England sprinkler celebration

English team celebrating the fact that they have retained the Ashes. From this video it looks like no English celebration is complete without the sprinkler dance. I guess it’s the final part of the sprinkler dance series. Hope am wrong! Congratulations to the English team.

 

 

Since I am dealing with cricket in this post. Let me share this image. This photography really impressed me a lot. Jacques Kallis tries to avoid a Sreesanth bouncer. The entire thing lasted few milliseconds and yet the photographer managed to get such a clean shot. Hats off to him and hats off to Indian cricket team for squaring the series at 1 all.

Jacques Kallis

Cricket pitch or a tent?

I had never seen a structure like this on a cricket pitch. This was one of the nice spots of an otherwise horrible day for Indian cricket.

Ground staff had built this structure to protect the pitch from rain at Centurion stadium in South Africa

Well, It is snowing on my page and raining in South Africa!

England Cricket Team – SPRINKLER DANCE

This video has been taken from Graeme Swann’s podcast. We might end up having an interesting Ashes series in Australia.

Also picked up couple of funny quotes from espncricinfo.

It’s up for Boucher to start a relationship with de Villiers

Ramiz Raja probably meant partnership during commentary for the second Test between Pakistan and South Africa

He deserves the contract to build national highways.

Harbhajan Singh is none too impressed with the Hyderabad pitch curator

We’ve got a little bit in common…I love golf

Shane Warne understates the traits he shares with Tiger Woods

Size obviously does matter. We’ve got cover in the bouncy areas, but people who can swing as well.

England’s national selector, Geoff Miller, gives an innuendo-laden take on one of the tallest attacks ever selected for an Ashes tour

Past few days of my life

Last few days have been really great. Things have gone very smoothly. Last few days have also been completely sports filled. The US Open, Italian Grand Prix, Champions League Twenty20 and EPL(English Premier League). What more can a sports fan ask for?

I would like to point out some of the happy and disappointing moments of last few days.

 

Happy Moments 🙂
Saturday

1. Fernando Alonso taking pole position in Italian Grand Prix.

2. Arsenal defeated Bolton Wanderers, Arsenal 4-1 Bolton Wanderers.

Arsenal's captain Cesc Fábregas, was the deserved man of the match

3. This is going to make some of my friends angry, A three all draw between Everton and Manchester United, which meant Manchester United dropped two points and left Arsenal at second place behind Chelsea.

4. In cricket Chennai Super Kings defeated Central Districts comprehensively in Champions League Twenty20 match.

5. And last but not the least Rafael Nadal made it to his first US Open final.

Sunday

1. Fernando Alonso wins Italian Grand Prix and jumps into third place in driver’s Championship

2. Royal Challengers Bangalore trashed Guyana in Champions League Twenty20.

Monday
Please see the disappointment section. 😦

Tuesday

1. Nadal wins US open to complete “Career Golden Slam“(Winning the four Grand Slams and a gold medal in tennis at the Summer Olympics). Only Steffi Graf and Andre Agassi have achieved it before Nadal. Roger Federer is considered to have achieved only a Career Grand Slam since his Gold Medal at the Olympics was in men’s doubles. He also joined an illustrious group consisting of six others who have won all the four grand slams(Career Grand Slam). Read this.

Nadal with US Open trophy

2. Last but definitely not the least, This is my post number 100. 🙂

 

Now that I have spoken about all the happy sporting events. Let me take you to couple of not so good events

 

Disappointing Moments 😦
Friday
1. Mumbai Indian lost to narrowly to Lions by 9 runs.

Saturday
Although I am a Rafael Nadal fan, I would give up anything to watch Nadal and Roger Federer battle it out in a Grand Slam finals. So it was disappointing to see Federer lose to Novak Djokovic.

Monday
US Open Final being delayed by rains.

 

Note : The US open days are different because of the time difference.

Cricket ground at Dharamshala

Unarguably one of the most beautiful cricket stadium of India. It can be made much better but I sincerely hope they don’t turn the ground into a concrete structure like the other cricket grounds/stadiums in India.

Ground on sunny days

Match Day

These are some of my favourite pictures.

Cloudy day

I love this picture.

On Rainy day

I hope there are few day matches in this stadium unlike this years IPL.