July 5th and 6th report

We played 4 matches last weekend ( Saturday and Sunday) including our second /last league match of the tournament. Saturday, we played against our regular opponents and as part of sharing the team members across the two teams, Vinay and Satish played against us. One of the highlights on Saturday was Satish scoring yet another 50. He is making this as a habit which augurs well for our team batting.
Still, I would say we failed to put up a huge total on Sunday where we played against Puma in our second and final league match of the tournament. Though, Satish is in his prime form with  the bat, got out in the very first ball of the match. With his current form he has set up a high expectation, I think it is too much to expect from this guy in every match. After that initial hiccup I think we recovered well by adding 45 runs in 6 overs. I thought Preetish and I batted sensibly to carry the innings. we failed to accelerate the rate from 6th to 10th over. Ideally we should have doubled the score in the remaining 4 overs which would have taken our score to around 90 runs but we ended up scoring 76 runs that too with the help of Ilan and Arjun. Though we felt we were 10-15 runs short on that pitch, it was actually a challenging total considering the bowling power we have and we took the match till the last over. during our bowling also we were controlling the things till the end of 6th over. They(Puma) needed to score 44 runs in last 4 overs. In the next 2 overs ( 7th and 8th ) they scored 33 runs and looked to complete the target in the 9th over itself. Rana provided one more twist by bowling one of the best overs of the match by giving just a single run which again swung the balance in our side. This situation lead us into the last over of the match where the opposition still needed to score 10 runs. I think I made a mistake by giving the ball to Arjun instead of Ilan. No doubt Arjun is a fantastic bowler and he bowled well for us in the earlier matches but on that day he was a bit disturbed and was not at his best. Also, Ilan looked in good touch and bowled well in his previous over. Still, I gave the ball to Arjun hoping that he will win the match for us. He proved me wrong and again he got disturbed by the batsman who hit 2 sixers to clinch the match for his side. We lost one more close match! I still think we will make into the knockout stage of the main cup as we maintain healthy net run rate compare to other two teams in our group.

Turning Points: We did not bat well from 6th over onwards where we needed more runs to put up a big total and while bowling also we lost during the same time ( 6th to 10th overs) where we gave away 44 runs.

Overall, there are lot of positives we can take from this match and also I hope we will learn from our mistakes to improve and perform better in our future matches.

For the detailed scoreboard, please click here.
 

June 28th Report

Last Saturday we played 3 matches and won the series 2-1. I think we lost the first match after having the game in our hand. After losing the toss, we were asked to bowl first and we bowled out the opposition team for only 40 runs  We messed it up while chasing this small total and bundled out for only 32 runs, conceding the opposition a lead 1-0. We came back strongly and won the next 2 matches to clinch the series 2-1. As usual bowlers did a wonderful job. Most of us wanted to mix up the players from both the teams and we did this last week to an extent. Rana and Kiran played against us! We should continue to mix the players especially bowlers so that the batsmen from both teams get opportunity to play against all the bowlers and similarly bowlers also get an opportunity to bowl at different batters.

This week I thought of sharing some perspectives on “Team”. When we mean team, it could just be  the “group” we are playing for that comes to our mind – which is very natural. However, my reference to “Team” here is about the associations that we all intend to make – during successes and failures.

Per popular sayings “ Success  has many fathers, and failures  has none” , I think the corollary is rather a stronger truth! What I mean by this is – when we are successful, others folk to us, and we feel good about it. When we fail at something, we will go after those who are not so successful and embrace them as our ‘friends’!

Let us say we set out on a goal to reduce weight or enjoy a movie – which are both positives that we would have taken from some of the successful people around us. When we are through this journey of either reducing weight after a few days or post the three hours of movie, we come out and feel we did not achieve our objectives! Immediately, we not only find reasons for being unsuccessful, but also start to ‘seek out´ to those in our circles who have similar viewpoints.

In the case of losing weight we will not only justify with those who have not been successful, we will start adding reasons why it had happened and start making new friends of similar ilk. We even go to the extent of liking them, and making them as best buddies! On the movies front, we will start reading more critics reviews that share our views, so we feel happy about the fact we are not alone.

The issue with the above mental state is that we will develop this as a habit, whenever we do not get to the goal we need to reach – and it becomes a whirlpool of negative thoughts and state of mind. So, it is important for us to give importance to even smaller events that may creep into our minds about the negative thoughts that may not only stem from others influence, but also from our makings.

So, when next time we do not lose weight or do not enjoy a movie, try it once again, or continue to speak to those who have been successful J

June 21 report:

 
Once again We continued our domination by winning both the matches comfortably. It was a complete team effort especially with our bowling to contain the opposition team on both the occasions . There were many good contributions like Satish batted well especially in the second match and he got good support from Mani. 

It was really good to see Ilan back in action . I would not say that he is at his best as we all know what he is capable of especially with the bat. However , one can see his determination to back in form and I am sure he will be at his best soon.

Dear Friends, we are all playing together since almost 2 years now and I am sure all of you would have supported charitable causes ( in some way) that helped the larger good in this world. We think we have been fortunate to have a great life and then have an opportunity to play the game we are all passionate about, with our friends round the year. Our contribution will certainly help underprivileged children pursue higher education. Some of the children in our country hold excellent academic records and are passionate about pursuing higher studies despite economic challenges and adversities faced by them. We will need to allocate time in our schedule to conduct some activity - where our focus would be to help local charities (schools, food banks, foster homes etc). One such activity that straightaway comes to my mind is organizing an annual cricket tournament and raising money to help charities? Let’s do something good guys as a team/foundation..

Thoughts/Comments?

June 15th Report

We started our new tournament campaign on a winning note. Though our opponents (Quest) did not put up a fight either while batting/bowling, this victory will boost the team's confidence for the upcoming matches. Overall it was a complete all-round performance from our team though I still have concerns about our fielding effort which is one of the key factors for our progress to the next level.
We scored 110 runs in 10 overs which I think is the highest total from our team till today and then we contained the opposition team for only 35 runs. This also is our biggest margin win till today. Rana, Arjun , Athreya, Kiran and Satish were simply good enough for the opposition batting.

In many ways this match will be a special one for Satish. To start with he was not feeling completely well and infact was doubtful to join the team. We should be thankful to his wife as she convinced him to play and then , there was a rain interruption which halted the match for a while. With all these interruptions/impediments, Satish provided us one of the best starts till today. He started with a six! and along with his opening partner, Preetish he took our score to 50 runs in just over 4 overs.  He did not give up till the end and was not out for 64 runs, more than half the overall team total. Though he was not feeling well and then batted through the innings I thought he would take at least some rest during the second innings. He proved me wrong by standing at mid on! Truly a committed player. and rightly rewarded with couple of wickets with his slower ones. Finally it was an easy option for the expert panel to adjudge him as the man of the match. I am really happy that he could achieve all this in front of his beloved wife!
I am particularly impressed with his approach. Very first ball of the match and he hit that for a six over mid wicket. That does not mean that he was simply slogging but he was more aggressive with calculated risk.

We hear the term "calculated risk " many times and hence I wanted to share a few thoughts on risk and whether we can take a calculated risk!!If you notice the definition of Risk, it is understood that we are entering into a situation fully understanding that it could result in losing something or an outcome that could be unfavorable.
If we were to calculate risks, we may not have had any innovations on creative ideas for the fear of rejection or failure. Come on, let us face it, taking risks itself means being unrealistic. When we are going against the odds, it is pretty much given that we are ready to fail. So, why calculate at all? I think when someone makes the statement about taking calculated risk, it primarily means that ‘I will / we will not take risk’. It is just that we put it in a more polished and politically right language.

So, how do we define someone as taking risk – and when is it Good or Bad? The intent here is not to say that risk itself is good or bad, because we cannot take a good risk or bad risk. The intent is to understand if we are not making any foolish decisions – such as let us say, I will take the risk of competing with Usain Bolt, without practice and preparation. Another likely example on risk is to start a business – which is itself a risky proposition. Now, can we take a calculated risk here? I am not sure if we can do that! Some people say that take a calculated risk by continuing in the job you are in and quit when your business is up and running – how many of such startups have succeeded! We could potentially prepare to start the business by doing homework, and not starting something we do not even know – that would be a foolish act and not taking a calculated risk.
The only calculation I can think of on risk is let us say we put our time and money into anything that we want to risk, and the returns out of that could be zero, nothing else can be calculated!

Thoughts??



 

June 7th Report:

Last week we played 3 match series and won the series 2-1. The pitch was slow and sluggish and that made all the batsmen to struggle. Only 3 boundaries scored in almost 50 overs from both sides which clearly tells the story. Our bowlers, especially slow bowlers Satish and Sanjay took stock of the situation and made an impact with the ball. In particular, Satish was brilliant with his slower ones and he clearly edged others to get the player of the week award!

People are commenting on this blog which is really a good sign. I agree with Satish that we need to be more aggressive while playing against our regular opponents on Saturdays. However, we also need to think about the pitch and conditions we are playing. Last week's play gives us the clear picture on how crucial the condition of pitch for quality batting. we definitely need to think about improving the quality of the pitch which will automatically improve our batting /bowling and overall cricket quality will improve.

I was thinking on planning and forecasting about our upcoming tournament match ( this Sunday) and I just want to share some thoughts on planning /forecasting in general.

For us, Indians, the concept of life planning maybe new in the media, but has long existed – maybe the importance that was given in earlier times was less, for they knew it was bound by many unknown factors. Recently, I think it has reached crazy proportions. Any newspaper or magazine you take, it screams on our faces the amount of planning we need to do, and how much we need to save, how to save, and the crores and crores that we need to accumulate to reach our life’s ambitions, and lead a comfortable life, until we cease to exist. We get expert advice on how to reach there, knowing very little about our background, how we have been raised, and our lives are driven by the values we have been shaped since our birth. These articles also predict how long we live based on our ancestry and hence how much planning we should do!

Many of us, have started to fall prey and heed to these – buy homes beyond our means, invest in areas that we do not even understand, the risks that they may carry, and without even thinking if we really. Note that all the recommendations do not take into consideration what our life should be, what we like, what our memories are and should be. We shape our happiness based on these softer aspects.

How many of us can look back – look back just one day, and see what happiness meant for us, and what memory stayed with us yesterday (yes, just yesterday). Did we plan for that memory / happiness moment? More often than not, we would have created something that made us, our family members, our friends, and colleagues, feel a lot lighter, made them feel better, happier, and hence created a memorable situation. None of these need us to have tons of cash or bank balance, now or in future.

So, I am puzzled, if all these planning and forecasting we do, deserve that much attention? With so many situations we have no control on, so many unknowns happening in the world, dependencies we have to achieve our goals, is it worthwhile to even spend a moment on planning or forecasting? Is it better to live in the moment, after we do all the planning?
 I still do planning, but have started to realize, I may go horribly wrong, and it could be just around the corner, so mentally preparing for that situation!!





 

June 1st 2014 Report

It is really disappointing to lose one more quarter finals! Honestly, if we review our performances in this tournament, we are very inconsistent. Out of 3 matches, lost 2 and won 1. Consistency is very keen to win any tournament.

Though we lost the way in the beginning overs I think our bowlers came back strongly and provided us a chance. We needed to achieve a target of 80 runs in 8 overs to qualify for the semi finals. Though we lost couple of crucial wickets we had a brisk start to our innings with the score of 22 runs in 2 overs. I thought couple of more good overs would have ensured our semifinal berth. Instead, we managed to score only 37 more runs in next 6 overs and I think that was the critical phase of the game where we could have may be batted a couple of good overs there. The guys have tried their best and it's just not worked out for us in this tournament. Including other main batsmen, I let the team down by not contributing with the bat when it required the most. Overall it is very disappointing as I think this was our best chance to lift the trophy and we all know that we are capable of doing this.

Despite the immediate disappointment of failing to qualify for semifinals, I am very optimistic for the coming tournament (starts from June 15th onwards), as this side would only get better with these experiences. I think there's a lot of positives from this tournament as well. The performances of people like Arjun has been exceptional, even people like Kiran and Preethish performed well whenever they got opportunities especially with the ball. Arjun, who played only a couple of games with us (including a match against our regular opponents on Saturday) and showed there is a potential for the future. Satish batted exceptionally well in one match and was okay in the quarter finals as well. I still believe he has much more to contribute with the bat to this team. Though Rana did not bowl to his standards in the quarter finals, he performed well in the league matches.

Harsha, Athreya and Ilan batted well in the second league match and I batted well in the first match but all four of us were not consistent as we failed to perform in other matches.

Having said this, there is always a next chance and I hope our team delivers better next time. I must thank the team for their efforts and those guys who missed their important personal works due to this match.

May 24th 2014 Report

Dear Team

Most of us follow Cricket here in India, and I am sure many of us would have watched the nail-biting finish of the Saturday IPL match between MI and RR. Surely it was one of the best of thrillers I have watched, a thought occurred at almost near the end that something similar happened in our tournament match on the same Saturday where we were in the same situation to qualify ( quarter final)  we had to win with a  big margin.

 

We had lot of heated arguments exchanged between players/umpires/organizers and due to that all the players were really charged up. We lost the toss and had to bowl first and Rana lead the bowling attack superbly again and he got an ample support from other bowlers ( Athreya, Ilan, Preethish, Kiran).

 

Though Harsha opened in the first match , we decided to sent Satish to open the innings so that we can strengthen our middle order batting where Harsha can play some cameo in the later part of the innings which we missed in the first match. Fortunately both the plans worked out and Satish played an amazing innings. He provided the quick start that was required to chase the target ( 68 runs) quickly and truly deserved man of the match award! Ilan and Harsha played superb cameos and finally hats off to Athreya for hitting that crucial six which eventually pushed us to the next round and thank god he did not try his favorite switch hit(just kidding). This shows that our team has lot of potential to win matches from any position. Now we have qualified for the knock out round and the remaining matches are still there and I hope that brighter things are yet to come.

 

 One of the architects of the opposition team's batting was their captain who was apparently out as he was clearly out of the crease when the bails were dislodged and ball was still not dead. This would have ended their chance of putting up a decent total. Umpires did not give him out, nor did he walk out like a ‘Gentleman’. He stood his ground, and took their team's total to 67 runs. Though I am not much bothered about his innings I just want to share my thought with you.

When a team loses there was not much criticism on the person who was not ‘honest’, and a ‘good’ sportsman. However, we, the people, tend to react and behave differently if there would have been a success. Question is why, we treat people differently, or measure on a different yardstick based on the scale of success a person has got.

This is akin to all of us, managing to get away with petty ‘sins’, or ‘breaking the law’, when we are not in the limelight or not have become overly successful in the eyes of the public. Let us take an example – we speed on a freeway / highway, do not get penalized by the traffic cops, and we are happy. While, if the same happens to a celebrity (could be a politician, his / her family, actors, sportsperson), who are ‘successful’, then the same ‘we’ will ask the officials to take action, criticize every move of those individual.

Is it that our human nature or even cultures, creates different rules for different people, based on the success and fame we get? Maybe it is OK to behave this way?

 The lesson we learn from these situations is that when we are on our path to fame and success (in any small way, even in a small group or community), we will be watched; scrutinized, and ensured we are questioned about our behaviors…our race likes to sympathize with losers, but does not tolerate winners who cross the line – though both are humans! Maybe we expect winners to be above humans – super humans!!

What would have happened if we would have lost in the above scenario?  Opposite team batsman would have been labelled the bad boy of cricket…thankfully they did not win and we did not see any ‘noise’ against them...