To be associated with the sport of cricket is the motto of my life. Right from school days, I have been an ardent and religious follower of the game. To materialize the motto of my life, I graduated with Journalism as the main subject, and also have interned in many an organization to acquaint myself with finer points of the trade. In a web portal-thatscricket.com, I very enthusiastically covered some part of the Indo-Aus series that was played in Australia, in Jan 08. These can be accessed at thatscricket.oneindia.in/.../0801bucknor-a-synonym-for-blunder.html and thatscricket.oneindia.in/.../big-speaking-indians-given-reality. By nature, I am extremely committed to my job, both in terms of quality and time management. Communication is another field that mesmerizes to the hilt, for it is the one that gives a channel to make myself known. Hence, I constantly keep myself updated about the current trends in writing through virtuosos of the field (checkwww.deccanherald.com/.../dheducation2008031256990), and read language-related books and upgrade my vocabulary all the time. Besides these, I love to travel and cover cricket matches, and through this, learn the cultures of different lands, and take part in socially important matters (check www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/thscrip/print.pl?). Cricket is a unifier of people. I want to use this tool to unify our people and offset differences. India is my home and every Indian is my relative. In this direction, I very much yearn to help the needy, especially children of the lesser god and give them basic essentials of life and a chance to live dignifiedly. I hope to manifest my yearning at the earliest.

of the unflinching, unfathomable confidence and belief in my team. RCB rose like the Phoenix in IPL 2 after hitting the nadir in the inaugural edition. What a befitting reply in the second edition! We were dubbed as the “test team” by many, and it is this “test team” that went on to become the No 2 in IPL 2. It is Anil, kallis, Dravid and Boucher, the crème de la crème of world cricket who led the team with vigour and guidance to the youngsters (proud of Manish Pandey, an RCBian who scored the trailblazing century). My name says it all-QUINTESSENCE. We have the most subliminal, talented and efficient players in our team. An expert coach and a shrewd owner are the icing on the cake. No doubt that we will be seen as one of the toughest teams in the Champions League. Hence the ‘fan’aticism.

This line up suits our conditions at home. This has 7 batsmen, 4 frontline bowlers, and 2 batsmen who can bowl (Kallis and Ryder). Ryder will be very useful with his slower ones, as also with his wicket-to-wicket line. Either setting or chasing a target, we must have a robust batting line-up, which is in this line-up. Two spinners in Anil and Merwe, and pacers in the last two players of the line-up will be a lethal force. All these have played on Indian tracks and know the conditions well.