Dear Ravi Shastri, Please Shut Up

With the Indian team crumbling into a miserable heap at the hands of the English seamers, perhaps the time was ripe for an off-field battle between some of the big heads from either camp. But before we get to that, lets make a few things clear about the status quo:

1. India have no excuses. Losing Zaheer Khan is probably the only piece of bad luck they may rue. Apart from that this is (more or less) a full strength Indian line-up.
2. India are not number one. And in fact they never were, they only ended up there as a temporary place holder in the lack of a true champion team.
3. England could be the real deal. The England's of the past would flatter to deceive, winning an important series before falling flat in those that follow. Not this one it seems, and once they get their ODI game in order, who knows... the next Australia?

But now to the point of the article. 

The Bombing of Pearl Harbor

Nasser Hussain, renowned for having a rather big mouth, made it clear what he thought when Harbhajan was unfairly given out lbw with a big inside edge. His two cents worth included “using incomplete DRS is disgraceful by BCCI”, as he correctly said that Harbhajan could have been there if complete DRS was allowed, and that hotspot is in fact less accurate than the ball tracking system, and yet India have opted for that. 

Granted the choice of words are not politically correct, Hussain is more or less right. But this is a very unflattering stick thrust smartly into the BCCI bee hive. How dare he criticize the big shots of India! 

The Atomic Bomb

The rebuttal, came from Mr Ravi Shastri. He struck back with this:

"They are jealous about the way the Indian Premier League is going. They are jealous about where India is in world cricket.

"They are jealous about the fact that India are world champions. They are jealous because of the money being made by the Indian cricket board.

"The bottom line is that they have never been bloody No 1 in the world in Test cricket.

"So don't criticise unless you have been there and know."

Do you Mr Shastri really think that India is *that* good? That they can flat out accuse someone of being jealous of their cricketing abilities, their money and even more laughably, the IPL? Take a good look at how this series is going sir, and learn some humility and respect. It is 2-0 and looking like 3-0 at the moment. Your commentary sounded like you were at a funeral as it was so depressing to see your beloved team being so soundly trounced. Tim Bresnan, the England number 9, is straight driving your best bowlers like they are club level rookies.

Your "bloody no 1 in the world" are playing like the no 1 joke. Beating a few teams on flat decks by out-batting them does NOT make a world number one team, and you will find out in due course don't you worry about that. Here's a fact, if it weren't for the soon-to-retire VVS Laxman and Rahul Dravid, India would be third at best. They would have lost to the West Indies. 

I used to think you were one of the few grounded and well informed Indian commentators, how wrong I was. You are just as delusional and arrogant as the rest of the muppets you are surrounded by. Funnily enough, as arrogant as they were, did you see the Australian commentators openly brag about how good they are? No. They only beat teams to a pulp and let the scoreboard talk.

Ravi Shastri, grow up and shut up.