Excluded - Out Soon (Interlude)

Short opinion - This album is a fcking classic, only Amin is the song which I am not a huge fan of but is still nice. The others are just quality, almost every song feels like a movie. This album had some actual desi sounds specially in Tadipaar that flute was fcking beautiful and the samples. Tadipaar is just a class apart as far as it is concerned as an album in DHH. He did this all alone. Astagfirullah the song was the start, fast forward an year later, Tadipaar the album was the cementing of legacy in the making for MC STAN.

Excluded songs - Intro

Short description of my opinion on this - basically a nothing burger of an EP with all songs being nice at best but one song stands out, I easily prefer his EP previous to this one.

As the title explains, this is a new series which I will start here, from today. I will rate 100 IHH Projects in 100 consecutive days (1 each) while I hope I try best to commit to this but yeah. It can be anything (album/ep/mixtape) just not a double A-side or a single (atleast 3 song project)

While I may have some projects lined up already, you may demand for those whom you wanna see early and whom you think I might even discover.

Today's project is - Dhoom V by Panther

​

So there's all of a sudden quite a lot of discussion about removing Sanju Samson, who fair enough has underperformed in recent games and has been pretty inconsistent where he has performed in 4 games within the 15 games (his last 10 bilaterals + his 5 T20WC games)

But 3 out of those 4 games came at absolute clutch times and he did it back to back 3 games which is commendable temperament for a player. Usually when this happens it's some player who's been there for the team regularly but a player whose spot wasn't even guaranteed specially with Kishan's entry as if he wasn't irregular already is a strong mental temperament.

I did rather say give him a free hand till 2027, I mean it's just been a while before this guy did the unthinkable. India will be playing around 18-20 T20I games from here on which is a very very good sample to see how a player does. Out of these 18-20 T20Is that's gonna happen let him play atleast 12 of the games meanwhile arrange like 4-5 games for someone like Vaibhav Suryavanshi in case Samson hits a new low in the form. This comes to happen because Sanju is quite an inconsistent player (reasons I have listed above already)

Even the greatest of the format Virat Kohli retired from the game at the age of 35 after the T20WC24 silverware because he knew his time was up despite the fact he played a brilliant innings in the final. Rohit did the same at 37 when he literally achieved his T20I prime throughout the tournament as a captain and a batter. Surya was shows the door out at the age of 35 when he won India T20WC citing batting form. Sanju is around 31-32 years of age with his prime which just arrived few months ago and that's the reason I am willing to give him a rope till this certain time. What my prediction is that Sanju's career will last till 2028 max for sure or if stretched out a little it can go till early 2029 and post that he will be ousted for whatever given reasons.

Suryavanshi shall be tested against the likes of Zimbabwe first , then West Indies and then New Zealand if he keeps delivering. We have to be sensible about how we go on about this kid because if handled well he will be the generational miracle. We don't have to be like oh his first tour is against minnows bad reee that's just how we shall go about this kind of player and a literal 15 y/o kid (or if 17 if you don't wanna believe his actual age), give an easier opponent at first and increase the difficulty slowly to give him a progressive and helpful build in character. The New Zealand tour will be held overseas also so it will be great to see what he does there also so he shall be given 2 matches at max in that tour and by the next year if we really think he did better than Sanju overall on basis of potential ceiling, consistency and what he has got to offer in future. That's the time where we start giving Vaibhav some real challenge in T20Is.

But if Sanju does well then I guess we will persist with Sanju Samson too till the time it feels right. Now if you ask me about Abhishek Sharma it might sound a bit biased but I am willing to give a guy better chances simply because he can adapt better than Sanju to the conditions with a sound technique and a footwork that actually exists, irrespective of how heavily inconsistent he may be. He is still 25 and shown capability to perform in the swing bowls. He did very well in Aussie tour, did score a fifty in Ireland tour despite one failure, and just now another fifty in England so he has some potential to perform overseas and he is excellent against pace and swing, though his weak point still being facing spin (although he did well in UAE tracks but again he was mostly facing pace bowlers) and he did struggle against spinners in India itself opps used to send in a spinner at powerplay just to get him dismissed early.

When I think about IHH artists, I always have artists in mind that are superb in one thing but they lack something on the other aspect like a lot of rappers aren't producers and a lot of producers aren't rappers, some of them are but they are very amateur in other fields besides their speciality like KR$NA is a great rapper but sometimes repetitive and doesn't have a production experience like most of the rappers, Raftaar and Emiway have produced songs sometimes but they sound amateurish, Sez and Phenom I have barely saw them rapping or singing, some rappers are good at one type but not at other. MC Stan is a genius producer but his rapping skills can fall short. YYHS is a great producer and singer but his rapping skills are meh. But here is actually someone who is such an all-rounder in the IHH scene.

​

and that ladies and gents in my opinion is Calm aka Siddhant Sharma. Atleast on the mainstream level, I remember those pre-Hurricane days of SM when I was 100% convinced on every track that wasn't produced by Sez then it was produced by Calm himself, he's had so much experience and greatness in production, even the biggest hit of SM Nanchaku was produced by him. He is known for his rapping skills more importantly, he is a proper emcee, battle rapper and one of the greatest performers on the stage. He can do any theme and any kind of rap, whether slow or chopper, whether aggressive or even some poet level stuff or catchy rap stuff however his production skills are mad underrated and it needs more talk in this IHH space. He's genuinely such a multi-talented artist I think it's rare in the DHH scene. We defo need more multi-talented IHH artists. I might be wrong about this if you guys possibly have another contender that can one up Calm in terms of being a multi-talented genius.

I had been thinking of gymming for a while to boost my strength and agility because I felt like a lazy bum and had low strength, my parents were initially reluctant because they feared if my epilepsy will trigger another seizure again by intense physical activity. But after finally some patience, the doctor and my parents both gave me a pass and I got enrolled to my nearest gym.

Had a pretty cool day out there, 1 km on treadmill for 12 minutes switching gears from 4 kmph to 8 kmph at regular intervals, 100 calories burnt in crossfit while covering over 1 km again. Spent 5 minutes in cycling machine. That was it for the cardios, then finally went to strength training I was waiting for, didn't take much risks to avoid any triggers and made a light yet a slightly productive start.

Started with basics like stretching and squats. Used 2.5 kg of dumbbells for 10x3 shoulder presses on weight bench, then 5x3 pushups, then 10x3 lat pulldowns with 15 kgs, then 5x3 pull-ups through assisted pull up machine, then did some shoulder/back based exercise through a band machine which idk the name but did it 10x2 and, then went onto 15x1 finger curls on forearm machine and to finally put an end to the gym session for the day, I rounded it off with 10x3 finger curls with 5 kg weight plate. That was it for the day. Will be following this template for like 2 weeks consistently before taking some things one notch up or bring more exercises to the routine.

​

Was in the mood of wanting to make an egg dish, so decided to experiment with Shakshuka.

I made tomato puree from scratch which was a messy process because it was my first timer

then sauted onions and garlic, added the boiled tomatoes after peeling it. Cooked it, cooled it down later and grinded it all, added some oil for taste, grinded water to make it a bit thinner and grinded it again for the final time

then I saute chopped onions and capsicum, added tomato puree and spices and then placed 3 eggs and their placements was just 😭 I was trying to create a space but the puree immediately occupied it again and again and all 3 of eggs went on the edges mostly. Although it was a lowk success because it did taste delicious in the end just the egg got a bit too hard boiled.

and to follow the tradition, I will eat this from the pan with rotis (not so traditional but that's all I had to eat with)

When I personally look back at Rohit's career specially his ODI career, I really feel like how did this guy got such a long rope despite a mediocre run but he ended up becoming a legend and became one of the very successful batters & captain of the format. His Test career and T20I career consisted of ups and downs but they also had relatively got better with the time specially in T20Is at the twilight of his career in the shortest format. By late bloomers, I don't just mean players who played late and shined. The meaning of being a late bloomer here meant that someone who was a very mediocre performer back then turned into an absolute beast late on.

But here I specifically analysed his ODI career which was divided into two parts : pre-2015 era and post-2015 era.

Pre-2015 era

Innings - 120

Runs - 3752 runs

Avg - 37.89

Strike Rate - 81.01

100s/50s - 4/20

Ducks - 8

Best Score - 264

The slow start

This was the beginning of Rohit's career, he was called into the side as a batting all-rounder who was an offspinner and a middle order batter. A couple of good innings at the start showed glimpses of talent and he was backed on that aspect. But then it was an absolutely mediocre run for Rohit in the format, he didn't had a test debut till 2013 and was going very average in T20Is as well. But in ODIs, he was hitting a new low every year. He did score 2,000 runs in ODIs at one point but he was one of the slowest batters to do it specially amongst the Indians. He had a terrible strike rate of just above 80s even when he was a middle order batter for major part of his career till then which is unacceptable for the 2010s era. He wasn't great with the ball either so he was clearly looking to transition from an all-rounder to a pure batter. Players at this modern day and age get a small time to prove themselves with competition piling up everyday but here was someone whose potential was still trusted.

He was backed on the basis of his potential ceiling and later the era of Viru-Tendulkar-Gauti ended at the top which meant fresh faces at the top, Dhawan-Kohli were a lock as they were doing great and continued to do so, Rohit eventually made it but still did not assure his place and was still questioned. Champions Trophy 2013 loomed around and there were discussions of removing him to make Murali Vijay or Dinesh Karthik open at the top. When the squad was announced, it raised eyebrows as it features axing of experienced names like Yuvraj Singh, Gautam Gambhir, Harbhajan Singh, Virender Sehwag while persisting with a youngster like Rohit who was yet to show any signs of going big despite being backed a lot. He was sent as their trusted opener when the tournament started, he had a decent tournament and ended as a Top 5 run scorer of the tournament, an improvement but still unsatisfactory and something big could have been expected. Then came the Australia series and that was where things changed for good, Rohit finally found his tempo and scored 2 gigantic hundreds with great striking - one being the 141 and the other being a generational pull 209 special. This series was career changing for Rohit because guaranteed if he failed this series he could have been axed for the first time and any other player could have cashed in. Then came the Sri Lankan series almost an year past that 209 knock in the same month and in one of the games he smashed the highest individual ODI score, he scored 264 runs off just 173 balls. This was finally where Rohit started finding his foot. So at this stage, Rohit was a batter who had an high potential ceiling and was backed for much longer than expected, he had a peak from late 2013 to late 2014 which made his stats go from bad to okay-ish.

Post-2015

Innings - 154

Runs - 7825

Avg - 56.7

Strike Rate - 99.66

100s/50s - 28/38

Ducks - 8

Best - 208*

The ultimate comeback

This is the phase where Rohit Sharma proves why he is one of the finest in the world. Starting right away from a brilliant century against Australia where he scored 138 which did went in vain but it was an amazing start to the year. Then came 2015 WC, it was first time where the results felt satisfactory for Rohit, he scored a playoff ton against Bangladesh in QF and overall scored 330 runs with 2 half-century and 1 century which is not bad at all. He continued this great form throughout the year and this was finally the first year where it felt like Rohit was on top of the world. More importantly he started scoring runs at a much efficient and faster rate. He had few failures but he finally gained consistency and stopped relying on rare daddy scores to have his stats look decent-ish.

This continued throughout and he just continued to age like a fine wine. He scored a double century again against Sri Lanka in 2017. His tournament game got better with time too, If WC15 went good then CT17 went even better and WC19 was just boundless, he was the leading run scorer of the tournament and hit runs for fun almost every game. He averaged over 50 every single year between 2015 and 2020 with a small lean patch of 2021-22 where he did okay-ish but found pace again and in WC23, we saw a completely different Rohit. It wasn't about him topping run charts now it was about how he would put his team to the best position so that others can cash in and accumulate to build in middle while Rohit sets a platform with brisk starts in powerplay, he kept this up even till the final, he led his side to an almost perfect campaign before the ultimate final heartbreak. He did not have the greatest of tournaments in CT25 till the final but came the big moment came the big man to score runs and put India ahead even when they did struggle after a while. From being one of the slowest batters to reach 2k runs to being one of fastests to achieve 10k, Rohit came a long way from being what could have been an ordinary and outstretched career to being an absolute ace of the game. This is one of the times where banking on potential for long term actually paid dividends even when it did not go well initially.

There have been a lot of discussions to have a new captain for KKR in IPL 2027 specially with the fact that Rahane has neither delivered it for the team with the bat and even with the captaincy he fell short in the two seasons. He does not have a captaincy mind for T20 cricket and is nearing retirement. Now here a lot of names come in like Yashasvi, Rinku, Green, Hardik, Pant or even Manish Pandey to an extent but practically speaking the existing players we have aren't reliable leaders, the most trusted could be Rinku but he lacks communication skills. The other names aren't possible to pull in because either the team where they are aren't gonna leave them or they don't fit the team. But here's one practical and the most possible solution for having a new captain which is short term yet useful. I know this might sound emotional but hold on for a second.

and that ladies and gents, is Suryakumar Yadav. He's been off-form recently, he's soon to be dropped from T20Is entirely. His season with MI has gone bad this year too and even his Mumbai T20 League game is going abysmal. Surya's form with the bat is a concern but then, he's a T20 wizard. He's the leader that we actually need. Even Gautam Gambhir called him the biggest loss of KKR and while he was at KKR, he made him VC in 2015 out of everyone that was performing till 2017.

Gautam Gambhir saw Surya as his successor and placed bets on his career to go big once he is in the spotlight of team plans and now I see why, once he left us he played for MI and became their best batter in history. He's out of form and all but then, he's a champion player and champions know how to bounce back. I would love it if we get Suryakumar Yadav in trade as the captain material.

Forget about improving the team, he can literally win us a trophy. He has an elite mind in T20 cricket. He has not lost a bilateral series, won Asia Cup and T20WC. He has a calm composure and a solid temperament that a great captain is needed to have, he uses his resources very well. Also him coming to the team helps the balance. Surya is a natural no.4 batter so that means Finn, Raghuvanshi and Green will bat at their best positions as well with Finn-Raghu opening and Green playing at no.3 and then Surya at no.4 and then the rest of batters/all-rounders. Almost everyone will play at their natural positions and the batting lineup will be more stable than ever. Also Surya's presence helps in the team, he will bring such a good vibe to the team, not just that but the other players who may lead KKR in future like Rinku, Green or even Raghuvanshi can learn something from him before he retires. Surya can easily give us 2 years if comes to us, might even be 4 at max if he succeeds and he finds his form with bat too and retire peacefully. What do you think lads? I would love for a homecoming to happen, would you?