that she gets a PR of 4 and i win the prize!

Technorati Tags: make money online kumiko suzuki money from adsense money from blogging

More Quizzing Sites and Quiz Blogs

I have done an update to the list of Quizzing blogs and sites that i maintain. There has been a recent increase in the number of blogs dedicated to quizzing and they definitely needed a mention in this list. Also, i chanced upon some very good sites with thousands of questions from Pub quizzes and the Jeopardy Quiz show. So, if you are even remotely interested in quizzing, you should give these sites a look. Go ahead, increase your knowledge by visiting the sites on the quizzing sites and blogs list.

Spare the Indian Cricket team

The Indian cricket team has been at the receiving end for the past few days after its unceremonious exit from the ICC World Cup. If you had watched Star News (No sane English speaking person would watch it, but there was some other program on NDTV at that time) over the past few days, the way they were bashing the cricketers made you feel sorry for them. Is this outcry justified ?

Yes, they performed badly. But, they are human, not the demigods which we Indian cricket fans perceive them to be. They too have their bad days and it was one such day which led them to the defeat against Bangladesh.

Everyone wants their share of criticism and uses their creative minds to bash the Indian team. Anand Ramachandran says that the Indian Cricket team has applied for Irish citizenship so that they can continue to play in the Super-8 as part of the Irish team. There are even some super-smart people who file cases against the Indian cricket team coach Greg Chappell, BCCI President Sharad Pawar and Kiran More, blaming them for the ouster of the Indian cricket team from the World Cup. Some people, with the support of political parties, burn the posters and effigies of our cricketers and also chant anti "ruling-government" slogans randomly during this act. There is also this mail going around with photos of the indian cricketers in their new jobs (The dhoni one with the monkey was cool!)

But, are the Indian cricketers really responsible for this loss? People are hasty in making conclusions about the inabilities of our cricketers. Not enough analysis is done by the media before making outrageous statements about the form of our team.

So, the real reasons as to why india is out of the world cup are:

• Bermuda played badly in their match against Bangladesh. Their batting was horrible. The two dropped catches proved too costly for them and for India.
• Allison Leverock, the mother of Dwayne Leverock for having fed him so much food over the past few years. If only his mother had kept him on a diet, he would have been a few dozen kilos lighter and would have held more catches to help bermuda win against bangladesh.
• The chefs of the hotel where Bangladesh stayed. Their cooking was so bad that the Bangaldeshis skipped their dinner the night before their match with India. If only they had had their dinner, a few of them might have been down with food poisoning.
• The lack of good barbers in Port of Spain. Dhoni had commented that his hair had grown a little too long to manage and this had affected his game in the warm-up matches. So, Dhoni had planned to have a haircut in Port of Spain before the match against Bangladesh. But, all the barbers there only specialised in making curls out of the existing hair and none had ever heard of a haircut!
• Varuna, Zeus and Hobal, the rain gods for shedding their tears intermittently and not continuously during the bermuda bangladesh match. If only they had cried continuously, the bermuda cricketers might have known that the match was going to be reduced and slogged, rather than play like a test match.

What people also don't see is the benefit we get from the loss

• Poster makers have said that their profits have soared to never-seen-before levels after india's exit from the world cup. People are now buying posters of indian cricketers and burning them. More posters are being sold now compared to when india was performing well and winning matches
• Students will perform better in the board exams happening throughout the country now. Of course, under the assumption that it doesn't get postponed or cancelled because of protests or bandhs by political parties.
• Tamilians will not be killed in Karnataka. This is because, in tamil nadu, people will not watch matches and hence will have their TVs turned off, thus saving electricity in the state. Hence the state doesn't need more water in the Cauvery river to feed its hydro-electric projects.
• The Ad industry will have many openings, now that the cricketers will be kicked out of the ad campaigns.

So, ladies and gentlemen, bearded hosts of STAR news, 10-rupee an hour poster burners of political parties, don't blame the Indian cricketers for this loss. They were just playing their natural game. It was the others who weren't doing so, resulting in the indians' loss.

Technorati Tags: cricket world cup cricket Indian team loss ICC World Cup

India will win the ICC world cup

so says this email forward which got today. It also quotes various "mysterious" coincidences between India's world cup victory in 1983 and the current world cup. Btw, non-tamilians might not understand the dialogues in the pictures below.
I hope that i don't have to update this post after today's India-Sri Lanka match!

Update after the India-Sri Lanka match: Ok, The theories below have "almost" been proven wrong. "Almost" because, i still hope that today's Bangaldesh-Bermuda match has been fixed by the biggies at BCCI.

Trivia – 1
Year 1981
1. Prince Charles got married
2. Liverpool crowned Champions of Europe
3. Australia lost the Ashes
4. Pope Died
2 years later India won the Cricket world Cup!!!

Year 2005
1. Prince Charles got married
2. Liverpool crowned Champions of Europe
3. Australia lost the Ashes
4. Pope Died
2 years later Will India win the Cricket world Cup ?????

Trivia -2
1982 Football World Cup won by Italy
1983 Cricket World Cup won by India

2006 Football World Cup won by Italy
2007 Cricket World Cup will be won by India ??

Trivia -3
1983 Cricket World Cup India lost its first match by 5 wickets
2007 Cricket World Cup India lost its first match by 5 wickets



Haiyo!!! Haiyo!!!
Ippadiyae usuppethi usuppethi udamba ranakalama akkittanungappa!!!!
Innumada engala nambikkittirukinga?

Technorati Tags: cricket world cup cricket Rahul dravid Inzamam

A cool counter for your blog

I am making a change to the template of my site after a long time. I was doing by usual blog surfing from the blogrolls of Chennai Central and came across Sundar Narayanans Travelog. His site had this cool thing on the sidebar which displayed the various countries from where readers visited his blog. I was immediately drawn to it, as the information it displayed was very interesting.

So, i go to Neoworx and register to implement a neocounter for my site. This is what you will see on all pages on the sidebar on the right down below the "Going Wild" section. I would have never known , until now, that there are people even from Mauritius, Canada and Netherlands visiting my site. Impressive!

Technorati Tags: Neoworx Neocounter site counter counter country visitor map

Dwayne Leverock, solid rock

Size does matter.

If anyone tries to convince you that it does not, show them the picture of this sumo-sized cricketer from Bermuda, Dwayne "sluggo" leverock. Weighing in at around 120 Kgs, just a look at him jogging in during his small run-up before he delivers his slow left-arm spinners would be enough to jitter even the best batsmen in the world. And it did!

Any bowler would be happy to get the wickets of Collingwood and Pietersen in a match. This is what Michael Vaughan had to say about leverock's performance:

He bowled very well. Any spinner that drags Kevin Pietersen out of his crease and does him in the flight - you know it's a good delivery.

His bowling figures of 2-32 in 10 overs might not have caught the attention of the world media, but his huge figure definitely has.

If the commentators go ga-ga when Anil Kumble "attempts" to field a ball in the most awkward position possible and applaud his commitment to the team etc, they should be at a loss for words to describe leverock's cricketing abilities. In spite of his size being a bit on the bigger side for a physically demanding sport, he has proved that he is a cricketer with all-round (no pun intended) capabilities.

How many international cricketers can take a catch like the one he took of Uthappa's ?

Take a look at his skills below: He comfortably takes a run, he is even able to field of his own bowling and a teammate is even able to lift him!

Arjuna Ranatunga showed the world that cricketing acumen would outscore physical fitness and Dwayne Leverock goes further to add more dimensions to this theory. Dwayne Leverock, the future of international cricket!

Technorati Tags: Dwayne Leverock Bermuda india Arjuna Ranatunga Size does matter ICC World Cup cricket

Pakistan crashes out of the ICC world cup

No, not because their cricket was bad. Not because, Ireland's cricket was good. Not because, the weather in the West Indies were not conducive to their reverse swings. Not because, there were more cameras than usual at this event and the pakistanis could not find a place on the ground, hidden from a camera view, to work on the seams of the cricket balls.

Their early exit from the early cup was a planned, strategically executed move in complete collaboration with their neighbours, India. India and Pakistan had more important matters than the cricket world cup to worry about, like their peace talks. So, even before the teams had left for the world cup, the team managements had been instructed by the respective governments to finish their outing as early as possible and return, so the people of the two countries are not unnecessarily distracted by the cricket and can go about having dozens of rounds of talks.

Pakistan have executed this plan to perfection by losing to West Indies and Ireland. India are on their way after losing to Bangladesh. Fortunately for Pakistan, one of their losses was against West Indies, a good team and hence the innocent public of Pakistan would blame the defeat on the cricket. But, for India, unfortunately, they would have to lose to Bangladesh and Bermuda to go according to plan. This would be difficult to explain for the team management.

So, the team management might "blow the whistle" on the government and reveal the truth behind this plan. Of course, the government at the centre would have learned a trick or two from the former defence minister George Fernandes, and would eventually say that they had only joked when they had asked the Indian team to come back soon from the World cup!

Technorati Tags: cricket world cup India Pakistan George Fernandes joke

Herschelle Gibbs hits six sixers in an over

Violence, murder, carnage - words you wouldn't normally associate with the gentleman's game of cricket. But this is what that happened in the ICC world Cup preliminary match between South Africa and Netherlands/Holland.

UPDATE: Yuvraj Singh has also done it!!!! Go check out the video here.

Yes, Ravi Shastri and Gary Sobers have done it before, but only in a first class game, where it is supposed that the quality of the players are much inferior to ODIs. But, was this game any better than a first class game? Bringing such teams into the world cup, after having competed amongst themselves, and then making them face teams who have a reputation of successfully chasing 400+ runs against Australia, does indeed require such strong words such as carnage and murder.

Here is the ball-by-ball commentary from cricinfo for that over.

• 29.1 van Bunge to Gibbs, SIX, Violence! Gibbs charged down the track and hoicked it over long on.
• 29.2 van Bunge to Gibbs, SIX, Murder! Floated on the leg and middle stump line and Gibbs sends it soaring over long-off.
• 29.3 van Bunge to Gibbs, SIX, Carnage! Flatter one this time but it makes no difference to Gibbs. He just stands there and delivers. This one also has been sucked over long off
• 29.4 van Bunge to Gibbs, SIX, Wah Wah! Low full toss and guess where this went Yep. A slap slog and it went over deep midwicket! He is going to go for 6 sixes in this over!
• 29.5 van Bunge to Gibbs, SIX, Short in length, on the off stump line and Gibbs rocks back and swat-pulls it over wide long off. SImply amazing. What a batsman. This is pure violence!
• 29.6 van Bunge to Gibbs, SIX, He has done it! One-day record. No one has hit six sixes in a row. GIbbs stands alone in that zone. And the minnow bashing continues! Full and outside off and bludgeoned over deep midwicket

Gibbs fell in the next over to the big relief of the opposition, but the happiness was short-lived. In came boucher and smashed the fastest ever fifty in a world cup! Well, other than the netherlands cricket fans, few other people might be unhappy. They are the Johnnie Walker people, who , assuming that such a feat might be improbable, had promised to donate one million dollars to charity , if six sixers are hit in an over!

Anyway, if you are interested in violence, watch the youtube video of herschelle gibb's six sixers in an over here.

Technorati Tags: Herschelle Gibbs six sixers one over South Africa netherlands holland match Ravi shastri Gary Sobers ICC Cricket World cup

Cricket Quiz to win Indian Team tshirts and caps

Here in Amdocs, we have a Social Club where they have arranged for screening all the world cup matches on Big Screen using a projector. To inaugurate the world cup, we had a small cricket quiz on tuesday just before the west indies - pakistan match. Also, we had got Indian Team tshirts and caps to be given away as prizes. This was not a regular quiz for the regular quizzers. This was a quiz for the masses, just an excuse to give them tshirts and caps! The questions, almost all of the them very easy, are given below. I shall update this post with the answers a week later. Until then, if you are interested, leave the answers in the comments.

• What does ICC stand for ?
• The term 'a pair'—where a batsman is out for nought has it's origin in an object that resembles two zeros placed side by side. Which object ?
• Who inaugurated this year's world cup ?
• After how many overs can a new ball be taken?
• This quote of Ian Botham led to one of the many disciplinary actions against him: "Everyone should send their mothers-in-law to ___________"
• Shahid Afridi holds the record for the fastest one day hundred (37 balls). Who has hit the second fastest(44 balls) ?
• What are the names of Sachin Tendulkar's kids ?
• When was the only time cricket was played in the olympics?
• When is the world cup final going to be held ?
• Which cricketer has sung along with Asha Bhosle in the album "Asha & Friends" ?
• This is the full name of a cricketer. Identify the blanksSahibzada Mohammad ____ Khan ____
• Who had scores of 0,0,1,0,0,0 in his first three test matches and a 0 in his first one-dayer?
• What is Don Bradman's Test average ?
• Which fielding position is most likely to field a French cut?
• KS Ranjitsinhji, K S Duleepsinhji and Ajaysinhji Daulatsinhji all came from the royal family of Nawanagar, now known as Jamnagar. Who was the last member from this pedigree to have represented India ?
• What was burnt to create the Ashes?
• 'Z’ is the autobiography of which former test cricket captain?
• what is the position right behind the wicketkeeper called ?
• To which country does the cricketer Anthony Ireland belong to ?
• What would happen if a player fielded the ball with his cap?
• Which cricketer's middle name is Chandidas?
• In world Cup 1975, East Africa was one of the teams. Which are the countries which formed a part of East Africa?
• What is the common terminology used for running out the batsman when he is backing up at the non-strikers end?
• The West Indian Batsman George Headley was nicknamed“The Black ______”
• In the interval of a New Zealand - England day-night ODI at Wellingtonin 2002, the director of a movie stood on the pitch with a microphone and persuaded the crowd to make howling, growling and grunting noises for use in battle scenes in his film _____________. Which Film ?
• In which city was the world's first ever indoor one-day international cricket match played?
• Gary Sobers is regarded as one of the best all-rounders in test cricket. He played only one ODI. How uch did he score ?
• Wife of this cricketer phoned him during a test match. It was told to her that he had just gone inside the field to bat. The wife told that she would prefer to hold because he never survives more than a few balls. Who is this cricketer ?
• To which country does the cricketer Jeetan Patel belong to ?
• Who is “Masaba” and how is she related to Bollywood and West Indian cricket?
• Who is the only man to play in both his country’s first and the 100th test match?
• What is shane warne's middle name?
• The BCCI logo is derived from the emblem of India’s highest order of chivalry (during the days of the British Raj) founded by Queen Victoria in 1861. What was the order called ?
• To which country does the cricketer Qaiser Ali belong to?
• What is the contribution of Paul Hawkins to the world of cricket?
• Who was the first cricketer to be given out by a third umpire ?
• “It involves the deliberate and systematic targeting of the opposing team's captain, in the hope that if the captain is given out or rendered ineffective, it would lead to diminished respect for the captain's authority and the rest of their team losing morale and the will to win”. What is the specific term for this strategy?
• Who is the captain of the England World Cup team?
• To which country does the cricketer Saleem Mukuddem belong to?
• In Australia, what are referred to as "sundries" ?
• Who said to whom "Mate ! You have just dropped the world cup " ?
• In cricket, what is meant by the phrase "bowling a maiden over"?
• In the match between India and Pakistan at Jaipur on 02-10-1983, Which new rule was introduced?
• The nickname of Glenn McGrath is what?
• How many runs did Sir Donald Bradman need in his last innings to finish with a Test average of 100?
• What is the first innings lead required to ask the opposition to follow-on in a Test match?

Technorati Tags: cricket world cup cricket cricket quiz world cup quiz Indian team tshirt cap

Karthi in Paruthiveeran is a hit

So say the reviews. I watched it at a friend's place last week. When Ameer was here, he had requested us to watch Paruthiveeran in the theatres. Sorry Ameer, i couldn't. By the time i make the annual pilgrimage to India, this movie might not be running in the theatres.

The movie has been a declared a big hit by the media with anantha vikatan giving a score of 46. Compare this to the score anandha vikatan has give to other movies in the past.

• Nayagan – 60
• 16 Vayathinilae – 58
• Salanagai Oli – 56
• Autograph > 50
• Enagaeyo Ketta Kural > 50

Going by the list above, Ameer has almost ended up within the biggies. His previous movie Raam was also appreciated by the critics and masses alike and also won two awards at the Cyprus International Festival held last year here.

I didn't like the movie as a whole. I am not a big fan of too much melodrama and tragedy and personally prefer lighter themes with interspersed comedy. Would i watch this movie again, i probably won't. The sequence in the middle, the song with the eunuchs, what was that ? It looked like that the script for the next scene was not yet ready and something had to be shot with all the available people on that day. It was a mess. A long, "something-like-a-song", it looked to be never-ending. This is probably the nth time we are seeing a movie where two families related by a marriage in the previous generation split up and their children try to hook up.

But, there were many positives in the movie. The screenplay was excellent. Kudos to Ameer for that. The characters were well-chosen. I particularly liked the one playing the relative of Priya Mani's dad, the guy with the coarse voice. The sections shot with the kids were amazing and i liked the change of colour for those scenes in the past.

Karthi was amazing for his first movie. He looked like he was acting in his hundredth movie. He handled all kinds of emotions with ease. Priya Mani too was very good. In fact, she had to handle a lot more of crying and shouting and she did that very well. The choice of each and every person to play a character seemed to perfectly match the requirement.

Here are some pictures where were taken when Ameer and Karthi were here in Cyprus. Enjoy!

Technorati Tags: karthi paruthiveeran director ameer surya brother kollywood

Galli Cricket Chronicles

Galli Cricket or Street cricket is the highly simplified version of modern day international cricket. All the rules are customised based on the needs of the cricketers or the location of the ground. Usually you don't have LBW, leg byes, byes or overthrows. None of the rubbish Duckworth-lewis rules apply here. If it rains, you go home, that's it. Of course, you keep cursing the team that had already finished their batting.

There is no third umpire. In fact, everyone on the field is an umpire and has the right and will voice their opinion about a dismissal. Usually, you have the entire batting team opposing the dismissal and the entire bowling team celebrating the dismissal even before it is accepted by the batsman. There are a few honest galli cricketers who, to avoid lying, say that they were watching some birds in the distance and didn't notice the dismissal.

Here, in Cyprus, we have all variations of cricket. We have a team playing the "proper" big-boys cricket with the leather ball. They also participate in the National League. We also have the regular weekend cricket (with tennis ball) which follows all the rules (like bowling, both sides batsmen etc). Finally, we have the Galli cricket version. I play in all the three, but the galli cricket is the most entertaining of the lot as it gives me an opportunity to not only hone my off-side-strokes in cricket (we have runs only on the off side), but also my negotiation/communication skills.

Someone once said that Tennis was a waste of time, as the time spent on actual tennis-playing was a fraction of the whole time on the field. You should come and see our Galli cricket. The actual time spent arguing/fighting overshadows the actual cricketing time. Every ball bowled, every run taken requires an approval from all on the field.

A visitor to our Galli cricket will be a witness to some strange scenes. Some times, he will see a fielder accompanying a ball, but not attempting to stop it. This is because of a rule that if a ball rolls out of the boundary of the field (behind the batsman), no runs (even those which the batsman has already taken) count. So, the fielder waits until the ball rolls out of the ground.

The strangest rule we have is called the "Change on intention" rule. If after having started a run, you realise that you are not going to make it to the other end, you can , at any point during the run, stop, turn and face the batting end. What this means is that you have changed your intention and no longer interested in taking a run. So, you cannot be made run-out at the bowlers end. Well, if you don't want to take a run, can you be run-out ? Of course not, Its not fair, right ?

Not all the people like this rule, because it seems that it favours few who are physically fit. Like the famous Magnus Magnusson of BBC Mastermind used to say "I've started, so I'll finish", some players say "I've started, so i have to finish". This is because of their relatively bigger size which in turn means a bigger momentum. Thus, once they start running, there is no way they can stop mid-way and turn around!

Traditionally, we have had the same two teams for the past few years. I pick some players (usually anyone new joins my team) and the there are a group of players who have always been in the opposite side. They are individually good players, but collectively ...The people in the photos below (Mani and Guru) belong to my team and the keeper (Ganesh) is one of the senior members of the other team. Look at the elegance of my team member's front foot strokes and look at the way the keeper is totally isolated from the line of the ball. No wonder they drop so many catches and we win!

Traditionally, my teams wins most of the matches. But, we do have the rare surprise like last week, when they won 3-0. But, these are as rare as "put whatever you think happens very rarely here". I used to send mails around the Thursday or Friday of every week for the game on the weekend. Invariably, i write something which infuriates the members of the "other" team and it becomes an all-out email war.

During a party, i caught all members of the opposite team having a drink. Later, they became the cast of a famous DVD-release!

Last week, Puneeth bought his new Nikon D-40 to the ground and he shot lot of good photographs. One of them caught me while fielding and returning the ball and it was cool ! Incidently, the batsman in the foreground (Mani) applied the famous "Change of Intention" rule and escaped getting run-out.

Technorati Tags: cricket world cup cricket street cricket Galli cricket

One dollar a day through Google Adsense

February may be the shortest month, but it has been the biggest for me in terms of Google adsense earnings. I am still not near the million a month figure, but i am close to it. February earnings through Google Adsense were a little more than double that of January's earnings, closing in at almost -------------------- ROL (Romanian Lei) which translates to about XX USD. Another thing to be proud of is the fact that this is the first time i have managed an average of more than one dollar a day for the month. Good going !

Update: Just heard that I am not supposed to disclose my adsense earnings according to the adsense terms and conditions.

Technorati Tags: earning money with google adsense google adsense Google Page Rank getting rich google adsense