This is what Chanderpaul had to say: https://www.espncricinfo.com/video/i-was-forced-to-retire-by-wicb-chanderpaul-968357

And the argument that his form was not good is simply not true. Chanderpaul scored 648 runs in 2014-15, at an average of 43.20. His batting average may look ordinary, but this includes runs scored in a few tough bilateral series. And the issue of selection has been raised by many players of Indian origin, including Ravi Rampaul. And in case of Rampaul, he was told that he can't be selected in the national team because he belonged to a different race:

https://www.cricketcountry.com/news/west-indies-selectors-told-i-was-not-picked-because-of-how-i-look-on-tv-says-ravi-rampaul-441512

Finally.  

I don't know whether he had any positive contribution to the team during all these years when he "coached" them. But he was one of the lucky ones. India was winning bilateral series on a constant basis against very tough opposition and he was also praised for that (irrespective of whether he had any direct contribution or not). And from what I heard, most of the coaching staff will be gone after the world cup. Apart from Shastri, this includes Bharat Arun, Vikram Rathour and Ramakrishnan Sridhar (respectively the coaches for bowling, batting and fielding). 

This is really funny. The CCP guys want to live in their dreamland and don't want to face the reality. Anyone remember the big push to make CNY the global trade currency two decades ago? Back then it failed, because CNY was regarded as the most manipulated one among the dozens of fiat currencies. And now they want to replace BTC with e-CNY, similar to how they attempted to replace USD with CNY two decades ago. Why can't these guys come in to terms with the truth? No one wants to do anything with their crappy national currency. Even US Dollar looks priceless when compared with the CNY. 

Next maybe Ecuador. In all the other Latin American nations, the national currency is in circulation (including Venezuela). Awarding Bitcoin the same legal status as these currencies may put the national governments at a disadvantage, as it will weaken the national currency. And that will definitely happen. If Bitcoin is awarded the status of legal tender, then I am 100% sure that the national currencies will get devalued. And that is the reason why I am more optimistic about Ecuador. They don't have a national currency since 2000, when Ecuadorian Sucre was replaced with the US Dollar.

Can you mention the country you are residing in? When I see posts like this, it is very difficult to make out what is happening. Because there can be several factors behind this 2x rise in the prices. It can be due to the devaluation of local currency, due to blockades and embargoes, or even due to political upheavals. Here in Singapore, the food prices have remained largely flat for the last 5-6 years. My relatives in India are also saying the same. But I have heard from my friends in other countries that they are witnessing an increase in food prices.

Have you ever experienced living in poverty? It is easier to say like this. But in reality, 99% of the people just want to live comfortably, even if that means that they are living under an authoritarian regime. Just go and ask the ordinary Venezuelans whether they would be willing to swap their passports with the Chinese. I am sure that 90% plus would opt for that. Go to any poor country, and you will get the same response. Democracy is essentially the dictatorship of the majority. So what makes it any different from the system that they have in China?

This time the European and American teams were at a disadvantage, because the Games took place in Asia. But the next edition is scheduled to take place in Paris, and therefore the disadvantage should be for Asian teams like China and Japan. And I have serious doubts regarding the future of China in sports. Their population is rapidly ageing, and this reduces the player pool. 

There are some positive developments happening. Today there was an announcement from the ICC that they would try their best to get cricket included in the 2028 Olympic Games. I don't know whether they are honest about this, but it is a good sign. The turning point was the appointment of Sourav Ganguly as the head of the BCCI. Once the opposition from BCCI gone, the ECB also had to change their stance (although half-heartedly). Cricket is moving in the right direction, and it will remain like that as long as we keep people like Srinivasan and Pawar away from the administration.

I am not sure about Smith. He is a legendary cricketer as far as test format is concerned. But in T20 format, he can be quite ordinary. Even in the IPL, he was a big failure. Only during the 2021 season, he contributed something with the bat for his IPL franchise, and during the previous editions he was a failure. The same happened previously with some of the other legendary players as well, such as Shivnarine Chanderpaul. Perhaps he should retire from T20 and concentrate on the longer format. But unfortunately for him, the salaries are quite low for the national side.

The cost is just huge. For example, the Russian government claims that it spent around $50 billion for the winter Olympics at Sochi (the opposition claims that most of it was stolen by Putin's proxies). And this time, the Japanese government estimated the cost of hosting the games at $15.4 billion. Not many countries can afford this much expense. And gone are the days when the population would blindly support such huge spending, just because of national pride. People still support sports, but at a lower level compared to the case two decades back.

The justification being given is that the TV broadcasters only want 8-10 teams to participate in the ICC events. But I suspect that the real reason is to divert ICC funds to a small number of nations, thereby increasing the share of revenue to the big-3 teams. "Globalization" of cricket was the brainchild of Jagmohan Dalmiya, who dominated both the BCCI and ICC before he was overthrown by a combined trans-national cabal of politicians and businessmen (Dalmiya was also a businessman, but he had a passion for cricket). The other camp wanted to reverse all the decisions made by Dalmiya and that was also one of the reasons why the funding for associates were reduced.

Just because the exchange rates are going up every year, we can't assume that Bitcoin is not suitable for usage as a currency. Gold is a perfect example of some asset that has been used as a currency for long. A few decades ago, fiat currency used to be backed up by either gold or silver. And even now, in some cases, gold coins are being used in payments. I am not saying that Bitcoin will rise to that level anytime soon, but it shows that being a speculative asset is not a barrier to being used in payments.

What to say? They can't blame the surface, as Bangladesh batted first and set up a decent total. I was watching the match live, and not even once I got an impression that the track was like a minefield. This time they couldn't even make in to three digits. And this is like the worst time for Australia to perform poorly, because the T20 world cup is only a couple of months away. There was hardly anything positive from this series for Australia. Mitchell Marsh was performing OK for the initial matches, but he also failed in the last couple of matches.

4%? I don't think so. Crude oil was trading at $48 per barrel at the start of this year. And a few weeks back, it had climbed to $75 per barrel. Oil importing nations are witnessing a rise in Consumer Price Index (CPI) without any exception. But these countries should blame themselves first. Very few of them accumulated oil, when it was trading at $35-$40 per barrel last year. Even major oil importers like India failed to increase their crude oil reserves significantly. Now the common people are paying for the mistakes of the government.

It is not beneficial to the board, but definitely it is beneficial to the players. If a player takes part in all the three formats, and at the same time he participates in 2-3 franchise T20 leagues, then he will be hardly having any free time. For the Indian players, it may be OK. Because they don't take part in foreign franchise T20 leagues. But take the case of someone like Kieron Pollard or David Warner. It is not possible for these guys to play in all the three formats, because they will be busy with multiple T20 leagues.

Don't expect it to repeat again and again. The cryptocurrency sector was entirely unprepared for the manipulation by Elon, and on top of that there were several other contributing factors, such as the mining ban in China. Elon initially supported Bitcoin and then suddenly changed his stance. And this caused a rout in the market. But now everyone is prepared and I don't think that similar manipulation will ever be repeated. I am curious about Amazon. I want to know which route they want to take. Are they going to create their own crypto, similar to the earlier plans by FB? Or are they going to manipulate the market, like Tesla? Or can we expect them to adopt a mutually beneficial approach, similar to PayPal?

Robert Mugabe allied with the Soviet bloc during the cold war. And ironically this meant that even the left-wing US politicians had to support minority white governments in the three southern African nations (Zimbabwe, South Africa and Namibia). Botswana, Swaziland and Lesotho were like buffer states under the influence of South Africa, while the other two countries (Mozambique, Angola) had communist regimes in power and the rebels (UNITA/RENAMO) were supported by South Africa and the NATO bloc nations.

Australia should get a win today, else the outcome of the series would look similar to what they got in West Indies last month. Australia made a few mistakes in their team selection. They selected raw pacers like Mitchell Starc, who are not suitable in such conditions. Starc conceded a lot of runs, and that played a part in their defeats. Also, the Australian spinners couldn't adjust with the ground conditions. Their line and length was not suitable for such tracks. The only Australian bowler who impressed me was Josh Hazlewood.

There is US monopoly in certain team sports like basketball. That ensures a number of gold medals in the last two days. But overall, this time the performance of the American athletes were below par. They performed extremely poorly in gymnastics (perhaps with the exception of Sunisa Lee). And then in track and field also, they were below par. This time they won a total of 39 gold medals, which is far lower when compared to what they received in 2016 Rio (46 golds, 37 silver). And despite biased judges and a ban from the IOC, Russia actually improved their medal tally from 2016.

Here in my country, the only food item which witnessed an increase in price is chicken. Other items have remained largely stable - other meats, fruits, vegetables.etc. And here we import most of the foodstuff and therefore if there was a global increase in food prices, then it should be first felt here. But I am yet to notice any such thing. However, as a result of the crude oil prices going up, overall the retail prices are increasing everywhere. And if your national currency is weak, then it will amplify the impact.