Terrible 'Dhada' and Karan Rastogi's futures win

Today's updates are dominated by the telugu movie "Dhada" I watched yesterday and anexcellent ITF futures win for Karan Rastogi in Kazhakisthan.

Watched Dhada yesterday and oh man, what a terrible movie it is! The director completely failed to emotionally charge up the audience and hence there was no connection with the feelings of both the lead actor and actress. Kudos to Naga Chaitanya for putting up such a great effort, he really worked hard towards his dance movements and fight sequences. His hard work paid off and as an actor he is pretty good now. He is looking a hero's material now. Kajal agarwal looked terrible, not sure who designed her clothes and hairstyle, it was utter s***t. Director should have noticed it right in the beginning and rectified her hairstyle, she really looked bad. If she continues to act in future with such a make up, Kajal Agarwal is bound to fall from the lofty heights she achieved after Mr. Perfect to the abysmal levels she never witnessed. I am really upset at the negligence towards her makeup. Songs were average, Devi Sri Prasad failed this time. Everyone else looked poor. Overall it was a very poor effect, no matter how much you spend on publicity the movie will sink.

Karan Rastogi won the futures title in Kazhakisthan. Though it is not updated on the ITF tennis website, I came to know about the result from a reliable source. He is slowly becoming the second best singles player for us after Somdev Varman. Nice to see his progress, he was once the most talented player in India before his injury. Good to see him regain his form back.

Then the terrible series for Indian in England continues. Hope they will put up a fight atleast today! I am still eagerly waiting for Sachin's 100th ton. That is the only thing we can cheer about in the entire series that too if it happens. The bowling department looked very poor. We have to drop and revamp our side drastically if we have to dominate the test cricket again.

Another gloomy news is the speculation about USA going back into the recession. I am still very hopeful that USA might avoid a double dip but for that they need to be very very careful and not fall in the debt trap. Very tough but if at all there is a country which can avoid it, it has to be USA. With a vast amount of data they have, I think they will analyze it well and avoid a recession. A long and tough work ahead for the USA. The most worrying factor is how the politics in USA has almost pushed the country into a debt default. This was never the case with USA, country was always placed ahead of the petty politics, but now things have changed. That is something which needs to be rectified immediately.

Some good news in the form of the resurgence of Zimbabwe. In the times of cricket losing its popularity in many countries, nice to see Zimbabwe getting back into the scheme of things for the test cricket. They have won the test played against Bangladesh and now has recorded a ODI win too. In a way it is good to see Zimbabwe being as good as what they were before the exile. But sadly the same can't be said about Bangaldesh, not sure where Bangladesh is heading? I don't see much hope for their cricket, after 15 years of international cricket they are still languishing at the bottom. I feel sorry for the cricket crazy people in Bangladesh.

Another sad news today, I know it has been too many disappointing news so far. Rohan/Qureshi had to withdraw midway when the set score was 3-3 against Bryan brothers. Rohan Bopanna twisted his ankle and couldn't continue. Sad to see such an interesting match go this way but I hope Bopanna's injury is not too serious and he will be fit for the US Open.

And we have Sania and Somdev playing at Cincinnati today. The match is scheduled at 7:30PM and 8:00PM IST respectively. Sania will be playing 83rd rank Vania King while Somdev is playing 104th ranked Marsel Ilhan. On the paper both are favorites to win this match, but the way Sania is playing I would give her only 40% chance to win. I think Vania King is the favorite to win. For Somdev it should be easy if he can play upto his potential, any miscalculation he might end up on the losing side, but yes I expect Somdev to win this match.

That's it for now, its time to decide whose picture should be on the top. The contenders for the day are Naga Chaitanya for his excellent work in Dhada and Karan Rastogi for an amazing title in Kazhakisthan. I will go with Karan Rastogi, he is a winner while Dhada is a flop. It would have been even if karan lost in the finals, but Karan Rastogi it is for the day.

Flop show by our batsmen....again

The updates for the day is dominated by the flop show by our batsmen against Northamptonshire. Apart from Mukund who has scored a century everyone else failed. We should be dominating these matches, nothing looks good with our Indian team in this trip. India finished the day on 327/7, the pressure is mounting on Dhoni to perform with the bat, hope he comes good in the next test. May be he should promote himself ahead of Raina or who ever is no.6!

The team selection news is out, Yuvi and Bhajji are set to miss the ODI series while Dravid is recalled after a two year gap. Dravid is in a sublime form and it is not a bad idea to bring him back into the team.

The other major headlines which hogged the limelight is the CAG report on the commonwealth games mess. Looks like the rot is deeper than what everyone else thought! Now Sheila Dixit also appears to be in the mess. I don't want to comment without reading the full report but it is equally wrong on the part of media to project the news as if Sheila Dixit is involved in the CWG mess. Many a times we listen to our subordinates and sanction certain things based on the trust we place on them. Unless until proven I am with Sheila Dixit on this. She is one lady who has taken the project as a prestige issue and strived to complete it on time.

And then we have Sania's match tonight against Heidi El Tabakh who is ranked in the 180s. Sania is going through a mini slump ans this easy match up should help us regain the confidence. Heidi El Tabakh is not even a regular on the WTA tour, she is more of an ITF futures player. Go Sania, get the job done with clinical precision. We will all be supporting you. The match is scheduled at around 11:30AM eastern time in Toronto.

We have AIFF arranging an emergency meeting to solve the issue with clubs refusing to release their players for the upcoming Indian caribbean tour in football. The tour is in jeopardy because of this. Hope AIFF solves the problem as early as possible.

Karan Rastogi and Ranjeet Virali Murugesan, both lost their semifinals matches in the Kazhakistan futures. Both have got very tough opponents. So the loss was more or less on the expected lines. They will be playing along with few other Indians in the same tournament again next week. All the best to our players in Kazhakistan.

In the honor of Dravid for being selected into the ODI team, today's picture is going to be Rahul Dravid.

Will Telangana leaders and people follow the Egypt upheavel?

I know that the conditions leading to agitations in both the regions are quite different, but something tells me that the Telangana leaders and people will take inspiration from the type of chaos that we are witnessing in Egypt and follow a similar suit here in Hyderabad. Of course the law and order is much more capable and stronger in the state of Andhra Pradesh than Egypt and they might not allow the agitation to gain momentum, but again it is a do or die situation for KCR and his TRS party. If they can'r carry this movement forward, they will be blown to smithereens by the new Jagan party and the Congress men in the next elections. I am expecting a huge agitation in the capital city for the Telangana state unless the police subdue the movement with Iron fists.

Liverpool's amazing comeback, Manchester United's first loss and Chiranjeevi's merger

The headlines indicate just the prominent news that has made it to the headlines. These were the topics I was thinking about and racking my brain yesterday.

I have to start with the fascinating tale of Liverpool slowly but steadily crawling back into the top 4. It is still a very difficult proposition with a 6 points difference between the 4th placed Chelsea and 5th Placed Tottenham and both the teams have a game in hand. But the upcoming fixtures are surely going to bolster their confidence, Liverpool's next two matches are against Wigan Athletic and West Ham United, 18th and 20th placed teams in the table. Chelsea will be playing Fulham(12th) and Manchester United (1st) while Tottenham will be playing Blackpool(15th) and Sunderland (7th). There is a good possibility that both Chelasea and Tottenham will lose points in the coming 3 weeks while Liverpool is in the best position to accumulate all 6 points.

Manchester United is sitting pretty at the top, but their next three matches are going to decide if they can maintain this healthy lead or not. The defeat against Wolves has come at a wrong time, they will next play Manchester City, Wigan, Chelsea and Liverpool! The worst part, 3 out of the 4 fixtures are away matches! Manchester City, one of the contenders for the title have to step up and win their 2 of the 3 fixtures, they should also make sure they don't lose to Manchester United. Arsenal will be playing Wolves, Stoke City, Sunderland and West Brom. Fairly easy matches for them. Going by the fixtures, by the end of March I guess Arsenal will be at the top followed by ManU and Manchester . Going to be a very exciting 6 weeks

My next favorite topic is Chiranjeevi's Praja Rajyam merger with the Congress. From the reactions across the state it looks like it is a shameful proposition for the fans of Chiranjeevi and people who voted for him but in all practicality, Chiru is in a much better position today (after the merger) than before. I think politically it is a strong message sent to Y.S.Jagan from the high command but again Sonia and company are committing the same mistake again and again and again. They got a much lesser charismatic leader to compensate Jagan. It is a pity that they couldn't reconcile with the young leader who would have been a much better person to lead Congress in the next elections. Chiru has lost his credibility with this move, it is only going to strengthen the new party Jagan is going to start.