Fitness key to retirement plans: Dhoni   - PTI

Chennai, May 02 : Mahendra Singh Dhoni on Tuesday rubbished talks about his retirement plans in 2013, saying his comments made during the Australian tour were "blown out of proportion" and there was still time for him to take a call. Dhoni had said during India's tour Down Under that he may retire from Test cricket if he is to play in the 2015 cricket World Cup.
"If I have to see through the 2015 (World Cup), I would have to retire from one of the formats," Dhoni had said then. Dhoni on Tuesday said that he would decide on retirement depending upon his fitness. "By end of 2013, I have to see where my body stands, whether I can play the 2015 50 over World Cup. And if I amnot fit enough then I have to make way for the youngsters coming in," he said.

IPL's hidden attraction   - Dilip Bobb

Apr 18, 2012 : It's sweaty, the timings are inconvenient, the teams have hardly any local players. But every IPL match sees huge crowds and wildly extrovert behaviour. What gives?
Okay, it's cricket, our national opiate, but here's the odd thing: Test matches in India have seen a gradual dwindling of crowd support. The vast empty stands at the India-West Indies match at Kolkata's iconic Eden Gardens in November 2011 was a sign of the times. Ranji matches, where support to state teams should be an incentive, attracts more stray dogs than people. International limited overs cricket matches get crowds in India because they are comparatively short, and it's the national team playing.
The IPL is a different animal. Apart from the Delhi Daredevils, who have Virender Sehwag, none of the teams has a local born and bred captain. In fact, very few teams have any local representation after the last auction: Gautam Gambhir switched to Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR), Harbhajan Singh is now captain of Mumbai Indians, Sourav Ganguly captains Pune Warriors India and not KKR, Mahendra Singh Dhoni plays for Chennai, hottie Virat Kohli wears the Bangalore Royal Challengers shirt and even Yuvraj Singh now supports Pune rather than Kings XI Punjab. All teams have token locals, but they rarely feature in the playing eleven. Yet, the crowds are amazingly vocal - fanatical in dress, behaviour and support for teams that have a majority of players from abroad and none from the city or state they are named after.

Landmark reached, we can go back to pure Sachin   - Harsha Bhogle

March 23, 2012: If the hundredth hadn't been on Tendulkar's mind, and we must take part of the blame for it, he might have got it earlier Sachin Tendulkar;s ascent to the hundredth was probably like being on the last leg of a Himalayan conquest. I say "probably" because I have experienced neither, nor am I likely to, but he seemed weary and consumed by the thought - in itself an unusual occurrence. He had started to fret a little bit, had refused to meet the media in Australia because he knew the hundredth would be the focus of conversation, but like "Betal', the vampire spirit, the landmark clung to him and wouldn't let go however hard he tried to ignore its presence.