India will play its last, inconsequential match against Namibia today and then they will all go home.
For the first time in about 9 years India has failed to qualify for the semi-finals of the T20 World Cup.
There will be much analysis by idiot experts and expert idiots, by journalists and sociologists, by coaches and hangers-on, by talk-show hosts and politicians, by pundits and imams, by celebrities and other ignoramuses, and sometimes by the knowledgeable. We will hear variously that:
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- the IPL is prioritised over playing for the country,
- the BCCI failed,
- the BCCI is only interested in money
- Ravi Shastri had no interest,
- there is too much cricket,
- team selection was wrong,
- the timing was wrong for the tournament,
- it was not an auspicious time,
- the batsmen failed,
- the bowlers had too much to do
- it was bad luck or bad karma
- India team players are not hungry enough,
- the matches were fixed,
- Virat Kohli is well past it,
- Rishab Pant is a buffoon,
- Harthik Pandya is crude and over-rated,
- …………
The real reasons claimed might seem quite simple.
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2 +0 +2 + 1 ≠ 8
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2 +0 +2 + 1 = 5 which is not divisible by 3
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The team uniform was the wrong shade of blue
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It was too hot by 1.5 ⁰C (climate change).
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But the one true reason, of course, is that