Cricket is evolving...

Dilshan's improvised stroke lofting the ball over his helmet and the wicket keeper's, for a four against West Indies.

See how T20 is changing cricket?

The beauty of T20 is all the sloggers have failed. While new risky strokes have been developed, those who are not making cricketing strokes are all failing. Great example of the already once legendry Afridi. He was just not connecting the other day. Even today while Jaisurya and Dilshan played brilliantly both fell to unorthodox strokes - the reverse sweep.

But T20 is having a wholesome or otherwise effect on The ODIs and Tests. In ODIs you are getting tall scores. Some of the daring of T20 is manifesting itself there. Tests are also being affected. You are seeing better scores, more lively batting and lesser draws. Now if that is good or bad I do not know.

The biggest benficiary seems to be India. Their bench strength has increased no ends. IPL is giving a lots of young boys in India to taste international cricket and rub shoulders with the greats of cricket like Gilchrist, Shane Warne and the like. Govt. ban on no more than 4 international players per team has worked for them.

Like it or not T20 has come to stay. The T20 that started in Karachi due to paucity of grounds caught up in Saudi Arabia. Jeddah, Riyadh, Yanbu and other towns have at least three leagues in excess of 150 teams. It is unfortunate there is no mechanism by which those boys can show off their talent internationally.

T20 is entertainment par excellence. I only hope it does not kill ultimate form of the game The Test. But if people like Tendulkar keep playing till they drop dead unlike Gilchrist, Lara and Hayden who left at peak, the chances are test will face challenging times.

Even a donkey could see we did not send the best team...

Shoaib Akhtar, Asif, Yousuf, Imran Nazir and the best are not playing... What result could you have?

I really pity the great batsman captain Younis Khan. He is heading a team that can never be rated as the best in Pakistan. He should have gone with the best team that Pakistan can have although his captaincy skills are also yet to be honed.

It is distressing to see the kind of selection committee and The Cricket Board we have. They could never manage the big players. They destroyed the world's best fast bowler. What business did  The PCB have of not giving the Central Contract to Shoaib Akhtar from where all the problem started. It is sad that no body talks of the root cause of the problems. If The Management is the best selection is on pure merit there is no way Pakistan will loose.

Our batting was pathetic and so was bowling. Fielding - the less we talk about is better. They could neither field nor throw the ball to the stumps. All the shots were hitting the fence and while we were batting all the shots were landing with the England fielders. That was the difference in field placements too.

Now let's hope Pakistan beat Nederlands with a wide enough margin of 50-60 runs to make it to the super eight. 

We can only pray and wish for miracles to happen.