Difficult time being a fan of cricket

It has been a quite tough few days, being a cricket fan after the spot fixing and all that in IPL. I thought I would hate the game of cricket from then but I couldn’t keep myself away from the game which was my love since the age of 6 and it was one of the hardest things I did, backing away from the Gentleman’s game, as it has given me a lot of movements to cherish. I tried to be away from the Television and Cricketing Websites and I succeeded for two days, hoping to continue forever, but I couldn’t forget about Test Cricket, which is the best format of cricket according to me. It was even more difficult when the match was happening in England where, every good ball and every shot are appreciated with applause. In England you can always expect an even contest between the bat and the ball.As always England didn’t disappoint me and I should thank New Zealand for putting up a good fight against a very good team. If that match would’ve have been a one sided one I would’ve never known whether I could have got back to cricket or not. A decision I would have regretted later. I should thank both set of bowlers who made it an even contest especially the New Zealand bowlers for the fact that England batsmen are one of the best at this point of time. Even though England won the series 2-0 it was not a biased one by any means. Test Cricket was so refreshing to watch, I was happy to see both batsmen and bowlers sticking to basics and trying to get on top, Batsman reaching the pitch of the ball and driving the ball on the ground through covers and bowlers knocking off stumps with seaming and swinging deliveries, what else you would prefer to watch?With ODI series starting at the end of test series and top 8 teams reaching England for the last champions’ trophy, I was in a dilemma whether to follow it or not as it was of a different format and was similar to T20, which puzzled me the most. I should thank New Zealand again for winning the first two ODI’s against England and I should thank Guptill for his extraordinary performance. Even the Champions’ trophy practice matches turned out to be very exciting with India chasing 300+ score against Srilanka with a beautiful batting display by Virat and Dinesh Karthik, Pakistan winning against South Africa and Australia chasing a good total against West Indies with the help of Shane Watson.

Group stages of the Champions’ trophy were excellent with almost all the matches being neck to neck. Rain played spoil-sport in one or two occasions as the matches were just getting interesting and I felt sorry for West Indies and New Zealand who were knocked out of the Tournament because of the rain affected matches. This Champions trophy had brought a few players to limelight like Shikar Dhawan who scored two back to back centuries in the group stage at more than a run a ball. Ravindra Jadeja, who shocked people with his bowling, by taking 9 wickets in group stage in English conditions. Ingram performed well as an opener especially against West Indies which was affected by rain. Charles helped West Indies get to a good start in almost all the matches and Root continued his dream summer of good performances. By seeing all this happen I couldn’t get away from cricket. These amazing and tension-filled situations, and all the nail-biting made me come back to cricket completely, for which I am very happy at this point of time

Getting back to Cricket doesn’t mean I forgot what happened a few days back in IPL that is still a fresh wound. I sometimes feel, with this fixing and all Cricket, that this is becoming more like WWE .All I wanted to say as a die-hard Fan of cricket is that I just love the game of cricket like you all do. The Game has created a lot of legends who gave everything for this game and I am still watching cricket only because of them. Please don’t spoil the name of this Game. What I expect being a fan after all this is cleaning all the mess from the scratch and make the game of cricket back to what it was, a sport to cherish and enjoy. This is not the first instance of hatred for cricket as this not the first instance of fixing in cricket. As good memories of game of cricket over shadowed the bad doings I was able to be back but that doesn’t happen every time. Anyway, hoping for all this mess to be cleared and I am eagerly waiting for Ashes and last stages of Champions’ trophy.