It is unlikely that Biranchi Maharana, a fine gent of Orriyese persuasion, has heard of the song in the title made famous by Prodigy.

Biranchi Maharana, in one fell swoop, endeared himself to such Indians as Mohinder Amarnath, Yashpal Sharma, Sourav-dadagiri-Ganguly and our dear friend Ugly. With the ‘thapad ki goonj’ reverberating around the world, I wonder how many of the present lot of Indian cricketers would queue up to shake Biranchi’s hand.

For all those still wondering, Biranchi Maharana of the Kalinga Sena, a local political outfit in Bhubaneswar bumped into Greg Chappel at the airport and allegedly slapped him in account of no Orriyese in the desi cricket team. Someone should have reminded him of a certain Shiv Sundar Das!

This is a no-frills I-told-you-so post. I suppose it would be fitting that I write endlessly about the beauty of this comeback. Except, thanks to the lacking alacrity of babu moshai Pranab Mukhejee and the general (and now characteristic) idiocy of the BCCI, I wasn’t lucky enough to actually see Mr Ganguly in action earlier today. I imagine that it was no less entertaining than it sounds. But in my mind’s eye, it all makes perfect sense - including the close finish. Ok, so it’s a some-frills post.

Act 1, Scene 1: Ganguly races to 50. Dravid stands up with the rest of the team to applaud. Begins to sit back down and then notices the boys are still clapping. Straightens up and puts his hands together like he never entertained the thought of sitting back down.

Scene 2: While the West Indians tried to pull a Garrison-finish, Sir Rahul looks into the distance, shuffles his feet, almost about to do something about it and then feels it is best to remain thoughful about the matter.

Scene 3: Mr Indiranagar is asked to comment about his team’s performance and he waxes eloquent about how ‘all the boys’ pitched in. And the team has come together and the spirit in dressing room is high. And since Viru is not around, someone might actually drink the Champagne.

[Exeunt Captain Bumble]

I bet Mr Dravid wouldn’t have complained too much if someone had blanked out his line of vision for the day. But allow me to note with due respect, his own very useful knock and what sounds like a remarkable partnership with Dhoni.
Riggs - in my humble opinion, today’s proceedings has effectively brought to nought the raison d’etre of our Sticky conversations. Feel free to disagree. But as I recall, vividly, we had a wager? Steak, was it?

Bartman

If I wore a hat, I’d doff it for the Colonel.

I don’t remember when the last time it was we had such on outspoken Chairman of Selectors who not only spoke his mind (like most of his predecessors) but also managed to speak sense. Shri Vengsarkar went even one further and even managed to walk the talk!

They wise men dropped Veeru and what a voice choice it has been. They even went and got the Maharaj back - for once I have nothing to say but ‘Jolly good show’ to the Bong. No one, not even Nagma can begrudge his place back in the final XI. I watched an interview of him after the final test I think and what came across more than anything was how much he has mellowed. Sitting at home and making ads that say ‘Dada ka baat sunoge na’ has made him lose the arrogance and he comes across as focussed with only one thing on his mind - make runs!

No Veeru can only mean one thing - The MumbaiDada and the MaharajDada are going to open and I hope, for old times sake, they click like they used to. A boom here and a bang there, one for the old times and we could very well be looking at our opening bats for the World Cup. I feel a bit bad for young Robin who will follow the two Batmen. he deserves more than just a look-in and I hope he gets one too.

More drama shall unfold over the next couple of weeks. Watch this space.

And on another note, yours truly had the distinct pleasure of dining with young V R V Singh a couple of nights ago. That boy is ALL WRONG to be a fast bowler - he’s shy, he’s sweet and he’s extremely soft-spoken! I was all set to teach him to be mean and nasty before I realised he was 6′4′’ and very muscular!

Fun Fun Fun. More later!

Having decided to ignore India’s Grand Afrikaans Safari, I choose to dedicate this post to 3 fine cricketers who retired last week when the Aussies took back their little urn.

Shane Warne, Glen McGrath and Justin Langer - lucky for me Youtube has clips of their final moments. Guaranteed to bring a lump to your throat, these clips left me wondering when the last time it was that I saw any Indian cricketer get a sendoff like the ones you’re about to see.

Enjoy - and thanks for the memories!

Here’s: Warnie and McGrath

and here’s: Langer

‘’It’s time for us to bounce back,'’ Rahul Dravid told a news conference, a day before the start of the third and final Test. Well, apparently, there was eggnog left over from Christmas. How else would one explain the sheer bravado of Captain Lumberjack’s battle cry ahead of the deciding Test?

‘’We’ve shown throughout the series at various times, that we can do well against South Africa so now we must put all the plans in place and perform when the situation demands it.'’ Well, as it turns out, what he meant to say, and would have, had there been leftover brandy instead, is that at various times during the series, the hosts have slipped, for most part from sheer boredom, and during some of those times, the ‘boys’ have shown marginal spunk and done well for themselves.

‘’Our best chance is on pitches which give our seamers the chance of taking 20 wickets as quickly as possible,'’ Dravid said. Yes indeed. And you would think this sort of thing would be a dandy situation, since the boys find it rather convenient on these said pitches to get out quickly themselves.

.'’We have to bat four sessions and that’s probably the biggest goal which we have failed to achieve.'’ You don’t say. ‘’Runs at the top of the order and a good, solid start is going to help us to achieve our goal of batting for four sessions. So, we might look at the top order. But no final decision has yet been made,” Dravid said. Um, I guess what he meant to say was -we’ll look at the top order, we’ll try and find a winning combination. And then, when we finally do, we’ll revert to sending Sehwag to combat the new ball so he can get out like the champion that he is. Mort - perhaps you’d like to put on your ‘Dravid-is-King’ cap and explain this to me? I mean, God forbid we begin to look like we know what we are doing. Or this part of some elaborate plan to take over the world?

‘’If the situation demanded it then I wouldn’t be wary of making any dramatic changes if it meant that it would strengthen my team.”  You know what would be dramatic AND strengthen the team? A psychological test to determine the root cause of the Captain’s self-destructive thought processes.

On a less depressing root, looks like the boys have taken to the Australian idea of combat with all the bad-mouthing on the field - well, only half-Australian really - the Kangaroos usually sledge and win. And they don’t quite resemble a suicide squad before they attempt to adopt an Alec Smart attitude.

- Ugly

Stand up and take a bow, Warnie.

Yu Bewdy Yu.

-Rigged

Apologies for the delay in the appearance of this post. It was originally typed out, in one sitting the day us Injuns pulled off one for the record books by beating the Boks in their own den.

Apparently Wordpress (the chaps wot own the thing that we use when we watchmacallit) had something in for me, for no sooner than I had written my best post ever, it did one of those Error 404 thingumajigs on me and it was lost forever. What do you think? Will I be able to be a successful technical writer?

Now, getting back to the point, the first test was such a blast. No one could have scripted it better.

I have a sneaky suspicion Comeback Man # 1, Maharaj read my ‘Gang-Bang’ post (courtesy Ugly) and responded in the best way that he could - by sticking it out there and scoring an unbeaten half-hundred in his comeback innings. It was thrilling and even I, who likes him as much as I like music by Boyzone, had to doff my hat to him. It was good to see him stand tall, chin out and take it like a Dravid.

What also fascinated me was the innings played by young VRV, who graduated, top of the class from the Courtney Walsh School of Batting. He backed away like a matador dodging a fiesty bull every ball he faced and sent the ball into all kinds of orbit. No sooner had he done his bit that young Comebackman # 2 Zak (so christened by our Zip Code Opener, Veeru) came in and sent Graeme back to the Smithsonian - thus setting the tone for his young Mallu mate, who will be covered in this blog later.

Having sent the Boks packing for less that a hundred and playing out another familiar Indian collapse at the top, it was left to Comebackman # 3, Very Very Special to come up with yet another very very special. He cut, he flicked, he drove and he edged past slip with the same serenity as a Jack Johnson tune, to get himself a well deserved 70 plus.

All this and then my most special moment of the match - the dancing Baby Sreesanth, who having received a mouthful from Nel-anna, not only tonked him over his head for six but also ran down the pitch, brandishing his bat like a Quixotic windmill and giving Nel-anna the best ‘WhoozYerDaddy’ dance I have ever seen.

If you missed it, here it is : Sree-Shake on YouTube

WhooooHooo, a star is born and I see Pepsi, Coke and Mountain Dew lining up to make him India’s next TV Commercial star.

The Boks, now mentally scarred after watching Sree shake his thang, struggled, hung in there for a bit and eventually caved in, setting up one of India’s finest wins abroad. Post all this hungama, my next best moment of the match - Sourav-da, coming on as a change bowler, trundling in with all the zest of a Mohinder Amarnath and delivering a nasty snorter that exploded on Kallis - I have no idea who was more surprised, him or Kallis.

What a game. Lets see what the rest of this series throws up.

-Rigged

Yes sir, Mort, so what were we saying about Nel anna? Were we saying that he’ll trip over the length of his new-found ego and be stepped all over by the Mallu kid? And what a kid he is mon - has got the fight, the hunger and the gumption that reminds one of .. let’s see..umm, a Ganguly? Well, the gumption that is, the dancing reminds one of Mamooty.

Now what does one say about Dada mon. Let’s just reiterate - the guy may be no Bradman but he certainly has what it takes.

Allow me to return to the sights and sounds of what is possibly the most entertaining day of the series. But before I sign off, here’s my next prediction in keeping with my now-established tradition of being right - Dravid’s looking jittery mon, he ought to be careful, wot? More careful than lesser mortals too - the only comeback he is capable of is to come back home to Indiranagar. And they dont have no Karoake bar in that part of town so he could croon away his sorrows.

- Ugly

The Maharaj is BACK!

The Indian selectors have done it again. While the entire cricketing world is taking steps forward in getting ready for the World Cup, we’ve recalled Sourav Ganguly. For a Test series against the South Africans IN South Africa. Now don’t get me wrong. Ganguly IS a special player with special talents. I mean, on his last visit to the said continent, he took more than six hours to score a test hundred versus the Zimbabwe Third XI. I don’t know how many players in world cricket can boast of a record like that!

Anyhoo, I’m not looking too forward to the first test. I just saw our lads get Chitty Chitty Gang Banged by the Boks and it was not a pleasant sight. I also saw Nel-anna saunter down the wicket and have a chat with some of the Indian batsmen. I can imagine what he’s going to try with Sourav.

What’s it going to be? Will Nel&Co cut through our boys like a South African bowling attack going through an Indian batting line-up? Will Sourav-da prove everyone (including himself) wrong by scripting a heroes innings? Will the ball pay frequent visits to his ribcage? All this and more on the Great Indian (S)Laughter Challenge, Jo-berg - Dec 15th to 19th.

Personally, I think he’s going to get some sweet chin music!

-Rigged