An assault on the senses...

[THX_1138]

The current record, stretching back to January 2006 stands at this: India 8 and Pakistan 3 A closer examination would reveal that with the exception of one game, the first game of the Dubai two match series, Pakistan has failed to be convincing in victory. Moreover, the eight loses have been rather harsh, a foregone conclusion within a dozen or two overs into the second innings. Such has been the voracity of India's claim to supremacy over their old adversaries that there is not a single opinon to be heard over the entire ether which would contest the assertion that India is overwhelmingly the better team. Moreover, this current reversal of fortunes has not been because of the old formula: assemble a battery of fast bowlers of a special operations team of wryly wrist and finger spinners, prepare a track condusive for such a bowling attack and throw in one maybe two decent top order batsmen; the recent success has been because of a clinical dissection of the opposition by attacking from the very first ball till victory. The bowling follows a predetermined plan to attack each batsmen, the fielding has seen its fortunes revived and the batting has been stunning. Be it tendulkar's shepherding through the testing overs or dhoni/yuvraj's death grip in the later overs. I was visiting a number of forums and the feeling has been universal, India are the better team and this is an assertion made rather unequivocally.

[Bumper]

Good post THX. I hope India's dominance over Pakistan continues for years. When the bowl out happened in T20, i mentioned back then that the episode will have a Miandad effect (that famous 6 off last ball) on Pakistan. I wish it becomes true & there are bloody good signs that it might.

[THX_1138]

yeah bumber i think it was either that bowl out or the dismissal of misbah in the final that might have a similar effect... in fact, the first post was inspired by what i read on our pakistani contemporary site and the feeling that india is the better side (they made some references to 82-85 which i dont know anything about) and india's dominance is reminiscent of pakistan's dominance in the early 90s... it was a first for that site that pakistani posters had actually acknowledged that india were the better side, not just on a singular occassion but on a universal comparison.

[Lurker]

Such has been the voracity of India's claim to supremacy over their old adversaries that there is not a single opinon to be heard over the entire ether which would contest the assertion that India is overwhelmingly the better team.

That is the keyword. India has done well good thanks to a good unit. Dhoni has been on record saying "This team has no superstars" and it shows. Yes SRT has been in good knick and India has gained from it but the amount of batting we have, and the batsmen who are resting the bench, tells me that even without SRT's contribution we would have won. The point is not to take a dig at Sachin but to show that we have now become less dependent on any one batsman in particular. The opposite is the case with Pakistan. Individually they have good players in Moyo, YK, Salman Butt, Akhtor, Afridi, Gul etc but collectively they are flopping.

[Gambit]

Good post THX. I hope India's dominance over Pakistan continues for years. When the bowl out happened in T20' date=' i mentioned back then that the episode will have a Miandad effect (that famous 6 off last ball) on Pakistan. I wish it becomes true & there are bloody good signs that it might.[/quote'] More than the T20, I think it was the 2003 world cup game. Chasing 270+ against Wasim, Waqar and Shoaib in a high voltage game after 3 years was never going to be easy but we absolutely whacked the living daylights out of the three and left Pak team and fans so stunned that they still get nightmares of that game. Heck Wasim and Waqar never played after that game.

[Ram]

I wouldnt call it the onset of a definite trend yet. Pakistan is struggling with its top order, a floundering keeper and a lot of mess within the team. Despite all the sh!t they have gone through as a team , they still pull out the odd upset. If they can settle matters within the team and find one good opener , they are as good as any team. They have potent attack, two attacking all-rounders and a decent middle order. India is reaping the benefits of having some established players at the top order , some power-hitting midde-order batsman and probably the BEST wicket-keeper batsman in the world, Dhoni. He gives our team that extra dimension.

[THX_1138]

Dont know about the second part of your post Lurker... pakistan does have individual egos that have conflicted but that has been the case since times immemorial. Akram and Younis, though often successful in the presence of each other had considerable internal conflict, Miandad and Imran were often at logger horns with each other etc etc. Nevertheless, individual brilliance propelled pakistan to success. Even in the quintessential moment of their success: the 92 world cup, it was both a combination of obsene rules, weather with individual brilliance of wasim akram and inzamam ul haq that shaped the victory as compared to a team effort. to be honest i dont really read too much into the word "team". its merely about how well you design your plans and stick to them. a combination of players who stick to this plan and are well rehearsed would succeed with greater probability as opposed to a well bonded collection of players. for instance, the australians win with just about any combination because they rehearse i.e. practice quite extensively, each player has certain agendas that they adhere to and the rest is all about individual brilliance...

[THX_1138]

More than the T20' date=' I think it was the 2003 world cup game. Chasing 270+ against Wasim, Waqar and Shoaib in a high voltage game after 3 years was never going to be easy but we absolutely whacked the living daylights out of the three and left Pak team and fans so stunned that they still get nightmares of that game. Heck Wasim and Waqar never played after that game. [/quote'] but they still kept winning consistently against us, albeit when we were going through our worst days just prior to john wright left... in 2004 they won three games in a row against us, which is their longest streak till the 6 match odi series where we eventually crumbled because of a burgeoning system and to some extent, poor captaincy.