Strengths and weaknesses are opposite features of a character, unless you transform one into another. Off course moving along the positive axis and having an optimist approach, the concern is to transform weaknesses into strength and not the other way round. This is exemplified by an Indian, in fact, the only indian to hit a century in T20 cricket: yes you got that right: Suresh Raina is the name. The southpaw often known to bleak like a lamb against the short balls, roared like a matured tiger and acted as an opportunist. As a tiger leans on his back foot before taking on the prey, Raina showed similar character, leaning on backfoot, and then rotating the arm to play the shot in the air but not just forcefully but with an art to play in the gap. After being dropped from ODI squads for Asia cup, Raina has made the comeback to show as if “T20 is my game and I am the boss here...” Although hes one of the best finisher of the game, he has never been the talk of the town for exceptional talent instead hes largely applauded for the commitment he has shown on the field. His commitment and not his talent is the key why he is so highly rated in limited over games and especially in the shortest format of the game. One of the best thing about the inning he played against Pakistan is that he was playing the shots in the gap (except the last ball of his inning) and some of those shots may not be the perfect cricketing shots as per coaching manuals but the best part was that he knew the fielding positions and played the lofted shots accordingly. And the beauty was to watch him capitalize the short balls. As getting out on short ball would have been making the same mistake again, just leaving it out and unable to score against it wouldnt be the best approach in T20s but to capitalize it was the best thing and he proved to show how to convert the weakness into strength.. Post-match in a short conversation he revealed that he has worked harder for a couple of months and now he doesnt give any extra attention to short balls but the key is to observe the length and take the position accordingly... And its well proven that the technique has worked so far. It also came to light that the southpaw consulted and thanked legendary southpaw and former opening batsman, saurav ganguly, for the same. Although there still remains some open threads such as bowling in death overs and not so good looking fielding side.... with india still a long way to go.... Rainas consistent knocks has added to team’s confidence along with his own.. It has provided the team reasons to joy and the key would be to keep the momentum going. And as far as the victory against Pakistan is concerned, to miss the contribution from Amit mishra and not to admire him and Virat would be injustice to the men in blue…. Written By: Rajat Nagar
Posted on: Thu, 27 Mar 2014 19:18:16 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015