THE BEST MATCH EVER?

2 years ago Pakistan scored around 344 and was 5 runs short of victory over India in the first ODI at Karachi.This was the match where Kaif took that awesome catch jumping over Badani.That was the highest chasing total till yesterday,although it wasn't a winning one.A few months back NZ prevailed over AUS in a high profile chase and won, chasing a total of 330 odd and till yesterday that was the record for the highest winning chase.Few other memorable 300+ chases have been the Natwest final at Lord's ;the 316 at Dhaka vs Pak {Kanitkar scores a boundary off saqlain},;SL chasing 333 set by WI at Sharjah ,Tillakaratne scores an amazing century but the team falls short by 3 runs.Move over guys! 300 is passe.400 is the in thing now.If a team scoring 434 in the 1st innings is out-of-the-world then what can you say about the team which has chased 434 at 8.7 RPO.GOD LEVEL!!!!!!!!!!

I cant imagine with what mindset Gibbs went in to bat! Chasing 434 is surreal.How could he even think that his team could go for a win?His lofted cover drives,pulls,straight hits to the fence were an absolute treat to watch.Never did he get bogged down and the best part of his innings was that he tried to score off every ball.In his 80 odd runs partnership with De villiers the latter scored just 14. Gibbs totally bludgeoned,hammered,pummelled the ball and I cant come up with more words. He never lost sight of his goal even when wickets fell and the way he accelerated after his century was too too too much! The age old adage "Fortune favours the brave" was seen yesterday .Without taking away any credit, Gibbs had a reprieve at mid-off.A couple of edges also flew to the third man boundary and there was a missed run out chance. Every ball he tried some innovation -coming down the track,creating room on the off,chipping it over short fine leg etc. But the way he threw away his wicket was slisha disappointing.He had already scored two sixes and a lofted drive without the power or timing towards long off with a fielder there was unwarranted.He could have taken a single or hit a full blooded shot.Anyways i think he was tired.All said and done this was one of the best innings' i have ever seen and I dont think anyone can emulate Gibbs atleast for the next few years. "Wonder"wath was also wonderful! And full marks to Boucher for having kept his cool.He kept the scoreboard ticking and ensured that 6 an over was always coming. Imagine a tailender like Ntini facing one of the fastest bowlers with 2 needed off 3,this being the series clincher,SA on the verge of creating history.Phew!He aptly took a single.Well done boy .Boucher deserved the winning shot and his boundary over long on brought the roof down in the room and we all were dancing,shouting,embracing each other as if it were an Indian win!Such was the tide against the Aussies.

Almost all the guys in the TV room were baying for Aussies blood barring one or two . Every boundary was greeted with rapturous applause and we all were left red-handed after clapping so much.The atmoshpere was totally electric with about 150 people and this is something i wont forget for a few years to come.

Ponting's captaincy has left a few open questions.Even you and me know that Gibbs is extremely strong in the cover region.Why didn't he have a sweeper when he was repeatedly hitting it over the covers? Secondly Lee was the best bet with such such an inexperienced attack.So why didn't he complete his quota and why that Lewis was given 10 overs after giving away 90 in 9?Lewis might be a great bowler in the death but after being hammered for 90 runs it was an unwise decision to hand over the ball to him.Anyways I am happy he did that because I don't want the Kangaroos to win every series.But I am pretty sure that they will fight back hard.After every defeat they have had comprehensive victories.They swept the Super Series 3-0 and defeated WI,SA,SL back home after their Ashes debacle and the previous ignominious loss to Bangladesh.So a good fight is on the anvil.

The Ashes victory saw a surge in the popularity of cricket in England.Lets hope the same thing happens in SA .I would like to see SA attain the levels it had reached in 1996-99 and regain its lost glory.

Bottomline: Any target can be achieved if you are determined and put your mind and heart into it.Will sum up with one of my favourite quotes - "Champions aren't made in gyms. Champions are made from something they have deep inside them-a desire, a dream, a vision. They have to have last-minute stamina, they have to be a little faster, they have to have the skill and the will. But the will must be stronger than the skill." - Mohammad Ali.And Gibbs,Smith,Boucher are champions. ^:)^

TIME IS FLYING AWAY

I am half way through the sem and have not yet described how it has shaped up.This is mainly due to an extremely busy schedule which for a change included mugging ,playing cricket and of course the usual time wasters like chatting,movie watching etc.As usual the Profs are not great barring two profs.One prof teaches well but slighly on the slower side.His class is somewhat like HIndi commentary on DD -1."Mohammad Kaif"..wait for 10 seconds.."shandaar shot"..10 more seconds.. ""kharab ball".Surpise-I have a Bradmanesque attendance average of 90+ so far in his class and have jotted down awesome notes.Infact i am pretty proud of a unique achievement.For the first time in my 3 years i studied for the quiz from my own notes.Of course it did have the usual glitches as i didn't copy a few graphs and the "sieve theorem" came into effect once again.Probably can be termed Beginner's Luck.As some golfer said "My luck is so bad that if i bought a cemetery people would stop dying"!The other prof is a total god.Infact he is going to be the next HOD and for the first time i seem to be enjoying classes.But he sent me out once as i went in 3 min late for his 8 am class.Grrrr.

The labs and the associated reports have been the most painful part eating away precious Sundays.Of all the things I dont think anyone would want to spend his Sundays writing lab reports and drawing graphs.In the previous sems too we had labs but I used to blatanly carbon copy the reports.This sem there were specific instructions not to copy from our batch mates.Certainly that dint deter me from copying ,the fact that i was dependent on others provided the impetus to write reports on my own.I still don't write it completely on my own.Thats obvious because Habits Die Hard.Thursdays and Fridays are the best days as the afty's are free.They are spent in the best way possible-sleeping.Even though I have been writng down notes in a few classes religiously I am absolutely not able to cope up with them and in most cases its blindly writing down what the prof has been telling.Sometimes when LB sits beside me we both have a small competition on who writes down more notes.Though I won on one particular day, after going through the notes I found out that what I had written was totally insignificant and irrelevant.The prof was using some analogies and like a fool I wrote down that without writing the subject matter.Phew!The simple things in life like writing notes in class is so tough man!Hats off to all you people who maintain notes.

This sem also saw the advent of GD's in our wing {6 guys} mainly in order to improve our debating skills.It has done everything except that.Mainly it has resulted in each of us taking turns to rape the other guy and pain him to the core.In most of the cases the guy getting tortured has had no support and its like 5:1 attack.But those sessions were total fun and I was also the victim many times.If I am not wrong I was the one who started these sessions and the cliched getting a taste of my own medicine.Hope to have one of those sessions this weekend.I am pretty sure the guys passing through our wing are convinced that these 6 guys have no other work apart from farting {aimless chat sessions in IIT lingo}.

I had put on weight in my December holidays and started running in our stadium in order to reduce it.Sadly i dont seem to have lost much inspite of running a good 5*400m these days.My main aim is to reduce my waist line so that i can flaunt my brand new Lee jeans by tucking the shirt in . :P.I hope to tuck in my shirt atleast by the end of this sem.Btw all you doubting Thomases,I am not that fat,just 65 kgs :P

This has been a total bits and pieces post.But what to do I dont get many ideas to blog about :(. Life is just going on peacefully these days.First quiz was just about ok.Hope there is no "sieve theorem" in the 2nd quiz!!!

P.S : For first timers sieve theorem --> Whatever i leave will surely appear in the exam.100%.For further details contact LB.