Pakorakorner | A personal portal with a strong Asian Indian flavor on a whole range of topics.

A new format of the cricket game targeted at the world's leading cricket market appears to have become a bumper hit for all and sundry. The three hour duration combined with the day-night schedule has managed to attract a new set of cricket audiences among families with small kids in addition to the already cricket crazy Indian public. Based on media reports, the turn out at these matches and the general interest level, it appears that the IPL is ...

The BCCI's quick decision to put "slapgate" to rest by issuing Harbhajan Singh a five ODI ban was as lame as it gets. It has been clearly established for the record that Harbhajan Singh slapped Sreesanth. Moreover, Harbhajan was captaining the Mumbai Indians when this happened! Without a doubt it was an awful on the field act for a sportsman. This is all the more a serious issue because cricket mania in India is at its peak. The game is ...

The firing of Charu Sharma the CEO of Royal Challengers is probably the first and quickest instance of action being taken against cricketing management. There is no question that thus far the Bangalore Royal Challengers have been a dismal flop on the field. None of the young local players have fired. Jacques Kallis who has been persisted with throughout seems completely unfit for T20. Dravid himself is struggling to find his feet in this form of the game. Sunil Joshi ...

Around 4.45 pm on Saturday 4/19/2008 Syed Faqeer Ali died while playing cricket in Fremont. He was representing a local team in the Northern California Cricket Association (NCCA) league. He is survived by his wife and 3-year old son. I have never met or seen Faaqer but have had the privilege of interacting with his Dad, Abid Ali a former Indian Test cricket player. I have very fond memories having played in the same cricket league in the past and ...

T20 is clearly a new format and the strategies and theories that apply to other forms of the game don't really belong here. In other words, there are no experts. With the IPL well underway the initial set of matches has shown a number of trends. The jury is still out on whether these trends signify long term patterns, but here are a few observations on what seems to work/not work in this new form of cricket. Prolonged Stay ...

The bad boys of Indian cricket landed in trouble once again, this time after a clash on the field. Except this time, there were no international players involved. Instead it was Mathew Hayden's "obnoxious weed" Bhajji going against the equally troublesome Sreesanth. As a cricket fan who has watched both these players in action, I couldn't help but feel that perhaps both these players had it coming. They had both been in trouble before and had done little to curb ...

The inaugural IPL match was not a one-sided game but a one-man game. As Rahul Dravid rightly pointed out if you disregard the 158 made by McCullum the rest of the Knight Riders combined made barely 80 runs. In fact, if you add the 82 runs made by his team it barely creeps up over McCullum's individual score. Firstly, all credit to McCullum. It was a rare display of prolonged consistent hitting that took the match away ...

The nexus between cricket and Bollywood has been formalized and is ready for launch. Not surprisingly the theatrics that go with Bollywood have found their way to the launch of the Indian Professional League (IPL). It has all the makings of a movie launch. Prior to this players were bought and sold like cattle. Bollywood stars are geared up for "song and dance" at various points during the matches. Cheer leaders have been imported from across the world. Advertising is ...

Finally a pitch that was becoming of a Test match. The Kanpur Test was a perfect example of how to make Test cricket interesting. A result in three days, all of which was packed with exciting possibilities. The pitch was assisting the bowlers right from day one. At the same time there were runs to be picked up for the batsmen provided they were willing to take chances and play their shots. Sourav Ganguly once again proved that he is still ...

Whatever happened to the idea of a home ground advantage? The Motera curators served South Africa a dream wicket. Team India completed the gift with a disgraceful performance in the first innings . The match was all but over by lunch on day one. The lone highlight of the match for India was Saurav Ganguly's fighting knock of 87 in the second innings. Ganguly was outstanding. His sweep shots, late cut and straight drives were a terrific addition to his ...