INDIA Lifts ICC Champions Trophy 2013

India once again proved everyone that they are the real champions after defeating England in ICC Champions Trophy final and retains the No 1 spot in One-Day International team list. India has won all five of their matches after a pair of warm-up victories in this Champions Trophy, thereby backing up their 2011 World Cup win with another ODI trophy. India has won six games in succession in the ICC Champions Trophy and also is the first team to win the final of the ICC Champions Trophy batting first.

This is the rightly balanced team with an average age of 26-27 and energetic lads like Virat Kohli, Suresh Raina, Ravindra Jadeja, Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan and Dinesh Karthik who have show and n the world what they are capable of, it came to such a point that the international media covering the tournament labeled the Indians the best fielding unit in the world — something unheard of in the past. 

MS Dhoni (31), the oldest of current team is the first captain to win all three ICC trophies - ICC World Cup, ICC World Twenty20 and the ICC Champions Trophy. Shikhar Dhawan has established an Indian record for the highest run-aggregate with strike rate of 100-plus in an ICC Champions Trophy competition - 363 runs (ave.90.75) in five matches, including two hundreds and a fifty. He has also received his first Player of the series award in ODIs. Ravindra Jadeja is the leading wicket-taker with 12 wickets at 12.83 runs apiece. He is the MOM of the final and is his fourth MOM award against England is his seventh in ODIs.

C S K – CHAMPIONS OF CHAMPIONS

A great league, Airtel Champions League has come to an end with a wonderful closing ceremony. This huge tournament starts on 10^th Sep 2010 and lasted for 17days with huge crowd, fun and entertainment. It has been a great show in terms of boundaries, wickets, thrills and of course super over too. The champion teams from India, South Africa, Australia, West Indies and New Zealand with a total of 10teams had played and finally Chennai Super Kings sealed the Champions League Twenty20 winners with their eight-wicket victory over Warriors in the grand finale in Johannesburg. It is the first team from India to bag this title.

In the most expected final match, Warriors won the toss and had got off to a violent start with bat. It was a reverse sweep by Davy Jacobs that changed the entire complexion of the game. After his wicket, the game came into the Chennai’s control with tremendous bowling performance from R Ashwin, Muttiah Muralitharan and L Balaji. They restricted the Warriors to 128, which was never going to be tough to chase. M Vijay and Michael Hussey played both pace and spin very well providing a steady and solid start with assured knocks shutting warriors out of the contest. When Vijay and Suresh Raina fell in quick succession, Dhoni did his job well. CSK were richer by USD 2.5 millions for winning the second edition of the tournament, their second crown in five months after their IPL triumph in April. Warriors received USD 1.3 million for finishing runners-up. It was a real emotional moment as this was their last match playing as a unit as they may lose some players in the auctions. Dhoni thanked the whole crowd, their coach Stephen Fleming, Hayden, Muralitharan and Hussey for constantly helping the youngsters.

Murali Vijay is the Man of the Match for scoring 58 runs off 53 balls. Ravichandran Ashwin is the Man of the Series for taking 13 wickets in the competition. Vijay wins the golden bat for becoming the highest run scorer in the competition. Ashwin wins the Golden wickets for being the highest wicket taker in the competition. The Super Kings are now the Emperors of the T20 world. This tournament has produced some entertaining cricket, Chennai were clinical right throughout and it's been a joy covering this.

ENGLAND BAGS ICC T20 WC - 2010

The English men have finally achieved their 35 years of world cup thirsty. Many people thought England was the underdog team playing against the mighty Australians on the ICC T20 world cup 2010 final. But the results proved otherwise and England beat Australia in the finals to win the coveted title in the match held at Barbados. Right from the beginning of the match, England was on the driver seat by reducing Australia to eight for 3. Finally with the help of Hussey brothers, aussies managed to score 147 for 6. This target looked so simple after a magnificent partnership between Kieswetter and Pietersen who put on 111 runs for the second wicket partnership. Kieswetter managed 63 runs while Pieterson made 47 runs out of 31 balls, thus finished at 151 for 3 with 3 overs to spare. Kieswetter was named the man of the match and Kevin Pietersen was adjudged the man of the tournament after his many match winning contributions to his team.

So far England managed to reach the finals of three world cup in 1979, 1987 and 1992 but lost on all three occasions. With four imports like Lumb, Kieswetter, Pietersen and Morgan, England looked more like an IPL team with four foreign players. However, finally they have achieved this hard target. Kudos to England and Paul Collingwood, who led the team to the finals. Mahela Jayawardene (SL) remains highest scorer of this tournament. On the other hand, Australian women bags the same title in women cricket.