With the 3rd test match between India and Australia just ahead, media is buzzing over Kumble's retirement, or, should I say Indian media's favorite mantra "don't look at the senior players' past records, fire them if they don't perform in a match or two". Well, I myself am not a big supporter of looking at players' past records alone in selecting them for upcoming matches. But that doesn't mean, you should start talking about their forced retirement if they don't perform in a match or two.
Sure, we need to give opportunities for young players. A 35+ years old player may bowl well or bat well, but when it comes to fielding, it's hard for them to be as active as youngsters (there are some exceptions like Jayasurya).
My point is, the senior players should look at their own abilities and retire while giving way to youngsters. Nobody should force them out. Look at Kumble's past records, he has taken lot of wickets, and most of them were match-winning-wickets. He is a great player. He should be given a graceful retirement. This is applicable to all seniors like Sachin, Dravid, Laxman & Ganguly.
Dhoni is a great captain and player. But what happens if he fails in a couple of matches. Will he be fired or will the media demand that he be fired?
Let's give our seniors a graceful farewell.
Woo Hoo !! This is my first entry on this blog !!
India launched their first unmanned space craft (Chandrayaan-I) to moon on 22 Oct 2008. It's an historic feat for them. But there are lot of critics who oppose this project. Critics in India argue that the money that was spent on this mission, $80 million, could well be spent on other projects to eradicate poverty. I'm not going to argue over that. That's a different discussion in itself.
This morning, my colleagues in the US were criticizing about this mission. I'm going to talk about them. They were saying that "India is a country where cows and stray dogs roam around the streets. Monkeys snatch food from humans. Communal clashes are part of their life. It's a big joke that they are launching a space craft to moon. What are they going to achieve by doing this?"
I wanted to say "Dude, there could be so many reasons that India might be doing this. There is no clear cut map of moon available now; there is a theory that Helium-3 is avaialble in abundance there - if so, is it possible to make use of it for the human race in earth, etc. This is not a project that the whole world mourns about; this is something even NASA wants to do - in fact, they have sent 2 of their own payloads along with India's 5 payloads and European Unions 3 payloads. Also, when US entered the space race 50 years ago, the main purpose was to beat Russia. I'm sure there were lot of problems back then which they could have solved instead entering space race. Moreoever, this is not a space race." Well, I didn't say this on his face.
But, just because someone is poor, we cannot deny his dreams or his ambitions. Who knows one day India might be a super power just like US !!
Labels: Chandrayaan, India, Moon Mission, USA
