I’ve always maintained that Vivek’s ideas are ahead of time – he has the knack of coming up with a technology roadmap that, while applicable to the corporate world, would otherwise only be confined to labs with academic interests. Firms have always gotten themselves into situations where they’re evaluating things that he’s spoken about for years before they begin thinking about it. The book is significant as it documents his ideas and vision for the future in a simple narrative without having to deep dive into the software that TIBCO provides to get a sense of what it does.

Critics will question the how this impacts privacy. Tapping into streaming, big data in an automated fashion has its consequences, and this technology in the wrong hands could lead to errors in judgment. It’s a valid point and the book does not cover it, perhaps it’s not the right forum. Yet, critics must be aware that patterns can be built around real-time aggregates, not specifics, thus mitigating the risk. The FaceBooks and Twitters have made us culturally more expressive in a digital manner, and as years go by, more about what we do in our day to day lives gets an online footprint. Aggregating this around a mathematical model that generalises for patterns isn’t intrusive enough to be a major concern at this moment.

The book is a must read for anyone wanting to be a CEO, or anyone who wants to start something up. It will not make you a twenty-first century Nostradamus – no – the 2SA can’t be gifted: it has to be earned, either through inheriting a talent or developing it. In many ways, the book increases your appetite for excellence. It makes you *want* to think smarter and faster. Importantly, it accentuates any foresight you have, and in doing so pushes you a step forward towards your own entrepreneurial aspirations.

In the Tipping Point, Gladwell writes about three types of people in The Law of the Few: the Connectors, the Mavens and the Salesmen. The 2SA subtly adds a fourth type to this list: the Seers.

Like a man blowing up the Kremlin and then launching Russian nuclear missiles from Mumbai Bombay.

There are reasons I wanted to like Mission Impossible 4: Ghost Protocol. Tom Cruise, to begin with. I’ve grown up watching him fly jets, spruce up cocktails, fuck with Jack Nicholson in a trial, hang from ceilings and catch sweat on his palm, mess with aliens, make love to Cameron Diaz and Penelope Cruz in the same movie, and even attempt to bomb Hitler. MI4 also has Anil Kapoor, an actor I enjoy watching especially in roles that exhibit his utter disregard for humility. What’s more: he has a role that’s tiny in screen time but substantial with hypersexuality. It has the stunning Léa Seydoux in the role of an assassin that accepts payment only in diamonds. It has Simon Pegg as the techie on board. The film moves from Budapest to Moscow – two cities on my bucket list – and then to two cities I am much more familiar with: Dubai and Bombay. So, you see, I really wanted to like this.

And while it is indeed an enjoyable ride, it is the kind of movie that makes you go “wait a moment. Did it just down my intelligence a tad?” a few hours after watching it. I mean, in hindsight, it’s impossible not to overlook the flaws. The factual errors if I may.

First off, a few minutes into the movie, we’re told that the bad guys use the same transmission frequency as the IMF ones. Must’ve been default, which is ridiculous – it’s like saying that Goldman Sachs uses default ports for its high-security server listen ports. So, Factual Error One: No secret agency in this world uses default radio frequencies. Certainly not an American one operating in Russia.

Factual Error Two: Russian nurses aren’t that hot. Update: They’re hotter.

Next, Léa Seydoux – the hired assassin who steals the codes for a stolen Russian nuclear launch-control device – is set to make the exchange in Dubai. The codes for the diamonds. Which brings us simply to Factual Error Three: The last place you want to sell Russian nuclear codes is a city where Mossad have had a track record.

Factual Error Four: No part of Dubai has sandstorms of the magnitude shown in the movie. Not unless a camel consumes a nuke and farts hard from Abu Dhabi.

Factual Error Five: No straight woman would leave Tom Cruise and instead attempt to seduce Anil Kapoor. Paula Patton’s Jane Carter would rather have been Ethan’s Cunt than Brij Nath’s.

Factual Error Six: There are no active Russian arms dealers in Dubai anymore. They’ve all become pimps and-slash-or made their wives whores. If any current arms-dealer thinks otherwise, please drop a comment. And run hard – because Arab cops do both: monitor my blog and drive only supercars.

Factual Error Seven: What kind of a jackass constructs a nuclear missile that can be aborted after launch, but builds a launch control device that – pray explain to me – cannot be deactivated when it is stolen? Or the codes of which cannot be changed? I mean, did this shit go through a design review? An architectural board? You know those #InSovietRussia jokes we crack all the time? Stop proving us right. I’ve see Active Directory implementations less prone to fuckups like this.

Yet, being Indian, there’s one thing about this movie that I really liked. No, it’s not Brij Nath’s role, but it’s the fact that offshore teams are conclusively becoming more important and strategic. Nothing pleases me more than to note that, finally, we are getting quality work offshored. Like testing a Russian Nuclear warhead in production.

There still is hope for the right-shoring model.

Today, I have decided to take a big step towards being Dutch, and that is to learn how to pronounce the Dutch word “gracht” correctly. Without scaring three people and spitting on twelve, that is. Yes, dear diary, twelve. Makes us wonder, don’t you think, if they dope because they speak that way, or if they speak that way because they dope? I mean, flem and saliva ooze out of the orifice in the face when you pronounce the word a lot more than when you have pneumonia. Yes, Pneumonia. Which … reminds me of something.

You know, dear diary, the word “gracht” is rather deep. Literally. Sixteen feet three inches, to be precise. It means “canal”, and if you drop your wedding ring into it while on a walk with the lady, you will forever live with two metrics for the rest of your life. The depth, as I mentioned above, and the temperature of the water in mid-January. While we went for treatment, the doctor said he had never seen testicles take so long to defrost.

So, back to the canals of Amsterdam, which I think are the most integral part of the city. In fact, if the city were a human body, the canals would be the arteries, with Dam Square being the heart. That, of course, does not imply that the Red Light District is the penis, vagina or any such thing. I think that would suggest that the human body had its reproductive system positioned mighty close to the heart, which is rather freaky if you ask me.

But we digress. The canals, surprisingly, do not cause any flooding during the rains, and that is largely due to the skill of the Dutch administration who are perfectly capable of calibrating the water levels to ensure that it doesn’t spill over onto the streets. Except for on two occasions. The first, in early 2007, was when a crowd of Dutch men and women walked along the canal saying the word “gracht” repeatedly, causing the canal to be filled with saliva and eventually flooding the streets. The second was more recently, just after England won the Ashes. Although tests later revealed that the canals were sixty-percent canal and forty-percent tourist urine from England who chose the Grachten to consume large quantities of beer and let loose larger quantities of liquid waste. Spare a thought for the Thames, dear diary.

The word “gracht” isn’t the only one in the Dutch language that makes the person you are having a conservation with take a few steps back. While Arabic and Urdu certainly has more words that involve the discharge of flem, it is very unique for a country in Western Europe to have a Germanic language, that has so many achhhh-sounding words. As you learn more Dutch, dear diary, you’ll start to sympathize with cartilage in the mucus membrane, and you will perfectly understand why a Dutch epiglottis continually demands a higher billing rate when it fills its daily timesheets.

All in all, though, it’s quite difficult to make strides into understanding the country’s culture without knowing the local language. From the outside, Dutch sounds like a loud, painful mixture of English and German with bits of Arabic thrown in. Like a threesome with Jeremy Clarkson, Heidi Klum and Nancy Ajram, all yelling out simultaneously. I think it’s going to take longer than I thought it would, dear diary.

‘nacht,
S

P.S. Did I tell you? There are hundreds of bicycles rusting down on the canal-bed.

I’m going to say two things that will – and should – make you love me. And make the rest of the world hate me. Terribly. First, I’m in favour of censorship. Secondly, you have a point.

There. I said it. If you think I’m being sarcastic, go fuck yourself.

By censorship, Mr. Sibal, I don’t mean what you mean. All I’m really asking for is a few things to be banned in this lovely country of mine. A few items that do not merit a public audience. A bunch of retarded people, whose names I can call out, who should not share any public opinion.

To begin with one such lunatic, we needn’t look very far. Kapil Sibal. I’m in favour of his ideas as long as they serve the purpose of denying him screentime.

But let’s, for a moment, try to understand *why* this thinking. What are the benefits of censorship? Lesser hate-speech?

Well, Godhra, to remind us all, wasn’t the result of someone calling all Afridis and Muslims “gay” on a YouTube video of Sourav Ganguly smacking Saqlain Mushtaq for a six over long-on. Get real, please. Those who have the time and inclination to go online and curse the hell out of each other have planted their rears on the comfort of armchair criticism. They’re not going out there with sticks, torches or G&M cricket bats.

The key, Mr. Kabil Sibal – and all nationalists, socialists, and democrats in this country – is this: if you want to prevent hate-speech, work on preventing “hate” instead of “speech”.

Dumbass.

So when I say he has a point, I meant it. A silly point. In a Ramnaresh-Sarwan-kind-of-way with a helmet and gloves and a piece of plastic to guard his crotch when anti-UPA pull-shots come his way.

So, Mr. Sibal, take a walk. In the park. With a cliff and a steep drop. Freedom of speech is my birthright, freedom of opinion is something I’m entitled to, and freedom for the government to fuck with the lives of every Indian is something we will eventually get around to denying.

If you really want to censor something, begin with all forms of Poonam Pandey and Arnab Goswami on social media. The former is a disgrace to Indian society (we ought to raise our children in an environment of voluptuousness as opposed to skeletal sensuality), the latter is a disgrace to, well, the human brain for starters.

Oh, while you’re at it, please censor Taslima Nasreen – she’s too sexist, too pessimistic, and as a result, too pessimistically sexist. Allowing a retard like her with several educated followers on Twitter is like allowing a retard like Narendra Modi to arm himself and walk into a mosque. The damage she can cause – to social optimism – is immense.

By the way, I *was* being sarcastic, of course. I am totally against censorship. If you really thought otherwise, go fuck yourself.

I mean, what *is* the point of denying people the right to read what they want to, and write what they should? That’s like taking away the best part of the internet. I mean, what the eff? What does he want to do – end up in a situation where the only information that Indians have access to is the one that the government authorises? That’s like owning all the media firms in the country. Who does he think he is, Silvio Berlusconi?

Wait, what? That damned Italian connection again.

Megan Fox is a *good* actress. I’m not talking about her looks or her lips (the pair of which would be banned in the Corbett National Park, for being too plasticky). I’m just speaking of her general acting abilities. Her commanding screen presence, her soothing voice, and her intense facial expressions. And if you’re wondering what I’ve been smoking – the answer is: nothing. You would, of course, share my opinion.

If, and only if, you watched Rosie Huntington-Whiteley in Transformers 3.

You see, the best part of having Megan Fox in the Transformers franchise was that – despite her mineral water bottle lips sticking out more than, well, the rest of her – she was hot enough to make a Nepalese thermometer feel like it’s in the Middle East. She had the ability to seduce both metal objects (Wheelie) and mental objects (Shia LaBoeuf). And those curves, bless them, they’re the Stelvio Pass of the human body. Who cares if she couldn’t act? She was, at the very least, more than tolerable. The last thing you wanted to do to that is to make her skinnier, push a more plasticky pair of tactile organs around the orifice in the face, and =put on her a more polite and proper accent from an island off the coast of Europe.

Enter Miss Huntington-Whiteley. Ouch.

You see, with that hysterical, American teenage accent of hers, all we could do is merely watch Megan Fox. With Miss Whitely, we actually *listen* to her. So much politeness, and such a terrible mismatch with the rest of her. Sure, she has the bod to die for, and I’m sure even Elton John must have contemplated going straight for a bit. She is, after all, one of Victoria’s best kept Secrets. And she is, in one respect, a perfect replacement for Megan Fox. Nought on ten as an actress, ten on ten for the libido. She’s the kind of shockingly incapable actress that can lead one to adding the “Academy Award Winner” prefix to Megan Fox *and* Kangna Ranaut.

But enough on the women. In other news, Autobot protagonist Optimus Prime has now signed up for a yet-to-be-titled Bollywood movie, to be directed by Rakesh Roshan. In a recent press conference, Roshan said: “In line with the larger-than-life expectations of Bollywood, we were looking for a fictional character with superhero abilities who lasted at least three Hollywood movies in heavy gunfire and came out alive on all accounts. Optimus was our automatic choice”. When contacted, Mr. Prime refused to comment on the film itself, but expressed eagerness at appearing in a musical.

Meanwhile, it has to be said that we now safely conclude that Shia LaBoeuf is not straight, and in a very disturbing way. Disturbing, given the amount of quality time he spends with the machines. I assume he’s simply perplexed in choosing between metal and flesh as his partner. Confusion, after all, is a hereditary trait in the LaBoeuf family. He is Jewish. His first name is Shia, a Muslim community that the USA insists is producing nuclear capabilities. His last name is LaBoeuf, or French for ‘the beef’, a surname that will clearly not win him brownie points with the Hindu-watching population of Transformers. And after three Transformers flicks with three ridiculously pretty women who have nearly stripped for him (we must count Ms. Fox and Ms. Whitely as one-and-a-half each) the Witwicky kid is still far from landing a steady girlfriend.

His orientation is clearly: ‘wait, what?’.

Unfortunately, Sreesanth will have to bowl in a no-fly zone. And that doesn’t work. You see, pitching the ball in front of the batsman is a skill he’s yet to acquire.

 
Sreesanth letting one fly at Kevin Pietersen of the RAF

In any case, the no-fly zone is now operational and the forces of America, France, Britain and relatively unimportant countries in Europe continue to shower Libya with penis-shaped chunks of metal holding gunpowder. While India and China shake their heads in disagreement. As they should. They can’t believe how Operation Odyssey Dawn wasn’t offshored.

What the coalition forces lack, though, is true firepower. Which is why they must hire the curator of the M. A. Chidambaram stadium, make him build a pitch outside the Colonel’s headquarters, and have Stuart Broad bowl one over to Yuvraj Singh. And hope that the latter isn’t distracted by Gaddafi’s virgin bodyguards.

 
[L] Yuvraj Singh blowing a kiss, and [R] Gaddafi’s bodyguards

But we digress. Watching the news, day in, day out, makes me wonder: how can you call the Libyan airspace a “no-fly zone” if your fighter jets roam the skies dropping bombs and the occasional reject stale French loaf designed to break a skull? I, like many, kept foolishly picturing a “no fly zone” where nothing is allowed to fly, and if anything was seen in the skies, they would be shot down. In fact, I even let out a few silent prayers hoping that the MRF blimp will make its way to the no-fly zone, automatically amounting to at least two extra hours of televised cricket during the IPL.

 
The MRF blimp has the potential to broker a peace agreement between Gaddafi and the rebels

We digress again. So, um, yes, the no-fly zone. If there’s anyone who has been affected by the no-fly zone – and has taken it more seriously – than Gaddafi, it’s Silvio Berlusconi. There are unconfirmed reports of various Berlusconi viewings at the Libyan border, holding his crotch, limping over into Chad. In his defence, and to explain the abnormality (typically, it’s some one else who is responsible for the handling of his private parts), Berlusconi replied with a “oooooooooooh! aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! ooooooooooo! Si, si, Siiiiiiii!” – which, when translated from Italian, means: “I can finally let it fly! Yes!”.

We are yet to confirm the exact meaning of that statement. Especially the clarification of what he considered a violation to the no-fly zone. In England, however, people often refer to men’s pants as a fly. A sample conversation goes: “Your fly is open, innit?” “Yes, and also, Stuard Broad is a woman!” “Piss off, Paki!”.

But we digress yet again. Berlusconi and Gaddafi are, after all, a couple with many similarities. They’re both retarded. They both hold top-office without getting a single vote. Both enjoy kissing each other on limbs alike. Both have no control over their manhood. Both are in love with extra-virgin olive oil, if Olive Oil is a proper noun and is the name of a Moroccan belly-dancer.

 
Berlusconi makes the first move in a long-lasting, intimate relationship

At this point, we must digress, because an event more important than the histrionics of a nutty dictator has occurred. Australia will *not* be cricket world champions this year. A few days back, Pakistan stopped their until-then unbeaten streak of victories in four World Cups including the currently ongoing tournament. And today, India knocked them out of the running. The Aussie reign over cricket – which feels almost as long as Gaddafi’s – has finally come to an end. The last time Australia were denied the title of World Champions was back in 1996 when Ranatunga’s Sri Lanka chased down 245 runs in 46.2 overs at the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore, thanks to a classy innings from Aravinda de Silva, who -

- wait – a stadium in Pakistan? Named after Colonel Gaddafi? Because he spoke in favour of Pakistan’s right to pursue nuclear weaponry? So that they could wave it from across the Punjab border at the Indians like a gentleman sausage on Sildenafil citrate?

And – after all that – India is *opposing* the no-fly zone?

While most countries are sending a fleet of warships to rescue their citizens from Libya, you send just one – pray one – unarmed helicopter with three Dutch airmen? To pick up two people who are almost in a warzone? Why, I wouldn’t send such a small crew to pick up two Irish tourists high on Dutch beer playing shag outside Pathe Tilburg. And you send the tiny crew into the heart of Gaddafi’s stronghold?

Oh, right. You picked the cheapest option on offer. Typical Dutch. I’m surprised your airmen didn’t ask Moses to split the Mediterranean so that they could cycle through it into Libya.

Regards,
S.

Kennabis

Kenya sent down thirty-seven wides against Pakistan in the 6th match of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2011. Bizarre. Almost a performance you can’t repeat. Certain wides, I’m told, required two umpires to signal them. Someone please test the Kenyan bowlers for substances. Like cannabis.

The demolition man

He came, he saw, and he batted in a fashion that left several Bangladeshi bowlers seeking contraceptives. The ones that prevent pregnancy if consumed within 48 overs. Fourteen fours, five sixers and demolition that cannot be otherwise computed. All this, while a young Virat Kohli blasted his way to an unbeaten hundred off just eighty-three deliveries. Prior to which India lost two wickets in entirely regular fashion. The first was a run-out orchestrated by Sehwag, leaving Tendulkar short of the crease, which somewhat reminded you of accidentally hitting the cursor keys while playing Cricket ’97. And getting God Almighty run out is like walking into church and asking Him to vacate his omnipresent accommodation. The second was simply poor shot selection on the part of Gautam Gambhir, who looked in the exact opposite direction as he intended to play. Bangladesh replied well, and although Sreesanth (who must have been offered asylum in Dhaka with a nine-figure salary and a voodoo doll of Harbhajan Singh) tried his best to lose the game for India with a ridiculous over, even he couldn’t threaten the runs his batsmen had put up.

Hup, Holland, Hup!

There were two reasons I was backing the Oranje against England. First, nothing pleases this blogger more than to witness England losing, unless the opposition is Australia. Second, I pay fifty-two percent tax in the Netherlands, and even a month’s tax from my humble salary easily pays for a generation of Dutch cricketing facilities. And Ryan ten Doeshchate very nearly inflicted what would have been an embarrassing defeat for England. Goes to show what you can do just by having just thirty-percent of God’s name as your middle name. Not that England were very impressed with his smart hitting and nagging bowling. Many Englishmen I know promptly looked up his place of birth (which reads Port Elizabeth, South Africa) and shrugged with an expression on their face that simply read “immigrant”. Which is when I pointed out to them that both their openers were South African. And their ODI specialist, Irish. And the guy who bailed them out of embarrassment, born to Indian immigrants. After which my previous manager, a proud Englishman who swells up in pride when he speaks about cricket, explained how the English do not approve of such discussions being clouded by facts.

Speaking of the Netherlands, for a small nation it packs a rather large social media punch. Holland was almost always the trending topic in every game of theirs during the FIFA World Cup last year – even against more populous internet-savvy nations. And then, the inexplicable: Ryan ten Doeshchate, the top trending topic on twitter. Yes, higher up than Justin Bieber. Still, it’s not much of an achievement in comparison to us Indians. When Tendulkar scored 200, we crashed twitter, CricInfo and half of BSNL’s network.

But we digress. In the end, England took down the Dutch by six wickets with thirty balls remaining. Officially, the score reads England won with eight balls remaining, but I take the liberty of adding, to those eight balls, eleven pairs that belonged to Strauss and co. which would have been chopped in a dark alley in Hackney had they lost.

The crotch guard, and the other demolition man

Speaking of the groin zone, Virat Kohli, we hear, has relationship issues. This, of course, is quite expected when you inside-edge a quick Rubel Hossain delivery onto your gentleman parts and forget to wear your crotch guard. Which, by the way, Ricky Ponting used to break an LCD TV in Gujarat. And here’s this little gem from Ravi Shastri on the Ricky Ponting TV incident, which provokes even the laziest of bloggers to author an opinion.

“The dressing room is like a temple, a church, a mosque or a gurdwara. What happens in a dressing room stays in a dressing room.”

Last I checked, no one broke a television set in a temple, church, mosque or gurdwara with, I daresay, a little piece of plastic moulded on Ricky Ponting’s genitals.

But a word of praise, before we begin. Only Akshay Kumar can wear pink, purple, red and fluorescent green – and get away with it. Respect.

So, TMK is the kind of movie that leaves your sides hurting by the end of it, because you’re constantly switching from laughter-induced-pain to cringing in disgust. It’s the kind of movie that has the Dutch flag as a tiranga, where a foetus that eventually grows up to be Tees Maar Khan has a piercing. It’s also the kind of movie where two perfectly respectable adult twins, Raghu and Rajiv of MTV fame – one of which is rather stern – are made to look and behave so irrational and childishly absurd that it becomes painful to watch them after a while. And Ms. Kaif, goodness me, displayed her ability to overact more than the overacting required of the role assigned to her. If her acting was any indication of her being credited in the movie, the credits should’ve rolled thus:

Akshay Kumar as Tabrez Mirza Khan
Katrina Kaif as Anya Khan
Katrina Kaif as Anya Khan
Katrina Kaif as Anya Khan
Katrina Kaif as Anya Khan
Katrina Kaif as Anya Khan
Katrina Kaif as Anya Khan
Katrina Kaif as Anya Khan
Akshaye Khanna as Aatish Kapoor
…

Besides, Katrina is so miserable with her dia… oh, well, I just remembered *that* item song. All is forgiven.

The rest of the cast are as ridiculous as the movie is. With Main Hoon Na, Farah Khan suggested that we leave our brains behind. With Om Shanti Om, she suggested that we don’t *have* brains. With Tees Maar Khan, she (successfully) threatens cerebral-damage if we don’t leave our brains behind for her next movies. We get it, woman. You win.

But make no mistake, TMK is a memorable movie. That’s because whoever wrote the script chose to copy-and-paste the dialogues all over the place, so much so that by the time the final scene comes on, the audience has memorized the lines. The movie deserves no stars. The scriptwriter, though, deserves to see stars.

Speaking of reviews, Taran Adarsh, who continues to wet Farah Khan’s posterior by giving three stars to Tees Maar Khan (which in reality deserves minus thirty) says that the movie is a tribute to old-school Hindi cinema. Which, as a guy who enjoys Hindi cinema, I find rather insulting. But then, he also said this of Yamla, Pagla Deewana: “It reminds the audience of the films of yesteryear with the typical masala”.

There, he did it again. YPD, though, is a very unique movie. The first of its kind in Bollywood. Finally, a movie whose title actually reflects the audience’s mental state during and after the viewing.

But mark my words, folks, Tees Maar Khan will, in twenty years time, become a cult classic. It’s the fate of all movies that are so horrible, so agonizingly unbearable to watch. Movies that are *so* bad, that they’re good.

And, as with any willow fan in the world, no discussion in 2011 can begin without a mention of the Ashes. England have won, and although many expected it, the event has triggered a mix of cricketing emotions that I simply can’t cope up with. I mean, I obviously must be rather delighted that Australia lost, and lost miserably (as are the cricketing-loving citizens of other Test-playing nations that were subjected to years of Aussie domination accentuated by years of Aussie arrogance). And that face of Ricky Ponting – priceless. In fact, I hear many Indians (fans of VVS Laxman, I’m told) have lined up outside Buckingham Palace, offering the Queen a stake in the ownership of the new IPL team, Telangana Thunderers.

The other emotion is disgust at England having won, marginally overridden by surprise at – you guessed right – England having won. Because, you see, since yours truly entered the world at the tender age of zero, the planet has been subjected to earthquakes, drought, famine and tsunamis – but nothing as earth-shattering as England winning on an international level. England’s performances on the field have been consistently awful until the recent past, and while a lot of this has to two with the Flower in the team, it’s largely down to one man that has delivered for the team when they need him: Graeme Swann.

For years, England have struggled to find a good spinner. In fact, most word processors engineered in the 90s automatically replaced “English spinners” to “lack of English spinners”. CricInfo had to handle NullPointerExceptions when returning records of English spin records, and even Google responded with a “Did you mean English spanner?” when asked the Q. And then, Monty Panesar arrived with a bang (and eventually left with subsequent strikes, but from the other end of the wicket) while another Sikh, in the commentary box, made a strange statement. And though it pains me to agree with the likes of Navjot Singh Sidhu, he very correctly remarked that even he could attack Monty with no difficulty. Besides, Monty Panesar rarely made the ball deviate from its line. To his credit, his abilities at ensuring the ball’s trajectory never changed were replicated in the field too, as he could let the ball go through his hands and legs with baffling consistency.

However, all that has changed since the arrival of Swann. For once, a sphere of leather has left the hands of an Englishman, has landed on the pitch away from the rough, and has turned enough to make batsman look like they were mocking moves from Bipasha Basu’s new workout DVD. And a good English spinner is worth his weight in Gold when he plays Down Under. In fact, Australia’s best player against spin is Michael Clarke, which says a lot.

The downside of England winning is the amount of arrogance it brings to the Barmy Army, and most of England’s supporters. The British are by no means a modest lot, a fact that’s easily evident from the adjective they use to prefix the name of their country. For years, Great Britain has lived up to its reputation of being awful at cricket, and her supporters, to their reputation of being proud. In a stubborn way, with ill-tasting beer and byproducts of the drink. What’s worse now is, they’re right. So, for the betterment of cricket, the world, and the purity of the River Thames, we must pray and hope for miserable form from the Englishmen in the times ahead.