There was a time when a cricketing tour of India was something to be reckoned with. Touring teams not only had to face the perils of players such as Bedi, Azharuddin and Tendulkar, but they had to be able to cope with the absolutely singular experience of playing cricket in India. The grounds were mysterious, the food was exotic, and the pitches were unlike anything found in any other cricketing country. Fast forward to the super-charged atmosphere of today’s cricket, and in particular the IPL, and it’s easy to see how this mystique has evaporated. You see, in their quest for the big bucks, the Indian Cricket Board (ICB) has sold out one of their national trump cards. The days of feared tours to India are surely gone, as more and more players flock to the country once a year to play in the IPL.

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Cricket America Website has had 572 visitors in its lifetime

Writing in the New York Times prior to the 2007 Cricket World Cup Shashi Tharoor laments living in a country that has achieved so much but yet is so naive when it comes to the greatest game known to man.  A simple game of baseball holds the attention of the country despite it being so simple and quite frankly cricket’s poorer relative.  A highly entertaining read and sentiments that I’m sure you will echo.

Shashi Tharoor, a departing under secretary general of the United Nations, is the author of “The Great Indian Novel” and the forthcoming “The Elephant, the Tiger and the Cellphone: India, The Emerging 21st Century Power.”

The greatest sporting event of the year in terms of audience began in Jamaica, when the West Indies beat Pakistan in the inaugural match of the 2007 Cricket World Cup. A six-week extravaganza follows — 51 matches that are being monitored with nail-biting excitement around the world. The final, on Saturday, April 28, will take place in Barbados, but friends of mine in New York are already planning a World Cup party at the home of an expatriate with a satellite dish. The party will be attended by a raucous group of Indians and Pakistanis, Bangladeshis and Brits, Australians and Zimbabweans. But of course there will be no Americans.

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If there was ever any reassurance warranted that Australia had not starting their descent from the top of world cricket it came in emphatic style in the scintillating Sydney Test. Jeremy Loadman warned us to write off the Aussies at our peril and  it appears his thoughts were well merited as Australia appear non willing to pass on the world cricket reigns to the chasing pack.

ICC Rankings as of January 3rd 2009 – courtesy of ICC website

Australia hold on to 1st, South Africa and India are close behind

Where do you see the future of Australian Cricket?

Scoring 6 consecutive sixes is an impressive and rare achievement in any form of cricket. When Yuvraj Singh smashedStuart Broad to all corners of the park and beyond in Kingsmead in the Super Eights of the Twenty20 World Cup, he became only the fourth batsman in the history of the game to register 36 runs in an over, following in the footsteps of Gary Sobers, Ravi Shastri and Herschelle Gibbs. Sobers and Shastri did it in first class cricket, whilst Gibbs and Yuvraj achieved it in ODIs and Twenty20s respectively.

Whilst comparing achievements from dissimilar eras is always hard – try arguing that Bradman is not the greatest cricketer of all time because he didn’t play in the professional era – in this case one of the feats excites and exceeds the others in its sheer class and graceful strokeplay.

Garfield Sobers – 6 Sixes in an over for Nottinghamshire vs Glamorgan , 1968 Swansea

Sobers, the then captain of Nottinghamshire, became the first ever batsman to hit six sixes in a single over of six consecutive balls in first-class cricket. Five of the sixes were beautifully clean strikes with a the full swing of the bat, but the record itself was only achieved with an enormous stroke of luck. Having hit four consecutive fours he got under a lofted drive that only made it past the ropes by some schoolboy fielding from Roger Davis palming it over the bar for 6.

The unlucky victim of his unchecked aggression was slow left arm bowler Malcolm Nash. At first glance from the video the bowling of Nash looks somewhat tame. But Sobers feat should not be devalued especially when you consider Nash’s impressive first class record – just under 1000 first class victims at a shade over an average of 25.

Herschelle Gibbs Slogs 6 Sixes in an over for South Africa vs the Netherlands, World Cup ODI, Warner Park, 2007

Elegance, gracefullness, cultivated are three words that I would often associate with Herschelle Gibb’s batting. On this occasion they could not be less fitting as Gibbs bludgeons the unfortunate Dan van Bunge in agricultural fashion for 6 consecutive sixes. The Netherlands show their faces every four years on the world cricket scene and Gibbs could not have highlighted their status as perennial whipping boys any better.

Ravi Shastri – 6 Sixes in an over for Bombay vs Baroda 1985

Video footage of this momentous Gary Sobers equalling achievement has been very hard to come by. The unfortunate bowler in this case was left arm spinner Tilak Raj and Shastri went on to score 200 not out the process.

(NOTE: listen very carefully to the commentary of Yuvraj’s footage and Ravi might get onto this video reel after all )

Yuvraj Singh – 6 Sixes in an over for India vs England in the Twenty20 World Cup, Kingsmead 2007

Yuvraj Singh’s feat overshadows everything that has gone before it in breathtaking fashion. The increasingly notable feature of batsman clearing away their front foot and having a free flowing swing of the blade in the shorter form of the game could not have been more superbly illustrated. Impeccable timing, proper cricket shots and hefty, hefty blows. It could be an advertisement for the modern game.

Spare a thought for Stuart Broad the unfortunate bowler. To be dealt with so savagely at the start of an international career then requires a lot of character to perform once more in the future. A couple of questions have to be asked though which could have changed the course of the events – Why did Flintoff have such heated words with Yuvraj before the over? Why didn’t Broad throw in the short ball if the yorker was misfiring?