Now, I understand that he said all this during a particular lull in the match (by Sehwag's standards, that is), but there's little excuse for such extended sermonizing. Audiences are allowed for such chatter during Test matches; that's the precise beauty of the format's length. But commentators? No dice.

The Set Max team was never known for exceptional cricket commentary. But the presence of Ian Bishop, Robin Jackman, Greg Chappell, Pommie Mbangwa and Tony Cozier in the team was an added bonus.

Now that most of them have left to attend national duties, we have to put up with full-time nonsense from Ramiz Raja, Aamir Sohail, Ravi Shastri, Sunil Gavaskar, Sivramakrishnan and Arun Lal.

Arun Lal and Ramiz Raja give an impression that they read through the Oxford English dictionary everyday before wielding the megaphone. Unfortunately, their dictionary doesn't provide them with the usage of the word in a sentence and the context of usage. As a result, they ostensibly have no inkling about the usage of those words and frame their own sentences 'around' them.

So you hear Ramiz Raja uttering "That was hit vociferously by Afridi".

He realised his folly soon after (that it meant something else), but never bothered to correct it and went on with it.

Ramiz is someone who can speak for hours and hours on cricket without actually making any sense.

He runs neck and neck with Arun Lal, according to whom, the bowler delivered a well camouflaged slower one. The bowler however didn't bowl a well disguised one.

Arun Lal comes up with words from his own dictionary at times.

Aamir Sohail tries to sensationalize every word of his.

If Ravi Shastri is a master of cliches, what we have here is a commentary team of cliches.

Every batsman makes a shot look ridiculously easy when they hit a boundary.

Invariably, every cricketer that is miked up is asked about the atmosphere.

And we are sick of their "It is great", "It is fantastic" kind of replies. For a change, it would be nice of someone to actually explain the composition of the so-called atmosphere. Something like 78% Nitrogen, 21.5% Oxygen, 0.3% Carbon dioxide etc. would be a much appreciated answer for a change.

It is a common observation that most of the cricketers that are miked up haven't played a single game in the tournament. It makes it all the more funny when they are asked about their approach to the game.

Invariably, every bowler that is miked up is asked the question "T20 is not a bowlers game. How do you mentally prepare yourself for it"?

We have had enough of this nonsense.

In future, if the commentary team wants to mike somebody up, let them be prepared with a different set of questions.

If they try to manufacture questions extempore, they suck.

As always, the capacity crowd loudly cheered every single run scored, every wicket taken and every brilliant stop in the field effected by the Knight Riders.

As usual, none of those cheers were heard when the opposition hit a boundary or picked a wicket.

The biased Arun Lal (with absolutely no cricket record to boast of) hails from Kolkata. He claims that the cricket suporters in Kolkata are knowledgeable cricket loving group.

It was the same 'cricket loving' Kolkata crowd that hurled glass bottles at the Sri Lankans when India went on to lose the semi-final of the 1996 world cup.

It was the same ‘cricket loving’ Kolkata crowd that went on a rampage and burnt effigies of Greg Chappell when an out-of-form Ganguly was shown the doors.

It was the same ‘cricket loving’ Kolkata crowd that supported the South African team in an ODI against an Indian team that played without Ganguly.

It is the same Kolkata that contains some cricket fanatics that put their regional interests above the interests of the nation.

Shah Rukh Khan MC'd a farewell event organised by Pepsi, which featured the new Pepsi Gold bottle -- sigh! Apparently the event had, amongst others, Priyanka Chopra and Mandira Bedi -- her of noodle-straps-fame. The event also featured songs by Sukhwinder Singh, Adnan Sami and Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy who belted out numbers from Salaam-E-Ishq, etc.

Everything is cricket in this cricket-crazed country!

Everyone is talking about cricket. Sunil Gavaskar, Kris Srikkanth, Kapil Dev, Harsha Bhogle and Ravi Shastri have never been busier. They are wheeled from one studio to another to talk about one thing or another. The topics may be incredibly diverse and varied as long as they focus on team composition! Well at one programme Gavaskar talks about team composition. At the same time Srikkanth and Mohinder Amarnath are at another studio, talking about team composition. You may have missed a simultaneous programme on a totally different topic on a rival channel. So you might record it. A later replay would show that at another programme, Shastri, Bhogle and Gavaskar collide to talk about team composition. Fresh eyes. Fresh views. Meanwhile, another programme has developed a scoop on team composition and that gets a lot of airplay and repeats too! Looking for a fresh angle, yet another programme wheels in Gavaskar and Bhogle to talk about team composition. By then, a tired looking Gavaskar, with match-sticks to prop up his eyelids, charges like a wounded bull into yet another studio where he and Srikkanth are going to talk about team composition. Srikkanth is looking fresh although he has hardly had time to blow his nose!

Occasionally, Kapil Dev will say something nasty about Greg Chappell. This merely serves as a temporary distraction before the amazing diversity of topics resumes around... team composition! Diversity is apparently good!

Then at about 1am, when the whole nation has slept, these pundits have to rush home to write articles for the next mornings' newspapers... articles about team composition!

Then another day begins and so does yet another round of expert-comments, interviews and studio-audience-shows.. on team composition!

Prompted by a lovely article by Shailaja Bajpai in The Indian Express -- in which she talks about much of the things that I have talked about in this article -- I set about looking at the number of celebrity-cricket-writers that are writing about cricket; the assorted army of now-old cricketers who are providing a healthy dose of sound-bytes about cricket to the various channels -- of course, all of them on team composition!

I have seen the following ex-cricketers write about and talk about cricket in the last little while. I may have missed a few, but I think I have captured a fair few of them.

And they have been organised in batting order!

Sunil Gavaskar, Kris Srikkanth, Arun Lal, Mohinder Amarnath, Sanjay Manjrekar, Mohammed Azharuddin, Sandeep Patil, Ashok Malhotra, Yashpal Sharma, Ajay Jadeja, Kapil Dev, Ravi Shastri, Kirti Azad, Syed Kirmani, Kiran More, Madan Lal, Javagal Srinath, Atul Wasson.

That's about 18 ex-players -- not a bad team to field huh?

Virender Sehwag's form, Sourav Ganguly's return and Irfan Pathan's fitness have dominated their bleat-time. But each one is unique. Each one has a voice. Each one has an opinion. Each one is heard... As long as they talk about team composition, everything else is forgiven!

-- Mohan