Booked
★★★ SACHIN's FAREWELL Series (India v West Indies 2013) ★★★
1st Test: India v West Indies at Kolkata
Nov 6-10, 2013 (09:00 local | 03:30 GMT)
2nd Test: India v West Indies at Mumbai
Nov 14-18, 2013 (09:30 local | 04:00 GMT)
1st ODI: India v West Indies at Kochi
Nov 21, 2013
2nd ODI: India v West Indies at Visakhapatnam
Nov 24, 2013
3rd ODI: India v West Indies at Kanpur
Nov 27, 2013
Booked
Booked.
Booked..
Tendulkar mania grips Kolkata
A Tendulkar extravaganza has been planned at Eden Gardens through the Test and its build-up. It will be interesting to see how the man himself handles it all
"There is no Diwali festival. This is Sachin festival," says Biswarup Dey, the Cricket Association of Bengal treasurer. "This is officially 'Salute Sachin'." That, of course, is the name CAB has given to a week-long celebration of Sachin Tendulkar.
Nobody does the dramatic better than Kolkata. Next to Dey stands a man with a huge bouquet of flowers with "199" written on it. Dey himself holds a basket full of roses. He is waiting for Tendulkar to arrive in Kolkata, where he will start his final Test series, and his 199th Test. Soon the word spreads - about a 1000 people gather outside Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose International Airport to await Tendulkar's arrival. About a 100 of them must be the media.
Inside, across the glass partition, Dey and other officials wait as the flight has been delayed. Across the glass partition there is another concrete wall. From behind the wall, Tendulkar sees the crowd, knows the commotion his exit there will cause, and starts moving towards the other gate. A surreal scene ensues: Tendulkar is moving behind the wall, but the 1000-odd gathered run along with the invisible Tendulkar. After a huge chaos, Tendulkar finally - and safely - manages to get into his car to join his other team-mates who played the ODIs against Australia and have arrived from Bangalore.
This welcome, right here in Kolkata, is the official start of Tendulkar's farewell series. Wonder what Tendulkar makes of it. If he takes time out and explores the city, he is likely to find cut-outs of himself, big hoardings with different people's quotes on him - the one where Don Bradman says he saw a bit of himself in Tendulkar is the most common - and finally bigger cut-outs when he reaches Eden Gardens for practice on Monday.
Now all this might not come to pass - there is a Test match against West Indies to be played - but the plans in place are ambitious and elaborate. Today, the CAB president and the state sports minister launched a music album by Piloo Bhattacharya, which contains seven Bengali and four Hindi songs about Tendulkar. They will be played the moment Tendulkar enters Eden Gardens for practice. Waiting to greet him outside the team's dressing room is his life-size wax replica, crafted by a Bengali artist-cum-fan.
On Monday, a photo exhibition of 100 Tendulkar photos will be unveiled. The CAB had invited former Test captains Sunil Gavaskar and Sourav Ganguly to inaugurate this at Bhawanipore Club, but both are in Colombo on a charity walk. It hasn't deterred the plans. On match eve, the CAB plans to get BCCI president N Srinivasan to unveil the coin for the toss in the Test, with Tendulkar on one side, and Eden Gardens on the other. Wonder what heads and tails will be. The CAB is hoping Tendulkar will attend, and personally receive a silver banyan tree with gold leaves from the CAB. The groundsmen will gift him a replica of Eden Gardens.
Tendulkar's face has already been printed on the match tickets. "Never ever have we seen anybody's face on an Eden Test ticket," says Dey. There is something or the other planned for all five days of the Test. With the first day's ticket comes a souvenir - a book. More ambitiously, 70,000 Tendulkar masks are reportedly going to be handed out to the spectators. If the CAB can pull this off, it will be quite a sight.
On day two, every seat is expected to have a placard, and when all the placards are held up together it is set to form a huge Tendulkar face. Day three is likely to feature a release of 199 balloons with Tendulkar's face on them. Day four could bring the West Bengal chief minister to felicitate Tendulkar. This was supposed to be a mega event after the fifth day's play - with Amitabh Bachchan and Shah Rukh Khan, who will be here for the Kolkata film festival, supposed to join the West Bengal chief minister - but the government is not so sure the match will last the five days. Advancing the event into the fourth day needs the ICC's clearance. On the fifth day, an aircraft is scheduled to hover over Eden Gardens and shower 199 kilos of rose petals.
It is going to be an interesting week to see how much of this actually materialises, and if it does how Tendulkar handles it all. He must already have enough on his mind with this being his last series.
Umesh Yadav, Rohit Sharma in India Test squad
Rohit Sharma, who is yet to make his Test debut, has made a comeback to the squad selected for the two Tests against West Indies. Ravindra Jadeja missed out because of a shoulder strain, creating an opening for the third spinner that was filled by legspinner Amit Mishra. The surprise, however, was that Zaheer Khan didn't make it to the four-man pace unit, while Ishant Sharma retained his place. Umesh Yadav returned after a back injury had forced him out of the Australia series, and Mohammed Shami was the new inclusion.
After spending the off season training in France and coming back fitter, Zaheer took match hauls of five wickets in successive first-class matches against West Indies A and Haryana. Dropped during the England series last year, Zaheer was expected to make it back into the squad. He has not, but the selectors are still looking at him as a prospect for the South Africa tour.
A source told ESPNcricinfo that the selectors debated whether to bring him back immediately or give him more match time in domestic cricket. The eventual consensus was that he needed more overs under his belt before coming back to Test cricket. "He is very much a part of the plans for South Africa," the source said.
Rohit made his way back into the squad with consistent performances at the top of the order in ODIs, and could even be used as a back-up opener should the need arise. As it stands, he and his Mumbai team-mate Ajinkya Rahane will compete for the middle-order vacancy that arises because of the absence of Jadeja, who has been advised two weeks' rest. Suresh Raina, who was part of the previous Test squad, was dropped.
Harbhajan Singh and Ashok Dinda were also dropped. Bhuvneshwar Kumar, the main spinners - R Ashwin and Pragyan Ojha - and other batsmen retained their places. A big matter of debate will be the retention of Ishant, whose results in international cricket have been ordinary of late. To go with the recent hidings in one-day cricket, Ishant last took more than three wickets in a Test innings more than two years ago, at Lord's in July 2011. His overall average of 38 is uninspiring, and since that Lord's Test every wicket he has taken has cost India 60 runs.
Squad: MS Dhoni (capt. & wk), Shikhar Dhawan, M Vijay, Cheteshwar Pujara, Sachin Tendulkar, Virat Kohli, R Ashwin, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Pragyan Ojha, Amit Mishra, Ajinkya Rahane, Umesh Yadav, Mohammed Shami, Rohit Sharma, Ishant Sharma.
Special stamp, gold coin for Sachin Tendulkar's 200th Test
Mumbai Cricket Association plans grand farewell for Sachin Tendulkar, who will play his 200th and final Test match at Wankhede Stadium from November 14-18.
A special gold coin with Sachin Tendulkar's photo will be used during toss when the Master Blaster walks out to play his 200th and final Test match at the Wankhede Stadium on November 14. The Mumbai Cricket Association is planning a grand farewell for the legendary batsman who will play his last two Test matches against the West Indies. The first Test, Tendulkar's 199th, will be played at the Eden Gardens. (Read: Five-pound sandesh-cake planned for Sachin Tendulkar's send-off in Kolkata)
The MCA has also decided to bring out a special postal stamp to mark the occasion. The MCA will also come out with a 64-page brochure consisting of articles, quotes on Tendulkar from personalities belonging to the fields of business, profession, sports, journalism. Limited edition brochure and coins will be distributed to the MCA and BCCI members.
The special 10-gram gold coin is among several Mumbai Cricket Association plans to commemorate Tendulkar's farewell game. The coin will have Tendulkar's photo and the MCA logo on either side. The coin will also have metallic replicas for fans who wish to buy them as mementoes. Everyday there will be distribution of 10,000 face masks, 10,000 scorecards and 10,000 caps with Sachin's photograph in different stands.
Other plans include special Tendulkar masks which will be distributed to ticket holders on all five days of the game. Special placards of 4's & 6's will also be given free to ticket holders. These placards will also have Tendulkar's photo and his name printed on different sides. If the placards idea doesn't get the approval from official broadcasters, then caps will be used.
Tendulkar, who has been an Indian cricket icon in the last 24 years, will also see his massive cut-outs in whites at every gate of the Wankhede Stadium. Special balloons with Tendulkar's face will fill the air while for the more statistically-minded fans, information on Tendulkar's centuries will be on display inside the stadium.
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Hope Sachin's farewell series is marked by the establishment of Virat Kohli as the new Prince Indian Cricket..Hope he has a great series..!
‘away – beyond the worldly rules of right and wrong, there is a field; I will meet you there’
But Kohli does not know the spirit of cricket...Originally Posted by Karikamuri Shanmugan
ethiraalikale verbal abuse vazhi manoveeryam keduthunna Australian thanthramaanu Kohli, Jadeja, Dhawan teaminte...
they have to learn good manners, courtesy and politeness from Sachin, Dravid, Kumble, etc...
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