South Africa v India: 1-1, the shortest test EVER, and India's T20 Squad

[00:00:00] Hello and welcome to this week's episode of the edges and sledges cricket podcast, our

[00:00:13] first one of 2024. I'm your host Ashwin. I'm joined by Varun. Varun, happy New Year.

[00:00:19] We were together just a few days ago. That's why we haven't released an episode in a little

[00:00:22] while. All of us have been traveling. But how are you doing back into the normalcy

[00:00:25] of the New Year? this has happened and I gave myself a steal bigger guy. Yeah, so the series was 1-1. The series, I think, in totality was less than five days. It left you wanting more because everyone wanted that third test. But we know that the South African world couldn't do it because of their South African 2020 tournament. But overall,

[00:01:42] yeah, a bit weird because the second test, and would rather have had it against South Africa, three against England. And I know there's a lot more to it. But anyway, thoughts? Yeah, the reality is that this cricket revenue comes from Australia and India and England.

[00:03:03] So there's three countries.

[00:03:04] Everyone else is playing it.

[00:03:06] And that's why we do have to worry about like that. It's more relevant, right? That you need to have series that kind of are deciders. And yeah, just feel like, I just feel like if we had, you know, today we were starting the third test, the energy would be great.

[00:04:20] Yeah, couldn't agree more. One one going into a third test is very different to one one

[00:04:24] thing. All right, great news. India, one, Jadeja came back in and we brought in Muke Shkumar, a little bit more of an out and out bowler. Jadeja didn't bow at all. Now that's given the state of the test, didn't really bat much. And they're saving him for M the one, right?

[00:05:40] They did the rest.

[00:05:41] But they didn't have the one,

[00:05:42] no, they didn't play both Jadeja,

[00:05:44] ad-hox, share it in the bud.

[00:05:45] But kind of overall thoughts on selection,

[00:05:47] the choice to play ash first, five years of the kid, he's following Robert and Pujara. So you don't necessarily know if he has that kind of game, but then to be fair, we don't even necessarily need to believe that number three needs to be a Robert or Pujara type. So it's just mentally like getting ready for a criminal use type, attacking player at three. Share said five now, I know you included him.

[00:07:01] I was okay with him.

[00:07:03] I wanted Kael Raul Moore and because he was only keeper,

[00:07:05] I was very happy with that.

[00:07:07] I think when P who's just totally misplaced his shards old man. He's becoming in a situation where he's neither betting well nor bowling well The odd 20 runs that he can contribute is not changing the game In fact, if you look at the first innings I think shards of stock in 19 overs went for 101 runs. The leader was just taking it right and

[00:09:21] There's no question he's good enough. It's a more a question of, are you future-proofing?

[00:09:23] Because he could still, on the merit of his career,

[00:09:25] walk back into the site, at least for a man tournament in India,

[00:09:28] but it doesn't help us for the next three to five years.

[00:09:31] All right, let's get to the cricket.

[00:09:32] So India batted first, not a great start by a top order,

[00:09:36] and that first innings of the first test

[00:09:38] was the KLR outro.

[00:09:39] How great was that century?

[00:09:41] I mean, yes, we like to think in hyperbole a little bit

[00:09:45] as his India cricket fence, that's just how we roll.

[00:09:47] But a lot of people are seeing across most formats. and then was the one who got out. But not sure if it's the best innings. I've seen like a top 10 like Swinil Gavas Karun is very crazy about it. Yeah, his best. Maybe he's not a great best innings. And yeah, it, because around him pretty much goalie got 38, after that nobody else really came close. So it was a knock that was very much needed.

[00:11:02] It was a knock that reminded me of all our South Africa tours

[00:11:06] in the last two or eight years where the top order being negative, it'll be fine and lo and behold, we ended up losing by ninnings. Rohit got out and third over, I think, just well shortly after. And then Kohli put up a bit of a fight. But let's talk finally about the tale. Nothing happened. This was the example of where when Ayer got out, and then Rahul Ash, Shahadul, Bhumra, Siraj,

[00:12:23] all singled it. I mean, just buckled. At that point,

[00:13:22] We did miss out on the bottom. He was absolutely fired.

[00:13:24] He was just...

[00:13:25] I mean, he picked up seven repeats in the game and it was a little scary at one point.

[00:13:31] You didn't want to face him if he was sitting in the middle.

[00:13:33] For sure. First innings especially he was unbelievable.

[00:13:35] Tekken things Nandar Burger looked pretty good.

[00:13:37] It was interesting to see his confrontation with Virat.

[00:13:39] I don't know if you've got a chance to see that, but he threatened to kind of throw the ball.

[00:13:43] Virat's not a guy who backs down.

[00:13:45] But then walking off at the end of the session, Virat kind of went and shook his head. but like another we could did for it. Yeah, I couldn't keep up honestly. I just couldn't keep up with the weekends because every time we looked down, there was a weekend. I think every alternate over there was a weekend because this guy was on fire and Bumra was supporting him very well. But that's something about Siraj. He just every four to six weeks, he rocks up,

[00:15:01] pulls out a team for 50.

[00:15:03] And then...

[00:15:04] He has a couple of quiet messages.

[00:15:05] He doesn't show up.

[00:15:06] Yeah.

[00:15:06] And then just goes around to his thing the first match to. If we can't get Dean Elgar, this match might be over. And we did get him. I mean, the top score in that innings was 15, unbelievable from Bumra as well. Mukesh Kumar picked up a couple near the end. I mean, just a tremendous bowling performance. And yet somehow, not the craziest thing to talk about is 55 All Art is not the craziest thing to talk about.

[00:16:23] But let me paint the scene for you. 55 All Art three kids without adding a single run to the scoreboard in a lemon balls that was just shocking in 11 balls which basically means less than every alternate ball we were getting out and just shocking like you

[00:17:42] look at the tail zero of two zero

[00:17:44] of two zero of one zero zero zero Went from the potential to your point, 220, 230, and lead on a tough weekend to 98, right? South Africa then came back. Markram played an absolutely brilliant knock, absolutely brilliant. Again, made a phenomenal century as everybody. On that weekend. On that weekend. To get a century as everybody else was getting out. You know, again, phenomenal spell this time.

[00:19:01] A second six for in the match this time for Bumrah, who looked outstanding in this match

[00:19:06] too. we've lost our ability to bat and we're not nobody's grinding it out. And this that where's your head on that? Obviously the truth is somewhere in the middle, right? Yeah, I mean, in the first innings for both sides, you kind of felt like the bowling was very superior. By the time the second inning started, you realize this pitch is just doing all sorts of things. Right. So I would be very surprised if a pitch like this gets even an average rating.

[00:20:24] It has to get a below average rating. one. And the fact that off of a good length of bounds was so variable, I'm 100% with you, and I'm fully supportive of what Rohit said is listen, just hold the same standard. Either say it's fine or say it's not, but don't do this crap where you say it's a fast-pulling weekend, it's great and spin-pulling is not. It's just hold the same standard. Exactly. And so we kind of hobbled very quick break. We'll come back, talk a little bit about the other stuff in the world of cricket, the women's game, But yeah, 141 all out and the Indian women chased it down in no time. Shefali Varma had a phenomenal knock and Smriti finally got some run to under her belt, so that was good. But then this morning, I woke up pretty excited morning, my time to watch the second T20 and

[00:24:23] not quite good enough, not think the bowling algorithm we did. What a bad, what an it is. They were saying that that was something else.

[00:25:41] So what I would say is, get all the media coverage, get the guards of honor, get their kids to come out. And of course, if you haven't figured, I'm talking about the guy who almost hit the winning runs, fell just short of hitting the winning runs in the 3-0 series, David Warner. Now, he's still going to play in T20.

[00:27:01] He still interestingly also raised his hand and said, I'm available for the 25 champions

[00:27:06] trophy, which is not a format.

[00:27:07] I'm playing any matches until then. He's been entertaining. He has been exciting. He has been controversial. And David Wona to me is actually one of the best in the business because I think he's held every trophy possible. Right from an IPL to a T20 World Cup, ODI World Cup World Test Championship.

[00:28:27] And I'm sure a number of others, he's led sites, he'saps up with 10,000 plus T20 runs and he's still playing T20s, more than 15,000 first class. Is that right? No, more than 11,000, excuse me, first class runs. I mean, 8,786 test runs averaging 45 almost. So phenomenal career. I think I can't tell what happened better than you said, lots of ups and downs.

[00:29:40] The visual of him, you know, in tears at the press conference will always kind of stand

[00:29:45] out. And this number could go much higher. So you're going to have a situation where, you know, I think very high probability that India once again qualifies for this, for the best championship. From a world-class championship standpoint, the one match in Cape Town was absolutely critical because you tied the series, you got one game and overseas under your belt, it was great. So, all right, speaking then of some of the news

[00:31:02] from the Indian camp, the big news had come out

[00:31:05] and we'll wrap up today's episode talking about the squad their Bambhain Dias more has been generated so much negative news that people actually now happy to see Rohit's back as captain. I think I'm happy with Rohit being captain. The thing for me is that both of them being included, they've both clearly put up their hand and said we are available. Otherwise, in what world are you going to slot both of them? Right? Both are open list. So that's one big factor. And Gil is always going to win. So I hope there's some clarity there. The notable omission for me was here Rahul. So he said I'm going to go with Lord Ed D20,

[00:33:43] but India is kept him out now. I those were the only callouts. I do like the look of rinkusing and jadei Sharma at the end. If you're trying to solve the problem of not being able to finish matches that cool, calm head. So yeah, it'll just be, I think the biggest one for me is just Gil and Jess. Well, how are they going to fit in? Because in this squad, that's the only one we are.

[00:35:01] Yeah, I think that's well said.

[00:35:02] I think the only other question I'll ask you then,

[00:35:03] is there seems like there's a,

[00:35:06] there's some sort of a discourse online I don't think this one bad series is gonna say that, oh, now, holy can't play because you didn't do well in this, right? I think the losing this just to me is gonna be holy because the rogerman's captain, he has to play. And I kind of see it like, why would you play both these guys in a T20? I can see that perspective as well. Although I think you still can play both.

[00:36:21] But I think holy is just gonna lose out man.

[00:36:24] I don't see a world in which both of them are playing

[00:36:26] because the technical should be batting at three, right? the CSAR swinging, but get back into it with England and five tests, as we said. So, thank you to everybody who joined us. It's a little bit of a weird time as we were figuring out our new year schedules, etc. We will obviously, this will be available wherever you get podcasts as well. Send us in your messages at one tip one hand on all the social media platforms. Leave us a comment on YouTube.

[00:37:40] We'd love to hear from you.

[00:37:41] We will be back next week to talk about how Virat and Rohit are doing

[00:37:45] if they play in the Afghanistan series and a lot more to come from the world