How good is Andrew Flintoff ?

Andrew Flintoff took a fiver at lords test grinding Australia to a 115 run defeat . Flintoff belongs to a category of very very rare species named All-rounder . He is a genuine Allrounder , not a utility player . He can easily find a place in the England team as a batter or a bowler . Right now there is no match for Andrew flintoff as an all rounder , however as compared to other great all-rounders like Sir Garfield Sobers, Kapil dev,Ian Botham , Imran Khan , Shaun Pollock where does he stand ? Frankly he along with Shaun Pollock and to some extent Abdur Razzak are the only genuine allrounders in the last decade or so .
However Andrew Flintoff is not better than the illustrious all rounders mentioned list above . In the early part of his career he struggled with weight issues . He was bulky which was bound to take its toll on Flintoff.What the heck !!!! a fast bowler bowling in excess of 140 kmph cannot carry around that much weight . He resolved the issues and came back . But the damage has been done .For a brief period he was almost unplayable and he played some very very crucial knocks. But that was it . He was plagued with injury .
On the skill level he might be on par with likes of Botham , Imran khan ,Kapil Dev and Shaun Pollock . But he did not look after his fitness in the way a professional player should have , especially in the initial yeras of his career . That has been his undoing . Fantastic player with amazing potential ,which was never tapped fully . What a waste!!!

Saina Nehwal : Making news for right reasons .

Saina Nehwal is on a Roll . For the uninitiated , Saina Nehwal is the 19 year old Badminton Champion from India . Saina's current Badminton World Federation ranking is six .

On june 21 2009 she created history when she beacme the first Indian to win a Super Seris Tournament in Jakarta by clinching the Indonesian Open .
Ranked 86'th in the Philippines Open , she became the first Indian Woman to win a 4 star tournament.
In 2006 Saina was the runner-up and in 2008 she was the winner of BWF World Junior Championships(World Junior Badminton Championships)
In September 2008 she won Chinese Taipei Open.
Saina was named the Most Promising Player in 2008 .She has lived upto that tag.
Her rise has been stupenduous and meteoric . On her way to the 6'th rank Saina Nehwal has deeated some of the top chinese ,malaysian and Indonesian players . This is an achievement in itself .
There was a time when Prakash Padukone had phenomenal success upto 1980's . But then Chinese came onto the scene . Prakash Padukone just could not handle them . However Saina Nehwal is doing quite well against these players and has scalped quite a few topseeds . She is almost on par with players like Prakash Padukone and her mentor Pullela Gopichand , both winners of All England Champioships .
Unlike Tennis star Sania Mirza, Saina Nehwal is making news for her Badminton and not for frivolous stuff like Sania Mirza who has not won anything substantial in a long time .

Saina Nehwal says , "Right now, my focus is to play 100 percent and beat the player, not to take unnecessary pressure on my shoulders.

"I should not start thinking I have to play for the people or win for them.

"When I go onto the court, I should think I'm playing for myself, and I'm happy doing that."

That says it all.

Welcome Back Rahul Dravid .

Rahul Dravid played his last ODI against Australia on October 14 2007 at Nagpur . With the emergence of fresh "Talent" like Rohit Sharma , Suresh Raina and Yousuf Pathan , Rahul Dravid lost his place in the ODI team .These players scored heavily on flat pitches , however on hard bouncy surfaces and in seaming conditions these "talented" players fell flat on their places .These guys were literally exposed against some quick short stuff in England and West Indies . Meanwhile Rahul Dravid shed his image of a defensive player and played some great knocks in the IPL 2009 scoring at a strike rate of 115 .This brought home the reality of the importance of players like Dravid .
The BCCI selection panel has taken a positive step by including Rahul Dravid in probables list for the Champions Trophy which will be played on hard and bouncy pitches in South Africa. Without doubt he will be in the Indian team heading for South Africa .
It is good to see Saha , Nayyar and Bhuvneshwar singh in that list .They deserved it .

Here is the Probables list :
MS Dhoni, Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Yuvraj Singh, Rohit Sharma, Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, Suresh Raina, Yusuf Pathan, Abhishek Nayar, Ishant Sharma, Zaheer Khan, RP Singh, Praveen Kumar, Harbhajan Singh, Pragyan Ojha, Ravindra Jadeja, Dinesh Karthik, Munaf Patel, R Ashwin, M Vijay, Amit Mishra, Ajinkya Rahane, Dhawal Kulkarni, S Badrinath, Ashish Nehra, Virat Kohli, Bhuvneshwar Kumar Singh, Wriddhiman Saha, Pankaj Singh