Ranji Trophy, Super league, 2007-08 [Ranji SS available]

[bigdhoni7]

are these matches televised? i wonder if zeesports will show it like they did the challenger series...

[apocalypse]

They are on Neo sports... The Super League matches

[bigdhoni7]

oh. i dont get neosports so hopefully someone here could get the highlights of the tournament. im interested in seeing manoj tiwary play.

[Tapioca]

Complete Hyderabad Squad : 
VVS Laxman (captain), Arjun Yadav,  SM Shoaib, Ashwin Yadav, 

Hmmmm .... who is this second Yadav ?

[Chandan]

oh. i dont get neosports so hopefully someone here could get the highlights of the tournament. im interested in seeing manoj tiwary play.

I don't get it either. Hence I'll be banking on Cricketics and Rajeev's highlight only, if my DTH refuses to bring Neo Sports by next month. Or I can watch a few interesting matches at my neighbour's place too.

Complete Hyderabad Squad : 
VVS Laxman (captain), Arjun Yadav,  SM Shoaib, Ashwin Yadav, 

Hmmmm .... who is this second Yadav ?

It is a medium pacer, Tapioca. But just can't say whether he is a relative of Shivlal Yadav or not!

[varun]

SuperSelector Update. Due to concerns raised by Chandan regarding the strict nature of being forced to select atleast 1 player from each team, I've relaxed the restriction somewhat to the following: Min from each team: 0 Max from each team: 3 You may change your teams.

[Chandan]

RAJASTHAN A disappointing 2006-07 season was a big setback for Rajasthan, struggling to gain recognition in the Super League. Recognising the need to spruce up the team's profile and fortunes, the Rajasthan Cricket Association (RCA) has hired the services of former India coach Greg Chappell and biomechanist Ian Frazer to coach youngsters at the new cricket academy, the Centre of Excellence. The experiment of recruiting foreign players - Vikram Solanki and Kabir Ali from England - didn't quite work out last season and the squad on this occasion lacks a bit of gloss, with Ajay Jadeja too missing from the list. Left-arm spinner Mohammad Aslam has been rewarded for his impressive performances last season with the captaincy, taking over from Jadeja. Complete Rajasthan Squad: Mohammad Aslam Captain Ravikant Sharma Robin Bist Nikhil Doru Shailender Gehlot Rohit Jhalani Wicketkeeper Rahul Kanwat Gagan Khoda S Mathur Pankaj Singh Vineet Saxena Shafiq Khan Prakash Kishore Sharma Rohit Sharma Another Rohit Sharma??:hmmmm:What they did last season Beginning the season with a 138-run victory against Gujarat, Rajasthan's performance plunged so much that they finished at the bottom of the table in Group B. Gagan Khoda, their most experienced player, started off in the right note with centuries in back-to-back games, the second of which came in a drawn match against Hyderabad. However, the batting capitulated to embarrassing proportions against Maharashtra, where they folded up for 86 in the first innings and went down by an innings and 250 runs. A draw against Punjab was a saving grace, but that was followed by two consecutive innings defeats, against Mumbai and Bengal respectively. Jadeja's contributions were pale in comparison to that of his previous season, given that he positioned himself in the late middle-order. With just one outright victory out of six games, Rajasthan just about managed to avoid relegation. Solanki, usually on the fringes in England's one-day squad, finished with decent returns of 259 runs in five games, but didn't quite blaze away with three-figure scores as was expected of him, while Ali didn't quite acclimatise, managing just two games. Aslam and Pankaj Singh finished with 20 and 13 wickets respectively, while Khoda headed the run chart with 390 runs. Men to watch The most recognisable face in the line-up would be Pankaj Singh, the tall right-arm seamer who was picked for the India Green squad for the Challenger Trophy. Though not of express pace, he has the ability to utilise his height to get bounce and lift. Singh has experience with the India A squad as well, with impressive returns on the tour of Kenya recently. Among the relatively new faces in the squad, Rajasthan's newly-appointed coach KP Bhaskar has identified two talented Under-22 players in Robin Bist and Rajesh Bishnoi as the ones to look out for. Bishnoi, however, hasn't been included in the squad for the first two games, because of his U-22 commitments. Bhaskar said that one season would be too early to assess the influence of Chappell on Rajasthan's youngsters, and it will be interesting to see how the team takes to innovative exercises like boxing, rock climbing and commando training in the coming months. SAURASHTRA With a record that has veered from the middling to sloppy, Saurashtra have rarely made an impact in the Indian domestic circles. For long viewed as minnows who could be easily rolled over, Saurashtra are gradually establishing themselves as a side with surprise potential. Relying on budding talent, they have a bigger challenge ahead of them this time: all their games are away from home. They are one of the few sides without too many changes - none defected to the ICL - and as a seasoned observer pointed out, "nothing much has changed in Saurashtra in the last 15 years". Saurashtra will want Cheteshwar Pujara to continue last season's form. Complete Saurashtra Squad: Jaydev Shah Captain Jayesh Arashi Odebra Firoz Bambhaniya Bhushan Chauhan Rakesh Dhurv Sandeep Jobanputra Sagar Jogiyani Wicketkeeper Shitanshu Kotak Kamlesh Makvana Sandip Maniar Pratik Mehta Sandil Natkan Cheteshwar Pujara Nikhil Rathod Kanaiya Vaghela What they did last season They started poorly, conceding a first-innings lead against Uttar Pradesh, losing to Baroda and Andhra Pradesh and missing out on the lead against Tamil Nadu as well. A couple of inspired home wins against Delhi and Haryana, both engineered by handy left-arm spin from Rakesh Dhurv, provided plenty of cheer and they ended the season with a high-scoring draw against Karnataka. They will hope to get more out of draws - the inability to take the first-innings lead was a concern - and notch up tall totals on their travels. Their batsmen have usually adjusted well to the slow and flat nature of the Rajkot strip, but countering difficult conditions away would be the major challenge. Shitanshu Kotak and Cheteshwar Pujara - one an experienced hand, the other an emerging one - managed more than 500 runs each last year. Dhurv ended with an impressive 25 wickets, at an average of 21.60, and Sandeep Jobanputra, the new-ball bowler, complemented him with 21. Men to watch Pujara is probably the one closest to the getting on the national radar, that too only for the longer format. He has shone bright in the Under-19 levels and displayed the patience and all-round strokeplay to rack up big scores. Ravindra Jadeja, a left-arm spinner who fields athletically, could develop into a bits-and-pieces player in the one-day version. Dhurv and Kamlesh Makvana will lead the spin department.

[MundaPakistani]

How is the quality of the competition in Ranji trophy these days? and is the set up any good? In Pakistan the Quaid trophy this year has no less than 23 teams separated in to 2 random groups, they have even mixed all the regional and departmental teams which makes for horrible competition.

[Chandan]

How is the quality of the competition in Ranji trophy these days? and is the set up any good? In Pakistan the Quaid trophy this year has no less than 23 teams separated in to 2 random groups, they have even mixed all the regional and departmental teams which makes for horrible competition.

I do not think it is very good, Faisal. Indian Ranji Super League has 15 teams but even thats is too many. This doesn't encourage fierce competition and at least 5 or six of those 15 teams just fight for survival to avoid being relegated to the second rung. None of the sides have more than one or two decent players and some do not have even that. So I think there is plenty of room for development if only BCCI could turn its attention to domestic cricket too. This article will give you a good impression: Lost in translation: Why doesn't India's domestic cricket produce finished cricketers, ready for the highest level? November 2006: Gagandeep Singh is called "bowling machine" in Indian domestic cricket circles. By both his Punjab team-mates and opponents. If you have seen him bowl over after relentless over on unresponsive Indian tracks, you wouldn't wonder why. Even in the heat of March he can virtually bowl all day. And he doesn't just turn up and bowl; he gets a wicket every eight overs. December 2004 was a good time to be Gagandeep. In the four matches of the 2004-05 season till then, he had taken 28 wickets. He had been the leading wicket-taker in the previous season's Ranji Trophy, and had 45 first-class wickets at 18.46 in all. At 23 he had forced his way into the Indian team on tour to Bangladesh. Five years of hard work in dreary domestic cricket had paid off. October 2006 is not a good time to be Gagandeep. He came back from that Bangladesh tour not having played a game. In July 2005 he attended a national conditioning camp as one of the 36 best available Indian players, but has since been forgotten by the selectors. He has seen Under-19 fast bowlers come and usurp his position on the fringe of the national side. In 2004-05 he finished with 48 wickets at 18.10. The next season he took 32 at 19.09, but he is no longer part of India's future, it seems. He feels already that his time is almost gone. "This year is very crucial. In two years' time another Under-19 batch will come up," he says. "First-class performances, as it is, don't matter as much as Under-19 nowadays. After 27-28, selectors stop looking at you." For a contrast, take a look at Australia. The last year was hard for them. They lost the Ashes, and changes were being called for in a team where the average age was over 30. In waltzed Hussey, 30 years and 164 days old, and a veteran of 15,313 first-class runs. Seamlessly he fit into the side and became the fastest ever to 1000 Test runs. It took 29 matches for his one-day average to drop below 100, and his strike-rate still hovers around that figure. He now averages 70-plus in both forms of the game, and is considered a threat to Ricky Ponting's captaincy. He is not an exception. Four months after Hussey's debut, when Glenn McGrath pulled out of the South Africa tour to tend to his ailing wife, his place was taken by Stuart Clark (30 years and 168 days), who ended up Man of the Series with 20 wickets at 15.85. And there have been many before them: Simon Katich, Stuart MacGill, Adam Gilchrist, Justin Langer, Darren Lehmann, Michael Kasprowicz, Brad Hogg, Matthew Hayden, Damien Martyn - it's a long list. Moral of the story: for Indian cricketers 25 is over the hill; for Australians it's only the beginning. For Australia it is a triumph of the system; in India's case it is testimony to the absence of a system. Australia look for the finished product, players who have gone through the grind, been hardened by competition, and are ready to plunge into international cricket. India search for precocity, a spark, and hope it can survive the cauldron. When asked if Suresh Raina wouldn't be better served if he spent a couple of years in domestic cricket, a senior member of the Indian team asked: "For what? To rot?" In recent years the U-19 league, and not first-class cricket, has become the feeder system for the Indian national team, and 23 seems to have become the upper limit for making it. Ramesh Powar in one-dayers and Aakash Chopra in Tests, have been the only players above 25 to have made their India debuts in the last few years. Chopra has since been discarded, while Powar holds on. Nayan Mongia was the last player to have enjoyed a successful run in international cricket after making his debut at 25. Sanjay Bangar, who played his first international match at 29 was India's oldest debutant in many years, and Robin Singh made a comeback at 33. But they are exceptions. Over the last five years 22 players under the age of 25 have made international debuts for India. Fourteen of them were 21 or less, and two under 18. Only seven players over 25 have made debuts over the same period. On the all-time list of youngest Test debutants, one has to scroll down to 19th position to find an entry that is not from India, Pakistan, or Bangladesh. Nine of the 10 youngest centurions come from these countries. The reason isn't hard to find. The system doesn't produce cricketers in India. Wasim Jaffer probably knows it best. He made his debut against South Africa eight days after his 22nd birthday, after three impressive domestic seasons, the first of which included a triple-century in only his second game. But Allan Donald and Shaun Pollock were in an altogether different league from the bowlers he had faced till then. "The gap between first-class cricket in India and international cricket is just too much," he says six years later, after having made a comeback to the national side. "Australia have only six first-class teams. That means only about 70 cricketers, while we have some 300. It's tough for players to keep improving in this set-up." VB Chandrasekhar, a former national selector, has a slightly different view. "You have to work with what is available. And our domestic cricket is definitely not of the highest standard," he says. "Plus, when we pick a player, as selectors we want to look at someone who will come and stay for 10 years. When you bring in somebody, it is always better to get someone who is younger, likely to stay, learn, and contribute for 10 years." Not that players from domestic cricket are completely overlooked. At 31, Railways cricketer JP Yadav's international career was almost over when he was picked for the Zimbabwe tour in 2005. "I had taken around 60 wickets and scored around 600 runs in first-class cricket that season. So it was like saying, 'I dare you to keep me out' to the selectors," he says. "You can't ignore anybody like that," says Chandrasekhar. "The only thing is, they don't catch up. He [Yadav] didn't do badly but didn't come and take Indian cricket by storm, which is what we expect when we pick somebody. Or we expect to have them deliver at some point of time, like Raina." Yadav is now out of the national side. And Railways have been relegated to the Plate group of the Ranji competition, which makes his domestic performances even more insignificant. Robin Singh's exceptional fitness worked in his favour when he made his comeback at the age of 33 © Getty Images What worked for Robin Singh when he made his India comeback in late 1996? He had taken 29 wickets and scored 443 runs the previous season? "There is no comparison between Robin and anybody else," says Chandrasekhar, "He was supremely fit. He is still fit. Fitness does play a big role. "Domestic cricket is played over a period of four months in India. It's not a year-round activity, so it's difficult to keep the fitness up. Maybe the training methods are changing. Maybe now we would have guys at 28-29 who are still strong and fit, but it hasn't always been the case." Amol Muzumdar will be 32 this month. He has been playing for Mumbai for 13 years and is a mainstay of their Ranji line-up. He averages 51.17 in first-class cricket. He was marked out as an India prospect when he scored 260 on his first-class debut in 1993-94 - still a world record. Today he is reconciled to never having made it into the national team. His initial years coincided with the strongest Indian batting line-up in a long time. Sachin Tendulkar and Mohammad Azharuddin were already in, and Rahul Dravid and Sourav Ganguly arrived in 1996. "I was competing with the real dadas of Indian cricket,'' he says, without rancour. "Those days I was trying to figure out where I would fit in." But the fact is that when vacancies arose in the Indian team, Muzumdar, though a regular in the Mumbai side, was nowhere in the frame. By the reckoning of one of his own colleagues, the years put in on the domestic circuit hadn't made him a better player: "By then he had stagnated. In terms of skills he was where he had started." The lack of security didn't help. "After eight years of playing first-class cricket for Mumbai, I didn't have a job," Muzumdar says. "Compare our scene with Australia," says Gagandeep. "In cricket, and in life, they have many more securities. We are prone to giving up more easily if the chance doesn't come our way. Four-five years is what we can go on for. If we don't get a chance by then, it's very hard to keep the motivation up." Gagandeep can't be blamed if he, or someone else like him, gives up at 25 and starts preparing for a life in domestic cricket without a higher goal motivating him. "Selectors very easily build rigid views about such players. They think a certain player is good for domestic cricket only," says Yadav. But it is difficult to reconcile with it when you are still strong and think you can make it but know you won't. "It is also more of an individual thing," says Jaffer, "to stay motivated when you see your performances get less weightage than [those of] an U-19 guy." Chandrasekhar cites the case of Raina, who didn't exactly take Indian cricket by storm in his first few matches. Raina had turned in good performances in Under-19 cricket, and was chosen for a probables camp, where he impressed the coach and the captain. After 15 one-dayers without a fifty, he was chosen for the Test team against England, although he didn't make it to the XI. "The idea is, once you see a spark, you want them to straightaway get used to the rigours of international cricket," Chandrasekhar says. "I made my India debut when I was 27. I made one solid effort to come back. After that I knew it was going to be very difficult. That's probably why you want to have somebody who is young and can be given a long rope, not someone who is 29." When she won another Grand Slam at close to 50 years of age, people asked Martina Navratilova how she could keep up with and beat players half her age. She said, "The ball doesn't know how old I am." Navratilova's big advantage was that she never moved away from top-level tennis - even if she didn't play singles, she kept playing doubles with some of the finest players of both sexes. Top-level competitive cricket is a luxury Indian domestic cricketers are not afforded. And when an opportunity comes, they let the ball know how old they are - and a few other things about their first-class cricket besides. -------------------------------------- And I agree ,mostly agree with the article!

[Cricketics]

isn't this an old article chandan.. i remember reading it last year..

[beetle]

I think Arjun yadav is shiv lal's son.

[Cricketics]

I think Arjun yadav is shiv lal's son.

think nahi,, pakka he is shiv lalz son with mediocre average.. he was selected for africa tour to play for India a..

[coffee_rules]

I think the super league should be reduced to 8-10 teams only. This following league would be as tough as any other div I team in Conty cricket: Mumbai Baroda Delhi Punjab Karnataka Tamilnadu Hyderabad Bengal Add U.P and Railways.

[Cricketics]

I like the Zonal System though.. u divide team in 4 groupz, east, west, north, south.. only thing is that we don't get to see enough playerz in that as only 4 teamz...but then competition is good too..

[beetle]

Some of the guys who left AP team for ICL ....cited the partiality towards this shiv lal's son as thereason for their leaving.

[theguyinallblue]

i think all the members here should be told to pick their XVI for Ranji matches.. we must know..who is doing what in domestic matches..and this way ranji matches will generate interest here on this forum as well..

[beetle]

nahi to???:omg_smile: waisay good idea.... Line say teams laga do...rules likh do....

[Cricketics]

theguy in blue.. we have alredy having a superselector of ranjit.... may be that would help

[theguyinallblue]

yeah..but how many have selected their respective teams there..in Ranji SS..there is hardy 9-10 entries..

[beetle]

Where do we submit the teams?