Adios Sourav!

No matter what you say about his technique against the short ball, he will always be one of my favorite cricketers. For some reason, I have always liked the cricketers most panned by the critics for technical and non-technical reasons. Examples from the past would include Ravi Shastri (yeah, laugh it up) and Azharuddin. I am going to try to write atleast a few words about Ganguly, without mentioning that clichéd saying about his off-side technique supposedly said by Rahul Dravid.
When you look at Ganguly he doesn’t look even a little bit aggressive. In fact he has this look on his face like a kid who just lost his parents in a carnival. He saves his aggression for when he bats. How many batsmen can step out to a fast bowler and dispatch the ball to the boundary like he does, without any apparent effort? Do I need to say about the way he handles the spinners? Don't even try telling me that he has his fifties and hundreds ONLY against the minnows. Well, what were the other big guns doing in the same match? Someone has to get a big score even against the weaker teams! I cannot think of a much better pair than Ganguly and Tendulkar to have opened the batting for any country and demolished the bowling attack like there was no tomorrow. The statistics prove that. It's was obvious that he slowed down a lot in the past 3 or 4 years, but he definitely had his fighting spirit intact. It showed in his comeback after being dropped from the team.
I had the chance of watching the last day of the test match between India and Australia. It was really heartening to see Dhoni handing over the captaincy to Ganguly after the 9th australian wicket fell. That man deserves it! Not everyone gets to leave on a high note, but Ganguly chose the right moment and the right series. Good-bye Ganguly, we sure will miss your well timed drives piercing a packed off-side. And for one last time, "On the off-side, first there is God, then there is Ganguly". Sorry guys, couldn't resist it!