There were many things happening around the world of Cricket during the passed by Year...Some notable things are nearly an end of an era for Australian Cricket,A newbie named Mendis,incredible team efforts from India and South Africa,Terror Attacks affecting Cricket,Monkey gate affair,IPL,12000 runs by Sachin,Retirements of Greats etc.,And the most important thing in my Perspective is that my Favourite Batsman Tendulkar scored century in first and final series this year...
Let me summarize these things....The year began with a bad note at Sydney because of the Monkey gate Affair between Harbhajan and Symonds...Symonds complained it to the higher officials and there was a case filed on Bhajji...He was charged on basis of Racial Vilification...Indians lost the match on account of poor Umpiring decisions,especially against India and not a single one against the home side...Indians threatened to pull off from the tour provided the Aussies withdraw the complaint against Harbhajan....This was the turning point of Indian Cricket this year...Series resumed and next encounter was played at Perth and India won the match hands down and triggered the fall of Australia cricket..Series came to an end with a scoreline of 2-1 in favour of Australia,which should have been the other way...
Next comes the Tri nation ODI series involving India,Australia and Lankans...It was the first time Dhoni would be captaining the side abroad....Unbelievable changes took place in the squad dropping Sourav and Dravid....The new look Indian side played good cricket throughout the series and was guided well by Tendulkar..Dhoni's leadership came in for praise across the globe after the Australians were thumped down in the best of three finals..And his option to stick with the youngsters was vindicated....
After the series got over next comes the IPL,which is new to the cricketing world...It had 8 teams participating and spanned over a period of about 2 months....Just about 2 to 3 months past the controversy at the Sydney,we were able to see Symonds back in India playing for the chargers and was even supported by the Indian Public...As all say Cricket is a funny game proved to be right...This event went on to become a huge hit,not even the organizers of this event would have thought of...IPL was introduced on wake of ICL,which is considered as a rebel league,organised and headed by Zee group and Kapil Dev respectively....
The introduction of a newbie named Ajanta Mendis of Sri lanka brought about a revolution in Spin department...His unique way of bowling attracted many and bamboozled the players...The players were not able to pick him,they were perplexed as to which way the ball would spin after pitching...Even the Indians,who are good players of spin bowling struggled against him...He picked nearly 25 wickets in 3 matches...He is also approaching the landmark of fastest 50 wickets in ODI's,which is currently held by Agarkar(unbelievable,but its true)...It would be interesting to see how this guy would fair after a couple of years...
This year has also seen many of the great players retiring from the arena...They are Gilly,Kumble and Ganguly...Of the three,Gilly was the one who retired with a series on a losing note...Kumble and Ganguly had a good farewell winning the series against the Aussies at home...
It was also in this series that Tendulkar scored 12000 runs and it was the first time this landmark being achieved....
At the fag end of the year,there was a terrorist attack which halted Cricket in India for at least a couple of Weeks...On wake of Attacks,Champions league,which was supposed to take place for the first time,was abandoned...Pakistan Tour was cancelled and a tour ban was imposed on Pakistan and a couple of matches against England were cancelled..
The most important happening of all is the Fall of Australian Cricket,who were dominating cricket for about half a decade...It was India who triggered the fall of Australian Cricket at their own backyard...It was a slap on the face of Aussies for its arrogance...Not only India,even the South Africans started to dominate the once mighty Aussies in the ongoing series..SA'ns chased a mammoth total of 414 runs at Perth and also won the series convincingly....
It would be interesting to see how Australia fares in 2009 and whether they would bounce back...And to see whether India and South Africa continue to play good cricket at the top level...It has been a fascinating year of Cricket as no country was dominating this particular year...
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