In this episode of Cricket Chinwag, Anand Vasu and Jaideep Varma look back at India’s commanding win over New Zealand in the World Cup final. They discuss New Zealand’s toss decision, the team selection call to leave out off-spin, and why putting India in to bat may have handed the advantage straight to the eventual champions. The conversation then turns to India’s batting, with special focus on Sanju Samson’s third straight 80-plus score in a knockout game, Shivam Dube’s underrated value, an...

Cricket Chinwag is a cricket podcast where Anand Vasu and Jaideep Varma break down the game with clarity, rigour, and respect for your intelligence. Each episode dives into tactics, selection calls, match-ups, and the numbers behind the headlines, offering context you won’t get from post-match soundbites.Anand prefers words to numbers, concepts to certainties, and trusts his feel for the game, earned from nearly three decades of watching, reporting, and thinking about cricket as a journalist. He brings shape and narrative to the discussion, grounding arguments in experience and instinct, and along the way shares some of the best stories he has picked up from the game over the years.Jaideep Varma is a writer, director, and long-time cricket obsessive who brings an analytical, data-led lens to the conversation, backed by an endearingly unhinged conviction that he knows best. Irritatingly, he is right a lot of the time. He is also the author of Impact Index, which evaluates the importance of performances within the context of a match or series, rather than through raw numbers alone.From Test-match tempo and ODI strategy to T20 innovations and domestic cricket, Cricket Chinwag is for listeners who enjoy the conversation but care even more about the substance.