India show why they're number one in the world

Midfielder, Sri Lanka-born Dav Whatmore played 7 Tests for Australia in mid-1970s. India-born Lisa Sthalekar has represented Australia in many Tests and ODIs, captaining Australia several times. Pakistan-born Usman Khawaja plays Sheffield Shield for NSW. Who knows, one day he may wear green and gold.

Brian I couldn't disagree with you more. The Australian team only now appear to emerging from a significant changing of the guard. In short time Warne, McGrath, Martin, Hayden, Langer and Gilchrist ( a number of international cricketing greats) retired leaving huge gaps. We struggled for a time but the signs and more importantly stability is beginning to build momentum once again. In terms of player number's mate its truly our national sport. The junior number are huge and we have the best development systems in the world of cricket. In the 07 Ashes Jonathan Agnew spoke at length about this and his ( and many others internationally) envy of our systems. Money may be an issue. But we have had a number of international sign to play domestic cricket here. Its about quality. Plus, watching the Big Bash this year I'd dare say it eclipsed the IPL in terms of quality.

most unlikely, Brian?? should we just cut our losses now and switch to baseball??

I think the sad point has not been said in this thread so far ... It is becoming ever so evident that India, Australia,SA, SL are the only nations that rate cricket highly ....in that it hurts to loose.. WI are all football & Basketball, ENG ... last count I saw cricket was the number 8 sport in the UK, struggling to get the under 40's to watch in numbers, NZ .. well they have never taken cricket all that seriously.. Pak.. home problems just to great... AFL, RU, RL & Football all on expansion drives including media... Also and meaning no bias in this comment ... name in the last 30 years the non Anglo Saxon players in the Australian team... compare your list with the Australian population make up and .... to the four football codes...

Australia's days as a cricketing power are gone. It's most unlikely they'll ever be ranked 1 again in Tests. India, SA, Sri Lanka and maybe England (with all their SA-born players) will dominate for years - Oz just don't have the playing population or financial muscle to compete anymore. In any event, the BCCI will ensure Oz and the other little nations won't feature in successive series to enable them to make a play for the No. 1 position.

True Tah,you have a valid point in sofar as favouritism in selection. However things are changing and some of the Indian players in the National team come from poor backgrounds. Dhoni is from a working class family. The Pathan brothers Irfan and Yousuf come from a poor family. In a democracy like India the gap between the rich and the poor is enormous. Jay puts the poor as 300 million but if the UN figures are anything to go by this figure is closer to 500 million. Cricket facilities at the top two tiers,National and state have improved significantly. However the club and school level play under terrible conditions. Unless you happen to play for a high profile corporate team like Indian Oil or the State Bank. In spite of these handicaps the Indian U-19 side is ranked in the top four. The IPL has uncovered some jewels from poor backgrounds and the opportunities are becoming greater. Not perfect but an improvement. India will remain strong because of the sheer numbers and the competition. If you make it to the Under 16 level the percentages are good and the facilities improve the higher you go. The National Academy,run by Dav Whatmore(an Australia) is state of the art and more money is being put towards infrastructure and grassroots. India is only 60 years old and will succeed inspite of its politicians .You learn to look for positives in India. It is depressing if you only think of the negatives.

yeah but 300 million live in poverty in India. most indians are concerned about getting an education and employment rather then pushing their kids into sport. australia will rise again and it will be beauase of their depth. Australian sides will also consistently win the Champtions T20 because our domestic compeition is the best in the world.

Savvas Australia has a much more professional setup cricketwise than India does. Any Sydney suburb would have better facilities such as pitches and cricket nets than 90% of Indian cricketers. The problem facing Indian cricket is that many many talented cricketers are ignored because of a huge amount of prejudice in their selections, basically it is bloody hard to crack it if you do not come from a wealthier background. This will ensure that Australia will always be competitive with India.

Australia depth?!! India has a BILLION people. Australia has 20 million. Australia will rise to the top again but not because of depth.

Everyone forgets Darrell Hair BEFORE the Muri chucking incident. His biasedness towards Australia was sickening!!!

SadButTrue, I thought like you too, but the attendance in the Kolkata Test gives me hope. People turned out in tens of thousands despite India losing the previous Test by an innings. One of the reasons for poor attendance for Test matches in India has been the selection of venues. Why Nagpur and Mohali when there are venues like Kolkata, Mumbai and Chennai? India is not invincible. Let's see how they perform in South Africa in 2010-11 and in Australia the following summer. India has had prolific batsmen but they are aging; Tendulkar, Dravid, VVS... cannot go on for ever. And their bowling is not all that hot after the retirement of Anil Kumble. Imagine they could not dismiss a no. 11 batsman Morne Morkel in 21.4 overs on the fifth day in Kolkata! I admit, Zaheer Khan was injured but the bowling appeared flat. Once their magical trio of Sachin, Dravid and VVS call it a day, India will struggle. Sehwag and Gambhir will give India good starts and Dhoni is a dynamic 3 in 1 -- captain, batsman and wicket-keeper. But I can see only Suresh Raina as a batsman with potential. I predict Australia with so much depth will return to the top sooner than later.

International cricket will be dead in India soon enough. It's a simple matter of participation rates magnified by coaching and training facilities that determines the top teams, innate ability is a fantasy. India is destined to get to the top of the cricket world and stay there, once they win everything all the time for two decades straight even they will stop caring. It's the same effect that has seen the sport decline rapidly in Australia; once sided, pointless games and over exposure. The only hope for the future of cricket is national club based leagues.

Let me put in a correction to my story. India will be touring South Africa in 2010-11 and play four Tests there and compete for the No. 1 Test spot. There is a certain magic about a Test in Kolkata. The recent Kolkata Test reminded many of another Kolkata classic, the 2001Test against Australia which India won by 171 runs despite being asked to follow-on. The heroes of the 2001 nail-biter for India were VVS Laxman (281 runs), Rahul Dravid (180) and Harbhajan Singh (13-196). The heroes for the current Kolkata thriller were VVS (143 not out), three other centurions and Harbhajan (a match haul of 8-123). In the previous Test in 2001, Australia had thrashed India by 10 wickets in Mumbai. In the just concluded Test series, South Africa had mauled India by an innings and 6 runs in Nagpur. Pity there was no third Test in the recent series to determine the real winner and the real No. 1. This will be decided next January in South Africa. Apart from scoring 47 Test centuries (next best Ricky Ponting with 39), Sachin Tendulkar has scored four centuries in his last four Tests. Two more in South Africa in the first two Tests and he will equal a Don Bradman record of six centuries in six Tests.

Kersi IMO India are the most talented side on the planet but they are still capable of producing a shocking effort aka first test against South Africa. They need to find consistency. They have to win a World Cup soon. Too good of a side not to. It seems at 36 years of age, Tendulkar is yet to slow down. What a landmark it will be when he gets Test century No. 50. He is on 47 at the moment isin't he. I agree that the two test format is ridicilious in particular when you have two of the world's top teams fighting it out for test supremacy.

Spiro,Ian Gould had the guts to call wide on four occassions when Harris persisted with the negative tactics. Umpires have the power but rarely use it. And when they do use it they get censured. Darrell Hair was vilified after the Oval. Bucknor was run out of the game. Why would an Umpire bother?

Kersi,the irony is that this series would never have happened if India had not attained Number 1 status. Originally it was a five match ODI series and then changed after India reached No.1.Let us suspend disbelief and ignore the machinations of the BCCI and concentrate on the cricket played. Great fast bowling by Steyn in the Nagpur Test. High 140's and outswing. Countered by the irrepresible Sehwag but in the end India missed the stability of Dravid and the formidable and stylistic self-belief of VVS Laxman. Amla's double ton and Kallis's 173 resulted in a 340 partnership and even Tendulkar's 100 in the second dig was not enough to remove the stain. Coming to the Garden of Eden SAF were well placed at 1 for 218 only to lose their last 9 wickets for 78 runs. India powered by almost a run a ball 165 from Sehwag banked 643 at over 4 runs per over. The significant point here is that because they scored so quickly it gave them enough(as it turned out barely enough) time to bowl SAF with only 9 balls remaining in the match. Some time was lost on the fourth day to rain but this was an epic Test and had the 50000 fans singing in the aisles. As you know the ground is being revamped for the World Cup otherwise there would have been 100000 at the ground. Now we can address the folly of the BCCI. This was the first Test played at Eden since 2006-7. Modi and Dalmiya(The head honcho at Kolkata) dont see eye to eye. In the end the fans suffer and also the players who are forced to parade their genius in the City of Oranges and no spectators.

The Test was a memorable match. Who played the last international T20 match? I watched every ball of the last wicket stand as South Africa tried to do what England had done twice to them in South Africa, hold out for a last-wicket draw. The only thing that annoyed me during the Test was the bowling of Pauk Harris, left arm spin around the wicket pitching outside the legstump and sometimes spinning in. He got Tendulkar in the first innings through sheer frustration. But in the second inning the Indians played him contemptuously with their pads. This is the height of negative bowling, started I think by that cricket mediocrity Ashley Giles, now an England selector. There should be a rule like bouncers and more than two an over pitched outside the leg stump should then become no balls. Already there was restrictions on the number of players behind the wicket on the leg side ad this sort of rule should be a logical extention of that.

You are spot on with your last couple of sentences. These 2-Test series are ridiculous. The BCCI does cricket an immense disservice each time it arranges such silly schedules.