`Indian versatility versus Pakistani volatility at Mohali’
March 29th, 2011 - 3:25 pm ICT by IANSDhaka, March 29 (IANS) The World Cup semi-final at Mohali Wednesday will be “a keen competition between Indian versatility and Pakistani volatility”, a Bangladeshi newspaper said on the eve of the match.
“It will be a fight between Indian professionalism against Pakistani individual brilliance. It will be a keen competition between Indian versatility and Pakistani volatility,” sports commentator Omar Khosru wrote in the New Age newspaper.
“It is a cool and composed Dhoni on one side and fiery and impulsive Afridi on the other,” he noted.
“War is a terrible analogy for sports, even though El Salvador and Honduras did actually fight a Football or Soccer War in 1969 after a tense FIFA World Cup qualifying match accompanied by inflamed rioting. In the modern-day sports parlance, the India-Pakistan cricket match probably comes closest to the analogy,” he added.
In Khosru’s assessment of Pakistan’s team, it “is not only unpredictable, it is temperamental and undisciplined as well, and often blows hot and cold.”
Pakistan team “has lacked professionalism; the players have thrown tantrums on and off the field against each other and team officials. The captain has openly demonstrated a gamut of wildly divergent emotions based on the bowling, fielding and performance of individual players for the whole world to witness”, Khosru wrote.
In comparison, the Indian team “is a professional, well-coached and well-oiled cricket machine. You have a legendary batsman like Tendulkar and eclectic and iconoclastic hard hitting Sehwag as his opening partner. Yuvraj is in prime form. On a given day, Dhoni, Gambhir and Kohli can each be a match winner. The fielding is good among the younger group but unremarkable overall”.
Placing his bet on India, Khosru said: “If history is any indicator, India should come out with flying colours because Pakistan has never defeated India in World Cup cricket. Even with formidable sides and Imran Khan and Wasim Akram as captains, Pakistan has failed to defeat India even once in the World Cup arena.”
“From an objective analysis, India would seem to have the upper hand with Pakistan as the underdog.”
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