Kohli's captaincy not thoughtful, if not mindless
September 15 : These days there is little time to celebrate or brood after a cricket series. After a long tour of England, some key India players, who play in all three formats of the game, are in the Gulf to play the Asia Cup.
On return, they are up against the West Indies before another long taxing tour to Australia.The focus is shifted so fast that everything preceded is history for the statistician to record.
Their Australia tour, third leg of the year's Grand Slams after South Africa and England, will be another gruelling one. Skipper Virat Kohli got a breather to keep his feet up and follow his teammates playing in the Asia Cup on the telly. The break should help him ruminate about his captaincy and why he lost the two tours he could have won with a little bit of application and some luck.
The stocktaking is a part of life and so is in cricket after every tour. Not many former cricketers or the itinerant correspondents are happy with the team's performance in South Africa and England, more so the way the coach and captain reacted to the scrutiny.
Captaincy and team selection are the things on which not everyone will be in agreement. Some question the team selection before the game and many are wiser after, with the advantage of hindsight. It must be said that captaincy, particularly bowling changes and field placements, were not thoughtful, if not mindless.
Whether Kuldeep Yadav should have played at Lord's on a wet English summer day, Ravichandran Ashwin at Southampton or Cheteshwar Pujara should have been dropped for the first Test are not the issues that led to India's defeat. If Yadav had taken wickets and had Pujara played and failed their showing in the run-up to the Tests would have come into question.
Same way, the class and talent was not fairly judged, the dependable Murali Vijay, who got some big runs overseas, was sent back after failing in two Tests whereas the other two openers were retained for no apparent reason except their ability to turn matches on their day.
Till the last day of the series when he came up with a strokeful hundred, Lokesh Rahul's performance was not commensurate with his enormous potential, though he made up with his outstanding slip catching to retain his place in the eleven.
It seemed Shikhar Dhawan was given the opportunity to make sure his technique is not suited for seaming and bouncy pitches. Will he be given another chance against the West Indies to allow him to stake his claims for a berth in the Australia-bound squad, or will Vijay get another opportunity?
There is nothing new about the selectors and the team management not being on the same page. There have been a number of instances when the team management snubbed the selectors' choice.
The clash of minds was seen again when the late joinee Hanuma Vihari, who came in for the last two Tests, was preferred over Karun Nair, only the second Indian to score a triple hundred in Tests and that, too, against England.
Mind you, Nair was picked in the original squad and retained for the entire series.
The only argument the selectors and the team management can have is that Hanuma was in form, having scored heavily for India ‘A' against international sides before the Oval Test whereas Nair had only been accompanying the drinks brigade the entire summer.
The simple act is that Indian batsmen let down the bravehearts Ishant Sharma, Mohammad Shami and Jasprit Bumrah who for the second series in succession bowled the team into a winning position overseas.
When it comes to batting, there was no support for Kohli and the captain publicly stated that he felt miserable after his failure in the second innings of the Birmingham Test which India lost by 31 runs.
He must have had a similar sick feeling after the way he got out in the second innings at the Oval. Who knows, if he had stayed and Rahul and Rishabh Pant played around him the team could have even won or returned with an honourable draw in the last Test.
The word draw is not in the dictionary of the coach and captain.
Both Rahul and Pant, were either advised to bat the manner in which they were trying to potter around or they were simply overcautious to justify their selection.
Both of them and Hardik Pandya should have been told to bat they way they normally do. They looked scared of getting out playing audacious shots.
This batting failure brings us to the topic of preparation for a major tour, playing an adequate number of warm-up matches. After their foolhardy decision not to take practice matches seriously, now coach Ravi Shastri wants a fair number of first-class matches before they go into the Test series.
Even for the hosts these matches should help try their talented youngsters, more so when Australia is in the process of rebuilding their side. Kohli, too, may look at practice games seriously.
It is high time Shastri and Kohli walked their talk.
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Netanyahu recommends his Cabinet approve Hezbollah cease-fire proposal
Beirut, Nov 26: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday that he would recommend his cabinet adopt a United States-brokered ceasefire agreement with Lebanon's Hezbollah, as Israeli warplanes struck across Lebanon, killing at least 23 people.
The Israeli military also issued a flurry of evacuation warnings — a sign it was aiming to inflict punishment on Hezbollah down to the final moments before any ceasefire takes hold. For the first time in the conflict, Israeli ground troops reached parts of Lebanon's Litani River, a focal point of the emerging deal.
In a televised statement, Netanyahu said he would present the ceasefire to Cabinet ministers later on Tuesday, setting the stage for an end to nearly 14 months of fighting.
Netanyahu said the vote was expected later Tuesday. It was not immediately clear when the ceasefire would go into effect, and the exact terms of the deal were not released. The deal does not affect Israel's war against Hamas in Gaza, which shows no signs of ending.
The evacuation warnings covered many areas, including parts of Beirut that previously have not been targeted. The warnings, coupled with fear that Israel was ratcheting up attacks before a ceasefire, sent residents fleeing. Traffic was gridlocked, and some cars had mattresses tied to them. Dozens of people, some wearing their pajamas, gathered in a central square, huddling under blankets or standing around fires as Israeli drones buzzed loudly overhead.
Hezbollah, meanwhile, kept up its rocket fire, triggering air raid sirens across northern Israel.
Lebanese officials have said Hezbollah also supports the deal. If approved by all sides, the deal would be a major step toward ending the Israel-Hezbollah war that has inflamed tensions across the region and raised fears of an even wider conflict between Israel and Hezbollah's patron, Iran.
The deal calls for a two-month initial halt in fighting and would require Hezbollah to end its armed presence in a broad swath of southern Lebanon, while Israeli troops would return to their side of the border. Thousands of Lebanese troops and UN peacekeepers would deploy in the south, and an international panel headed by the United States would monitor all sides' compliance.
But implementation remains a major question mark. Israel has demanded the right to act should Hezbollah violate its obligations. Lebanese officials have rejected writing that into the proposal. Israel's Defense Minister Israel Katz insisted on Tuesday that the military would strike Hezbollah if the U.N. peacekeeping force, known as UNIFIL, doesn't provide “effective enforcement” of the deal.
“If you don't act, we will act, and with great force,” Katz said, speaking with UN special envoy Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert.
The European Union's top diplomat, Josep Borrell, said Tuesday that Israel's security concerns had been addressed in the deal also brokered by France.
“There is not an excuse for not implementing a ceasefire. Otherwise, Lebanon will fall apart,” Borrell told reporters in Italy on the sidelines of a Group of Seven meeting. He said France would participate on the ceasefire implementation committee at Lebanon's request.
Bombardment of Beirut's southern suburbs continues
Even as Israeli, US, Lebanese and international officials have expressed growing optimism over a ceasefire, Israel has continued its campaign in Lebanon, which it says aims to cripple Hezbollah's military capabilities.
An Israeli strike on Tuesday levelled a residential building in the central Beirut district of Basta — the second time in recent days warplanes have hit the crowded area near the city's downtown. At least seven people were killed and 37 wounded, according to Lebanon's Health Ministry.
Three people were killed in a separate strike in Beirut and three in a strike on a Palestinian refugee camp in southern Lebanon. Lebanese state media said another 10 people were killed in the eastern Baalbek province. Israel says it targets Hezbollah fighters and their infrastructure.
Earlier, Israeli jets struck at least six buildings in Beirut's southern suburbs. One strike slammed near the country's only airport, sending plumes of smoke into the sky. The airport has continued to function despite its location on the Mediterranean coast next to the densely populated suburbs where many of Hezbollah's operations are based.
Israeli military spokesman Avichay Adraee issued evacuation warnings for 20 buildings in the suburbs, as well as a warning for the southern town of Naqoura where UNIFIL is headquartered.
UNIFIL spokesperson Andrea Tenenti told The Associated Press that peacekeepers will not evacuate.
Other strikes hit in the southern city of Tyre, where the Israeli military said it killed a local Hezbollah commander.
The Israeli military also said its ground troops clashed with Hezbollah forces and destroyed rocket launchers in the Slouqi area on the eastern end of the Litani River, a few kilometres from the Israeli border.
Previous ceasefire hopes were dashed
Under the ceasefire deal, Hezbollah would be required to move its forces north of the Litani, which in some places is about 30 kilometers (20 miles) north of the border.
A ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah, the strongest Iranian-backed force in the region, would likely significantly calm regional tensions that have led to fears of a direct, all-out war between Israel and Iran. It's not clear how the ceasefire will affect the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. Hezbollah had long insisted that it would not agree to a ceasefire until the war in Gaza ends, but it dropped that condition.
Hezbollah began firing into northern Israel, saying it was showing support for the Palestinians, a day after Hamas carried out its Oct. 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel, triggering the Gaza war. Israel returned fire on Hezbollah, and the two sides have been exchanging barrages ever since.
Israel escalated its campaign of bombardment in mid-September and later sent troops into Lebanon, vowing to put an end to Hezbollah fire so tens of thousands of evacuated Israelis could return to their homes.
More than 3,760 people have been killed by Israeli fire in Lebanon the past 13 months, many of them civilians, according to Lebanese health officials. The bombardment has driven 1.2 million people from their homes. Israel says it has killed more than 2,000 Hezbollah members.
Hezbollah fire has forced some 50,000 Israelis to evacuate in the country's north, and its rockets have reached as far south in Israel as Tel Aviv. At least 75 people have been killed, more than half of them civilians. More than 50 Israeli soldiers have died in the ground offensive in Lebanon.
After previous hopes for a ceasefire were dashed, U.S. officials cautioned that negotiations were not yet complete and noted there could be last-minute hitches that delay or destroy an agreement.
“Nothing is done until everything is done,” White House national security spokesman John Kirby said.
While the ceasefire proposal is expected to be approved if Netanyahu brings it to a vote in his security Cabinet, one hard-line member, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, said he would oppose it. He said on X that a deal with Lebanon would be a “big mistake” and a “missed historic opportunity to eradicate Hezbollah.”
