WITH THE CRICKET World Cup round the corner, one cannot stop remembering our cricket team’s past performances, their aspirations, their hopes in the present World Cup, the big names in the team and of course the wonder team of 1983.

 

I remember the slogan of this advertisement whenever I think about the World Cup ’Eat Cricket, Sleep Cricket’ and now even ‘dream cricket’. It’s in our blood. Despite recent losses in the last series in the Caribbean and the team’s constant failure or call it a practice of staying out of form for some big players, we Indians never stop supporting our team. And more than just once, our cricket team has made us feel proud. For the coming World Cup, our team seems to be the most balanced among the 16 competitors and thus deserves to lift the cup on their way back.

 

Our batting line is one of the strongest in the world. With Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and Sourav Ganguly we know that we have no shortage of experience. These players are not only known for their capability to change the face of the game single handedly but they can also be quite consistent.

 

In an essay of records, Sachin Tendulkar also holds the World Record of scoring maximum runs in the World Cups. He has so far scored over 1730 runs in the World Cup tournaments. And with most of the people seeing this as his last World Cup, we cannot imagine what the Master Blaster has on his mind. Along with Sourav Ganguly and Mark Waugh , Sachin also holds the record for maximum number of centuries, 4 each, in the World Cups. 

With most expecting this to be Ganguly’s last world cup as well, are we heading for more centuries coming from two of the greatest Indian batsmen of all times. Sourav has always been known for his ‘out of the ground’ sixes. No wonder he also holds the record for the largest number of sixes in the World Cup. So far he has hit 23 sixes and with the kind of return he has made to the team, we certainly expect this figure to hit the hilt.

 

When we are talking about the performances of the big names of Indian cricket we cannot forget mentioning Rahul ‘The Wall’ Dravid. Rahul has lived up to his reputation of being the backbone of the Indian Team with a record for the highest partnership in the World Cup. He along with Ganguly scored 318 runs against Sri Lanka at Taunton in 1999.

 

With young guns likeYuvraj, Dhoni, Pathan, Kartick and Sehwag around, our Batting grid looks the strongest. The good thing is that this current team looks very sturdy with the bowling department as well. Speedsters like Shreesanth, Munaf Patel, Zaheer and Agarkar in the team give them good bowling options. They are fast, if not the fastest, intelligent and aggressive. Our spinners in Bhajji and Kumble give the team not just more experience but also an edge over most spinners in the world. With the team working harder than ever and of course with our blessings and support it looks all set to come back with not just more records and individual success stories but with the Cricket World Cup. Lets start planning a grand welcome already.

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