This is not quite the southern hemisphere summer I was looking forward to. Melbourne is chilly. Jackets essential!
But before I get to Melbourne - the flight. Long and painful. Price of my last minute booking was that I flew to Perth from Singapore, hung out at the airport for 3 hours in the dead of night before my next flight to Melbourne. During the first leg of the trip I watched the new Wes Anderson movie - the Darjeeling limited - which was bitterly disappointing.
So got to a chilly Melbourne around noon, got picked up by Ponna, Andy (Ponna's bro), Lal and Vikas (who ironically left Singapore a couple of hours after me but got there a couple of hours before) and headed out for a lovely Sri Lankan christmas lunch with Ponna's extended family.
Post that, a detour for Ponna, to perform his duties as the good boyfriend we all know he is, to deliver Christmas presents before heading to the hotel, downing a couple of large scotches (very good and very expensive single malt acquired at the duty free - Highland Park 21 years - thanks Comu) on the rocks and crashing.
Woke up, headed to the Ponna's for a bit, discussed chick flicks, constellations, planets, life in Australia, politics of the sub continent, the wicket for tomorrow's game, team compositions and headed out to dinner at Chapelli's on Chappel Street... Kinda the equivalent of Orchard (without the massive malls) in Singapore or Linking Road in Mumbai (ok maybe not).
Now, for tomorrow. My fearless forecast... Hot and sunny day tomorrow. India will win the toss and bat. Put up 250 for 5. Dravid and Jaffer will open. Laxman one drop followed by Tendulkar, Ganguly, Yuvraj and Dhoni. Bowlers will be Kumble, Zaheer, RP and Irfan. We'll draw this game. Key performers will be the Mumbai brigade - Sachin and Jaffer with the bat and RP and Kumble with the ball.
However, if Australia wins the toss and bats... Now that's a whole different story... And not a very happy one for India!!!
Let's hope I'm not eating my words tomorrow with my fearless forecast!!!
Over to the MCG!!!
For an alternate view of this adventure, check out Resident Dormitus
1 comment:
good show boy.
i think we did pretty well considering wat mite have been. my call for tomorrow. Jaffer around 20. dravid around 45 mark. sachin will kick in with saurav and score big. my call for tomm is India around 300 for 5.
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