CRICKET LOVELY CRICKET

Encourage sports other than cricket

In the recent Sarita Devi case at Asian Games in Incheon, South
Korea was a travesty of fair play and a blot on the competency of the
judges.  It was a clear instance of partisanship on the part of judges
for depriving a certain winner Sarita Devi in the boxing bout.  It was
her sheer desperation and frustration that prompted her to refuse the
bronze medal. This led to questions of her behaviour and lack of
sportsmanship.  The International Amateur Boxing body declared that an
enquiry will be held  into her behaviour and if found guilty she will
be banned. But why is nobody questioning the incompetency or bias of
the judges.  In fact the enquiry should be directed at the judges and
if  found guilty should be disqualified as they are not fit for the
job. Alas, who will judge the judges! Often it is found that it is the
victim who is penalised and the guilty go Scot-free. The incident is a
blot on the game and sportsmanship. The Boxing body should be put
on the mat for appointing such useless judges for important events.

We are all very proud about the performance of the Indian team in the
just concluded Asian Games.  When our cricket team could not
participate and bring a Gold medal despite being tagged and hyped as
having very great side with very good  bench strength, our Men's
Kabaddi side won the seventh Gold in succession and proved that they
are not second to none.  It was an inspiring show as the match in the
final was a close one against Iran and the score line 27-25 in favour
of Team India tell the tale of a close encounter.  Even our Women's
team won the Gold to keep the Indian flag flying in Kabaddi.  India
thus completed a golden double on the Kabaddi mat for the second
successive edition after the women defeated the same nation 31-21 in
their final  But we witnessed players like Leander Paes and his team
mates skipped the Asian Games for better ATP points tally should feel
ashamed as their absence caused us yet another Gold in Tennis also.
Our cricketers have time to play IPL, CL and Kanga League failed to
show their faces in Asian Games so far.   Team management is helping
their cause to make more money and in the bargain make big booty.
BCCI is money minded and not medal minded.  It is time to encourage
games like Kabaddi in India rather than fostering the Paper Tiger
Indian Cricket Team, who are scared of going out of India and play in
Asian Games as well.  Kudos to Kabaddi team for the stupendous show.


It is heartening to note that Indian team performed very well in the
Asian Games in Incheon and that made us very proud.   Had we put in
some more efforts and played with killer instinct we could have
converted number of bronze medal to silver and silver medals to Gold
and come out with flying colours as the fifth or sixth team in the
medals tally instead of finishing with 8th position.  Fifty seven
medals is not a mean achievement.  The scintillating show of 37 bronze
medals could have been converted to Silver if our stars, showed little
resilience in the end games.  The finishing touch was missing in the
end and we finished with only 11 Gold medals and 9 silver medals in
the end.   There was a chance of finishing behind top teams in the
overall medals tally, but the lack of Gold winning show put paid our
aspirations in the final show down. Hockey Gold and Kabaddi Gold
medals made us proud in the end.  Time to go all out in all such
sports events to make a more meaningful performance than what we
achieved now.