Team India in 2008...

The year 2008 was the most successful year for Team India..This year has seen the dawn of a new era..Two Respected men of Indian Cricket bid adieu from Cricket...One man crossing 12k runs...It's all happening for Indian Cricket...Dhoni gets promoted to captaincy in Tests,too..Sehwag leading in the most runs scored in this particular year...

Team India had a bad beginning this year at the Sydney losing the match from nowhere...But,the Protagonist of this match is the Monkey gate saga between Symonds and H.Singh...The Australians were struggling to get the wickets of Sachin and Singh and as usual they started to provoke the opponents with an idea of getting wicket...But,Fortunately for India that didn't happen...Frustrated Symonds and Hayden started to sledge bhajji from the behind and after a point of time Symmo says to Bhajji that "U have made a Racial Remark,calling me a monkey,and have to face the consequence,mate"and Bhajji was left clueless as to what was happening...And this was made even made bigger by the Media..Adding to this was the Umpiring Blunder,which paved way for an Australian victory...After the match was over the Newspapers carried a headline like,"Australians played with 13 players and India with 11"...Other newspaper had a headline that,"Australia had 3 umpires in the middle(Bucknor,Benson and Ponting,who judged Ganguly 's Wicket)...Harbhajan was banned for three tests following the Racial vilification but the Team Management threatened to pull off from the tour unless the ban is revoked...Finally,The ban was removed and the Indians Carried on the tour...Next match was at Perth and Indians proved their mettle by winning the match hands down...Though Indians lost the series,they won the hearts of Millions by showing their fighting spirit...

Next comes the Tri Nation Series in Australia...Adjoining the two were The Lankans...This series was the turning point of India's dream run,this year...Intervened by Dhoni,Selectors dropped the Southpaw Ganguly and The Wall,Dravid but retained The Master,Tendulkar...The dropping saga raised criticisms all round India....But,Dhoni,wasn't perturbed...First few matches,Team India didn't increase the level of confidence of the people but the victory against Australia in the second ODI made them to look at...And,Not with much difficulty Indians reached the finishing stage...And,It was at this point of time Dhoni made an implied remark on Sachin that the openers should play good cricket for us to win the match...The first final was played at SCG and India won the match convincingly,thanks to a brilliant century by The MASTER...The words by Dhoni might have egged him up...Dhoni was pronto on to his remarks about Sachin that,"He scored more than 16K runs,don't know whether I played 16K balls"....The next match too was won convincingly by the Indians and the Euphoria was great in the ground...After the series Dhoni's bold decision to hang on with the Youngsters was justified and was appreciated for his efforts..

Next came the IPL,a cash rich league,organised by BCCI..It went on to become a huge success...The next series for the Indians was the Asia Cup held at Pakistan..Tendulkar was rested and it was a new and energetic team which got selected... Indians cruised to the finals without any hindrance but their real test was awaited in the finals,where they have to face a unique bowler in Mendis...The Indians choked against this man in the finals and squandered a rare opportunity of lifting the trophy...At this instance,the media sparkled at the team and went on to say that the seniors might have helped them at this cause...

Indians next assignment was against Sri Lankans abroad...Dhoni opted himself out of the squad for the tests...Everyone thought that the seniors would play Mendis better...But,it didn't happen...Dravid and Laxman choked against this man,whenever he bowled...It was only Tendulkar and Ganguly who played him better but neither were aggressive against him...They lost their wicket to him only once in the three match series...Tendulkar needed 170 odd runs to go past Lara but unfortunately it didn't happen in this series...And he was not having a good series averaging below 20...Got starts,but never converted it into big ones...And,India lost the series 2 to 1...The ODI squad was picked without Tendulkar,owing to injury....Yuvraj was the only one who was seen out of touch,especially against Mendis...Every time Mendis bowled,Yuvraj would be gone within an over...He couldn't read his bowling...Such was Yuvi's touch against this prodigy,Mendis...But,this time around the youngsters,barring Yuvi, played better cricket against Mendis and SL and won the Series 3 to 2...Public was awestruck by their performance....

In October,it was Border-Gavaskar Trophy against the Aussies...Full strength was picked to counter and regain the cup from the Aussies...Tendulkar needed 70-90 runs to go past Lara...Prior to the series,Ganguly announced that this will be his last series...The first match ended in a draw thanks to the effort of Zaheer and Bhajji with the bat in the first innings,otherwise would have been an inevitable defeat for the Indians...Going to the next match at Mohali,Tendulkar needed another 20 odd runs...Many started talking that it was over for the Master and his Charm has lost and he can no longer be a great batsman as he used to be...But,as usual the Master speaks with the bat and shuts them up with a well made 88 runs and goes past 12K runs and Lara's record...This knock went on to become a match winning knock and India leads the series with a couple of games up their sleeves..The Third match of the series went on to become a tame draw...This match saw the departure of a Legend named KUMBLE..He was given a hero's departure and his farewell was awesome...Dhoni carried Kumble on his shoulders around the ground and made everyone feel elated...The final test was held at Nagpur with India leading the series 1-0...Dhoni led the test team for the first time as a full time captain... Aussies had nothing to lose...Everyone realised that Aussies would go for a kill...This match had a lot of landmarks...This test marked the 40th century for Master...First man to be at this landmark..This test also marked the farewell test for Ganguly and a debut for M.Vijay...100th Test Match for V.V.S.Laxman...The match was won by the Indians on the last day and lifted the trophy..Before the fall of last wicket,Dhoni made a gesture to Ganguly by handing over the post of captaincy for a couple of overs...This made every one feel that there was no displeasure between the two...

Indians played their next home series against England...It was a 7 match ODI series...Tendulkar was not selected for the first four matches in order to give him rest,as the hectic schedule follows after this outing...This time it was Yuvraj's time..He played a couple of brilliant innings scoring hundreds on each occasion and made his presence felt,whenever he walked in...The first four matches were won by the Indians easily and for the next three ODi's Sachin was selectes and got a fifty in his second match of the series... On the night of fifth one dayer,there was a bomb attack in Mumbai and The English were flown back to their own backyards...The other two one dayers were cancelled and England survived a White wash...However,the two test matches took place as per schedule but the venues were changed,cause of attacks...

The first test was held at Chennai,Originally to be held in Mumbai,saw one of the successful run chases...The only man who was not among the runs against the Australians was Dravid...And Straightaway,he was under scrutiny as many were waiting in the wings...Again,Dravid failed in the first test... Sachin scored a century on the fifth day of the test and made sure that Sehwag's blitzkrieg on the penultimate day was not wasted...Yuvraj,too,played a vital role...Dravid was given another opportunity to prove his credentials and he made use of it by scoring a long awaiting century and the match ended in a draw...India lifting the trophy 1-0...At the end of the year,it was Sehwag who topped the batsmen list in terms of runs and his partner Gambhir scoring ample of runs and they both form a formidable pair...


So,Indians finish the year on a high with a series win...Hope that Indians have a even better 2009...Overall,a great year for Indian Cricket...