Much has made the cricket news headlines this DLF IPL, and indeed it is what Lalit Modi has specifically engineered to keep his brain child up and visible at all times and sometimes at all costs. When Shane Warne’s little beer drinking episode happened and the cricket news latched on to it with relish even if it was an inconsequential little bagatelle. Modi probably smiled a benign little smile because it all added to the entertainment factor of the IPL and after all, in showbiz, no publicity is bad publicity!

South Africa may have been the saving grace for the DLF IPL this year, but the unique conditions and the pitches there have ensured that we have had some low scoring matches, and bowlers getting in on the action that in T20 matches is usually batsman dominated. Rather than mammoth totals we have seen sides struggle to chase 150 and bowlers controlling the proceedings on many occasions.

Then there have been the expensive and the high profile who have failed to perform. Take the Kolkata Knight Riders team, certainly the most visible IPL team in the cricket news. Always in the thick of cricket controversy whether for a multiple captain theory, racial divides within the team or a non performing captain, this is one team that has been high on visibility and abysmally low on performance. The team has a glamorous team owner in Shah Rukh Khan and the best publicity mechanism in place, but alas it also has the worst performance of any team by far in the DLF IPL 2009.

With the exception of the big three Aussies, Matthew Hayden, Adam Gilchrist and Shane Warne, other big guns of India as well as of the international cricket arena have simply failed to fire. Notable flops have been Brendon McCullum, the very expensive Kevin Pietersen and Andrew Flintoff, and even Sanath Jayasuriya and Chris Gayle. Sachin (Tendulkar) and Sehwag (Virender) started off with the customary bang, but so far it appears as though the end will be with a metaphoric whimper.

Probably the biggest irritant this year in the IPL has to be ‘Strategic Time out’ which causes an absolutely unnecessary lull in the proceedings and stops the momentum of the game for the viewers as well as the players. We will doubtless have statistics of 11th over dismissals and upsets in place soon. This is in the interests of no one except the commercial interests of the sponsors.

And talking of commercial interests, there is the very obvious reminder of commercial interests being paramount when seasoned commentators suddenly take to referring to sixes as DLF Maximum and big wickets as CITI Moments of Success. It may annoy some of us, but it is definitely a sign of the way that international cricket will be run in times to come.

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3.25 Copyright (C) 2007 Alain Georgette / Copyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved."

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