reflect on Vinces form and decide if Moeen did enough here. Had Stokes not been injured, there | Forum

Services boxer Duryodhan Singh Negi has not been troubled in the ring so far at the Senior Boxing nationals. Stitched Custom Soccer Jerseys . On Monday in Guwahati, he breezed into the welterweight (69kg) finals and assured himself of a silver medal with a comfortable unanimous decision against Prayag Chauhan of Delhi.Assam hasnt always been this welcoming for Negi. On the night of December 22 eight years ago, things were far less pleasant. Back then, Negi wasnt in a brightly lit air-conditioned boxing hall, but in the chilly Eastern Garo foothills under a near-moonless night. Negi wasnt skipping around the canvas in ring shoes, but stepping as silently as he could through dense jungle terrain in army combat boots. Instead of boxing gloves, he had a loaded AK-47 rifle in his hands.Negi was part of a unit of 4th Kumaon that was conducting a patrol in Assams Goalpara district. They were on the lookout for members of the terrorist organization ULFA. Negi remembers they had been on alert for nearly three days. We were sleeping in the open while others kept watch, he says. I remember how cold it was and that I had had perhaps one hour of sleep in that time. Our eyes were red and we were very tired. But we got a word from an informer that the terrorists were nearby, so we kept going.Negi remembers the moment his commanding officer saw a flashlight -- by his estimate 30-40 metres away. There was no reason for it to be there, he says. When we heard a Kalashnikov being cocked, we knew had found them.Negi describes the ambush his team set up. Two of our soldiers flanked them and fired from their sides, he says. I had to provide suppressive fire from the front. There was a major firefight for about an hour. I couldnt see anything but since we knew they were above us in the mountain, I just kept firing into where we first saw the torch.The next morning, the troops recovered the bodies of two militants and captured another who was injured.Negi shrugs at the tale. Thats what you had to do if you were a sipahi (soldier), he says.Indeed thats what Negi was. Unlike the other members of the Services team, he didnt join the armed forces under the sports quota but rather as a regular jawan.Most of the boxers from the services team are boys who we brought in through the sports quota. For a jawan to rise through the ranks and reach this level in the nationals is incredibly hard. it is just raw talent,?Brigadier Murali Raja, former president of the Indian boxing federation, said about Negi.The eldest son of a farmer in Uttarakhands Pithoragarh district, Negi enlisted in the army in 2004, when he was 19. He had no knowledge of boxing then. Im from a poor family, he says. I joined the army to escape poverty. Sports was never a priority for us.Negis first encounter with the ring was far from pleasant. In 2006, when his unit was stationed in Solan, Himachal Pradesh, Negi was told to box in an inter-battalion tournament. They didnt give me the option of saying no, he says. They told me it was an order. I was very scared. There was a temple near the boxing ring and I remember praying there: God, dont let someone break my nose or put my eye out.Negis nose wasnt fractured and after one month of basic coaching, he was selected to fight the inter-battalion tournament, which he won. Everyone else was even worse than I was, he jokes. The tournament would be the last bit of training for Negi for four years as he followed his unit to Assam.There was no time to box, he says. We would be constantly following up information from our sources and then patrolling or setting up ambushes. Most of the time, we wouldnt get anything but every once in a while we engaged the enemy.It was only in 2010 -- when 4th Kumaon were posted out of Assam to Nagrota in Jammu & Kashmir -- that Negi got a chance to resume his hitherto brief fling with boxing. As someone who was believed to have boxing experience owing to his stint four years before, Negi was picked up by his unit and told to prepare for the army nationals. Despite no practice of any discernable standard, Negi kept winning. He eventually picked up a silver medal, losing to a boxer who had joined the army under the sports quota.The result was enough for him to be chosen to train at the Army Sports Institute in Pune. And at the ripe old age of 27, Negi began his career as a full-time boxer.He couldnt have chosen a worse time. The Indian Amateur Boxing Federation would be banned the very same year. Negi would continue to practice in Pune but had few opportunities to show his abilities. He would make the most of his chances. At the 2014 boxing nationals in Nagpur -- which were subsequently termed unsanctioned -- Negi won the gold in the light welterweight (64kg) division. He subsequently participated in the 2015 Presidents Cup in Indonesia, where he lost in the quarterfinals.Negi isnt the most skillful boxer and, at 171 cm, doesnt have the best reach. But observers say he more than makes up for these shortcomings with his high work rate. While his conditioning during his time in the army certainly helped, Negi credits his endurance to his growing up in the Himalayan mountains around Pithoragarh.Having assured himself of a silver medal at the senior boxing nationals, Negi will be part of the national camp once more. Theres no doubt in his mind that boxing is far easier than soldiering.Its a lot easier to be a boxer than to be an army jawan, he says. You can take risks in boxing. You can let yourself be open up to punches if you think that you have a chance to hit back as well. But when you are on a mission, you dont want to put yourself in danger. Negis experience in combat has also made him something of a hero among the other members of the camp as well as his teammates in the Services team. Nearly all of them [with the exception of heavyweight Satish Kumar] have joined the army through the sports quota, he says. Many of them have never even fired a gun. So they keep asking me to tell them stories of my time as a soldier.Boxing has benefitted him too, letting him rise through the ranks faster than he would have as an enlisted man. By winning the nationals in 2014, I was given a promotion to havildar (sergeant), he says. That would have taken me 15 years, but I got the promotion in 11 years.And while he is grateful for the chance to box, Negi admits he sometimes misses his life as an infantryman. I still speak to the soldiers from my unit, he says. They tell me stories about their missions and I miss the excitement of it.For the moment though, Negi says his goal is to break out in the welterweight division. It wont be easy. At 31, Negi is easily among the older active boxers in India. Yet he is confident he can make it -- if not for himself, then for the honour of his unit.Fourth Kumaon has a lot of firsts, he says. [Major Somnath Sharma of] our unit won the first Param Vir Chakra. We were also the first to capture Siachin Glacier [Operation Meghdoot in 1984] and we did it without any specialized equipment. Now I want to make the unit proud through my boxing. If I win a medal at the Commonwealth or Asian Games, that will also be a big achievement for them. Wholesale Custom Soccer Jerseys Online . -- Team after team passed on Andre Ellington in the draft. Cheap Custom Jerseys . As he recorded his 23rd and 24th points of the evening, a segment of the sellout Air Canada Centre crowd expressed their appreciation for the Raptors point guard with a smattering of MVP chants. http://www.soccerjerseyscustom.com/ . -- Charlie Graham stopped 67 shots as the Belleville Bulls edged the visiting Guelph Storm 6-5 on Saturday in Ontario Hockey League action. Just as nobody wanted to ask Usain Bolt how much quicker he might have gone had he not slowed down before the line in the 2008 Olympics, so it seems churlish to pick holes in Englands performance Old Trafford.England have, after all, just completed the fifth-largest victory - in terms of runs - in their Test history. Joe Root showed that he is continuing to develop as a batsman and has the skill and intelligence to adapt his game to the situation. Alastair Cook, whose decision not to enforce the follow-on was vindicated, continues to produce at the top of the order and Chris Woakes emergence as an international-quality bowler provides the strength in depth that England have been searching for in the seam department.This is a more than respectable Pakistan team and they were hammered. It is 1-1 with two to play and the Edgbaston pitch may well suit England better than any other in the series.But the fact is that England came into the summer with questions to answer about several areas in their side. Notably, they were unclear over the identity of the most suitable partner for Cook at the top of the order, unclear about at least one of the middle-order positions, unsure about their keeper, their spinner and their first-change bowler.So, five Tests later, how much progress have they made?The answer is a little. But whether they are improving as a side or being dragged along by the improvement in their best young player is open to debate. It remains entirely possible that England will go to India later this year with a new opening batsman, a new first-choice spinner and a new face in the middle-order.To some extent, this is positive. If England can win against decent sides despite performing at something around 75% of potential, they clearly have the scope to develop into a fine side.And there have been positives. Woakes seems to have come of age at this level and might, before the year is out, give the selectors some interesting decisions to make if they decided to go into Tests in Asia with fewer seamers. While he does not quite ease the pain of losing Ben Stokes for Edgbaston, he does reduce it. The last time England had two such fine allrounders was arguably in the brief period in the late 1970s in which Ian Botham and Tony Grieg played together.In this match, too, Jonny Bairstow produced an admirable performance with the gloves. There were only two catches, but there were no drops, few fumbles and only two byes in total. He still has questions to answer, but this was a step in the right direction.Most of all, there was the performance of Root. If, in the first innings, he demonstrated the discipline and restraint required to succeed at No. 3, in the second he demonstrated the strokeplay and selflessness to prove he can adapt as his side requires. Afterwards Cook referred to his double-century as a great innings and one of the best he had ever seen while Misbah-ul-Haq described it as amazing. It was hard to disagree. Root really does look as if he is developing into a special player.So it is probably inevitable that England should rely upon him and Cook. Just as Sri Lanka once relied upon Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene, Australia relied upon Allan Border and South Africa now rely on Hashim Amla and AB de Villiers. To some extent, that is the inevitable burden of excellence.In the end, that was the difference between this Test and the first. While at Lords, Root top-edged an overly aggressive slog-sweep, here he made sure he took advantage and, as Cook put it, ground Pakistan down. England took advantage of winning the toss, they werent in a rush with the bat or their tactics and they still won with more than a day to spare. There is a lesson there.The concern - or perhaps it is just a gripe - is that Rooot and Cooks success is masking some pretty modest returns from the rest of the top-order. Custom Soccer Jerseys Outlet. Roots move to No. 3 has opened a hole at No. 4, with Alex Hales, Gary Ballance and James Vince all struggling to supply contributions so far this series.It is Vinces form that is most concerning. He is not just falling for low scores - he is averaging 18.57 after seven Test innings - but failing in predictable ways. His first-innings failure here, edging a drive at a ball angled across him, came in spite of a life earlier in the innings attempting the same stroke. The failure to learn does not bode well.If Vince is dropped - and Stokes injury may save him - it does not mean the end for him. Many players have found their first taste of international cricket tough but have returned to county cricket with more knowledge of the standards required to succeed at this level. He has the talent to come again.Ballance has only had three innings in this series - one of them quite impressive - so probably deserves a longer run to prove himself, while Hales surely did enough in the Sri Lanka games to earn a place for the rest of this series. He is not at the stage, though, where he can be said to have secured the opening position and is clearly struggling against the swing of Mohammad Amir. How he overcomes that very specific challenge in the next two Tests may define his career in this format.Moeen Alis form is a worry, too. While he has the third-best average of any English spinner (with more than five Test wickets) since the war, he also has the worst average of any England bowler with more than 20 Test wickets this century.He took five wickets at Old Trafford - a reflection of Pakistans policy of trying to destroy him as much as any particularly wonderful bowling - but seems to have developed a worrying habit of delivering a head-high full toss an innings, which betrays a man struggling for form and confidence. England deserve credit for sticking with him - Cook has developed as a captain in that regard - but Adil Rashid continues to push hard for inclusion. It could well be that both men play on an Edgbaston track that tends to turn as the game progresses.The truth is, England rather got away with their errors in Manchester. They got away with Cooks missed slip chance on the fourth day - had Younis Khan been at a different stage of his career, he may have punished them - and they got away with a top order that offered contributions from two players. So dominant were Englands seamers and two of their top three that it made little difference that Hales, Ballance and Vince struggled.Theres still work to do, Cook said. Theres still inexperience in that batting line-up. Three of the top five are pretty inexperienced. We still have a couple of years to go as a side.But that presupposes that experience will improve players. It might, of course. But it might also show they are not quite up to the standard required. It remains a bit early to draw conclusions about a couple of this top order. As a result, it is a bit early to gauge how much improvement England have made.Selection for the next Test will be intriguing. As well as trying to find a replacement for Stokes - there is surely no way he will be fit for next Wednesday - England must also reflect on Vinces form and decide if Moeen did enough here. Had Stokes not been injured, there was a chance that England could have picked Rashid in place of Vince for Edgbaston. But now they must decide if they also want a replacement seamer and how much batting is required. For a side who have just achieved a huge win, they have quite a lot of thinking to do. ' ' '