Indian umpires lack appeal

Courtesy: http://in.sports.yahoo.com/050421/32/2kw3y.html

"Though international umpiring errors are common, these two decisions in the same game still stood out. Unfortunately for Indian umpires, they would also give weight to complaints about Indian umpires from various quarters, including the ICC. ICC chief Malcolm Speed told the BCCI working committee last year that Indian umpires "were not up to the mark" and that that image needed drastic overhauling."

My foot!!! This is absolutely hilarious. OK, I agree with the Yousuf Youhana's runout case. But AV Jayaprakash's decision is not even 0.01% as bad as some decisions made my Steve Bucknor and others (remeber when Sachin was hit on shoulder and was adjudged LEG-BEFORE-WICKET) . Just because they are not from India, doesn't make them better umpires. For heaven's sake, even people like Shepherd make mistakes after officiating in innumerable Tests and ODIs. Supposedly lacking-in-appeal Indian umpires are not as experienced as them.

Article says
"Though some lay the blame for India's exclusion on the "ICCs racist basis", that view is largely unfair, especially given how India's umpiring system works". I agree. The point here is, I am not claiming that only Indian umpires are good, but I am saying there are useless umpires in other countries also. So why are Indian umpires being pointed at?

Having said this, I don't expect any aggressive reply from Indian officials or the BCCI. They would be busy making up 60-70% revenue of ICC.

Office nuisance

This person (unfortunately sitting near me) is going on and on..from last 40 - 50 minutes about some house buying etc...I've heard names of all the builders like sobha, sriram, purvankara, prestige. And he is talking LOUD. Typical nuisance material. Feel like ripping off his telephone connection. This is SO IRRITATING.

Bahrain GP report: Alonso Does A Schumi

Source: http://www.planet-f1.com/news/story_19078.shtml

"The Spaniard never looked in trouble after he had shrugged off the early challenge of Michael Schumacher in the new Ferrari - the World Champion retiring with a transmission problem."

This years races have been full of change compared to last year thanks to radical changes in F1 rules and Renault reigning supreme. Toyota have been the surprise package. Ferrari has been pushed down the constructor's championship table.

Now is the real test for the Scarlet team. They'll have to come up with a real good overall package quickly before Renault run off with the title.

Our own NK (Narain Karthikeyan) had to retire very early in the race because of some trouble with his car.

Changing to Blogger

I am planning to make blogger as my primary blog for whatever little blogging I do. I need a bit of custmization on my blog which I find tough doing in livejournal.

Gagan Ajit banned for 3 months

"The Indian Hockey Federation on Friday banned star forward Gagan Ajit Singh and Daljit Singh Dhillon for assaulting Indian Oil Corporation player Bikramjit Singh during the recent National Hockey Championships in Hyderabad."
Source: Rediff:Gagan Ajit banned for 3 months

This is the second or third instance of hockey players beating up each other. The other time, some guy had whacked Dilip Thakur very badly. Take it easy guys, you don't have to wack other players with those sticks, they are meant for playing hockey.