What ails the IPL

“Now that the IPL is over, I have no idea what I’m going to do after getting back from work every day. It was the one thing that used to keep the entire family interested - I love it, my wife preferred it to saans-bahu melodramas, even my six year old son would rather watch the IPL than his cartoons. I suppose it’s back to the soaps for my wife and back to cartoons for my son; what am I supposed to do with myself?” One of my friends who still lives in Mumbai told me this just after the last IPL. I may have paraphrased this slightly, and it’s not verbatim, but this captures the sentiments that I’ve heard from a few others who live in India.

Regardless of whether you think IPL should be the only form of cricket that’s acceptable in this day and age, or whether you are firmly in the camp that believes in wearing yellow and orange ties to cricket games and consider T20 to be a form of hit-and-giggle cricket that’s only enjoyed by imbeciles, the fact remains that the IPL is here to stay. Personally, I’m somewhere in between. Although the quality of fielding and umpiring can be atrocious at times, there is some high quality cricket in between the circus and the condensed format makes drama almost impossible to avoid. However, as I semi-passively followed the seventh version of the IPL unfold, I couldn’t help get the feeling that despite its widespread appeal, there are a few flies in the ointment, as it were, that the league needs to work on. There is one really important element that the league needs to get right in order to ensure the worldwide appeal and longevity of the league that it took it’s name from - the English Premier League.

Let’s start off trying to define a seemingly straightforward concept: What's loyalty in a sporting context? For the average English or Spanish soccer fan, that used to be an easy one to answer. It usually meant that your father or grandfather grew up supporting the Local Club and you ended up following weekend matches at their knee and the choice of which team to support was not so much a choice as it was a responsibility that was handed down to you, like a worn jersey. It used to mean buying season tickets, clocking up countless miles through rain and sleet to hostile away games and sticking by your team through thick and thin. The widespread reach of sport via television and the internet has meant a wider fan base and these days, a Manchester United cafe is just as likely to sprout in Kuala Lumpur as in Manchester (or London, as the old joke about plastic Manchester United "fans" goes).

Cricket has no history of club based competition, for the most part. T20 started this trend and the IPL has been the torch bearer in truly internationalizing the appeal of the franchise model to a point where every cricket playing nation hopes to emulate its successes. However, due to the fact that there is no precedent, it is doubly important that the league thinks long and hard about building that elusive, hard-to-define element among its fan base - loyalty. You would imagine loyalty to be developed by three major factors - where you grew up, where your team plays and where your favorite cricketer plays. The trouble is that the IPL makes it hard to support a team based on any of these counts.

I personally have been confused by this since the advent of the IPL. I grew up in Mumbai (Bombay, as I still like to call it), have supported the Indian cricket team since I can remember. I’ve grown up worshipping Sachin Tendulkar, I’ve been a huge fan of Anil Kumble and I think Sourav Ganguly has been the best captain India ever had. Which team do I support then? Mumbai Ranji cricketers have been spread out across the teams, I can’t physically go to games because I literally live on the other side of the globe and I admire cricketers in every team and can’t see myself wishing for Rahane or Raina to fail when Malinga is bowling at them. Could someone help me out here?

I understand that I’m not really the target demographic. The folks who the clever IPL marketers want to turn into season-ticket buying, face painting, jersey wearing loyalists are the kids who grow up in this T20 world and feel the kind of emotion about their IPL team that Priety Zinta feels towards Kings XI Punjab. And currently, there are two real problems that need to be addressed to make this a possibility.

Firstly, the IPL organizers need to sit down and figure out a sustainable model for player transfers. The auction-based approach worked fine for the first season of the tournament, since the league needed to bootstrap, but the fact that almost entire teams are thrown away and new ones built in place every three years makes my head spin sometimes. Consider Robin Uthappa’s journey. He started off playing for the Mumbai Indians, got traded to Bangalore where he played for two seasons before moving to the newly formed Pune Warriors. After the Warriors were liquidated, he ended up moving to KKR where he recently won his first IPL title. Four teams in the span of seven years. Of course, his transfer from Mumbai to Bangalore was the result of an old-fashioned trade and the fact that his employers ceased to exist was beyond his control, but I wouldn’t be surprised if poor Robbie gets slightly confused upon bumping into someone on a cricket field about whether to give him a high five or a stinky eye. Why not allow teams to trade in order to re-balance the team without having to go through a complete overhaul every three years is totally beyond me.

Chennai, in particular, have showed the benefits that could be reaped from sticking to a core to help build a team dynamic (of course, winning a lot tends to help too). It’s natural that a string of losses brings out everyone’s inner Roman Abramovich but a total reset is nothing more than an escape valve and you still need good players and team management to get great results. Don’t believe me? Ask the Delhi Daredevils about their 2014 season.

The other big issue is that the Indian Premier League tends to move quite often to play in places such as South Africa and the Emirates. Somehow, the fact that Chennai did not play a single “home” game at the Chinnaswamy stadium is an utter travesty. I find it hard to imagine the Milan clubs not playing at the San Siro, or the Boston Red Sox playing anywhere other than the legendary Fenway Park. Like the municipal officials who get surprised every year when the monsoons arrive at roughly the same time, the IPL officials were probably too busy counting the moolah to factor in the Indian elections. Here’s a news flash: They happen every five years.

One of the stands at Barcelona’s famous Camp Nou display their famous slogan: ‘Mes Que Un Club’, or ‘More Than A Club’. Although a fairly large part of this logo is politically motivated, this slogan represents what the club seeks to be - more than just the beautiful football that’s played on a weekly basis but an institution, a tradition and a sporting dynasty of sorts. That’s the kind of commitment that’s required for from the IPL clubs and the overall league. It’s not the cheerleaders and the strategic timeouts or the Bollywood groupies, but an aspiration to be more than a league that’ll ensure its long term health. And my friend won’t have to worry about what to watch on television when he gets back home from work for a six-week period every year for a long time to come.

The Sachin Years

Writing about Sachin is a thankless task at most times. It’s a bit like writing about the Beatles. It’s really hard to come up with things that haven’t been chewed, ruminated and digested by legions of cricket fans all over the globe. The awkward teen doing a TV interview with Tom Alter with insanely high waist-ed trousers, the practise sessions that were motivated by a 1 rupee coin placed on top of a stump by “Achrekar sir”, the vada pavs and the friendship with Vinod Kambli, the rise of Sachin the marketing commodity which coincided perfectly with Manmohan Singh (the Financial Minister avatar) opening up the Indian markets in 1991 and many, many more stories. Because we all have our own private Sachin, I’m going to walk down memory lane and pick my favorite Sachin moments over the years.

The Wonder Years (1989-1992): This was the period when he arrived into our collective consciousness, as a shy 16-year old prodigy. I mean here was a sporting equivalent of Doogie Howser, except that he wasn't fictional. This period was characterized by curiosity, awe and avuncular affection in equal parts. Hordes of middle-aged Indian aunties were seen gushing over this precocious teenager as he walked out to an intense media glare to face the most intimidating fast bowlers from all over: Wasim, Waqar, McDermott, Merv Hughes (“This little prick is going to score more runs than you, AB”), Hadlee … the list goes on. I clearly remember my late grandmother (who could generally not be too bothered what what 22 men dressed in whites did) once come out and watch Sachin, just for the sake of seeing him. “Ha Sachin ka?” Is that Sachin?

After his trial by fire on the Pakistan tour, his near miss at a first test hundred in Napier, he smacked a century at the SCG the same time that a blonde leg-spinner was starting out in international cricket. He even one-upped himself in Perth, cracking a 114 when the rest of the Indian batsmen didn’t know whether they were coming or going, a century Ian Chappell still rates as one of Sachin’s best.

However, it was the ODI World Cup in 1992 (where India were also-rans) that he took on the mantle of being the team’s fulcrum for the first time. Where teams looked at him as a young international freak before, they started to build plans that involved getting him out early. My favorite moment was his stroke filled batting in scoring a half century against Pakistan. This World Cup was what really started my love affair with cricket and Sachin was an integral part of it. It was around this time that the Wonder Years were coming to an end, and his career entered the next phase.

The Lone Ranger (1992-1996): This was a period of great tragedy, or great romance depending on which way you look at it. India had some handy batsmen and bowlers on subcontinent pitches. And there were a couple of good performances here and there (the 1993 Hero Cup win, 3-0 sweeps of England and Sri Lanka at home), India were always a team relying on brilliant individual performances from him to carry them through. This was the period where all the Sachin stereotypes have been built on. There was a commercial on TV at the time that had someone say, “Sachin hai na?” Is Sachin still batting? It captured the mood perfectly. India only had a chance if Sachin was around. Kids who grew up watching cricket in the 2000’s when Sachin had an able support cast will never quite get the desperation of this period.

The lowest low of this time came during the 1996 World Cup semi final against Sri Lanka at the Eden Gardens. It was probably one of the most painful moments as an Indian cricket fan but it captures what supporting India was like at the time more than anything else. After Sachin had been sublime to get India to the brink of a World Cup final, Azhar made the absolutely horrendous call of giving Sri Lanka first use of a newly laid pitch. Chasing just over 250, Sachin made the pitch look like it had no demons in it while he was around. Once he got out for 65, 98/2 became 120/8 and a literal riot ensued. I locked myself up in the bathroom and cried. There were pictures of Vinod Kambli, his childhood friend and teammate, walking off the field of play, crying inconsolably. That pretty much sums up this period for me.

The Golden Years (1996-2005): This Golden Age of Indian cricket actually had more to do with the support cast rather than Sachin himself. As Indian fans, we should thank the likes of Ganguly, Dravid, Sehwag and to a lesser extent Laxman and Yuvraj for taking the pressure off Sachin and allowing himself to express himself without having to be an Atlas every single game. I really do think that without the emergence of these batsmen, Sachin would’ve been broken and would not have lasted in international cricket as long as he did.

There were some disappointments during this time, make no mistake about that. The second innings 136 he made against Pakistan on a difficult pitch against a great bowling attack in Chennai is still, in my mind, his best innings that almost was a throwback to the pre-Ganguly/Dravid era, and the 2003 World Cup final against Australia will continue to rankle. However, this time had some astonishing good displays of batsmanship that were not about Sachin alone - like Dravid and Ganguly’s plundering of Sri Lanka in England in the 1999 World Cup. Inasmuch as Sachin would’ve loved to be part of the fun, I’m sure he enjoyed watching that match and felt some sort of release. There was also the legendary 2001 series against Australia that will be remembered for the Laxman/Dravid partnership, or the Pakistan series for the Sehwag triple.

Sachin provided some masterclasses of his own during this time too, including the 241* against Australia at Sydney which almost spoilt Steve Waugh’s farewell series and his belligerent 98 against Pakistan at the Centurion in the 2003 World Cup. However, the highlight of this period will always be his duels with Shane Warne. Warne dismissed Sachin for 4 in Chennai to elicit a ruthless response from the Master. His 155* in the second innings of the same match in Chennai was probably one of his most complete innings. It only got better in Sharjah when his twin centuries to hand India the trophy were innings of a genius at the top of his craft. One particular moment that lingers on was Warne going around the wicket to pitch it into the rough against him. Warne is animated in his field placings, has an intense look in his eye. Sachin steps out and hammers the first ball over long on’s head. Camera back on Warne who is seen swatting a fly away with a sinking feeling in his gut.

The Second Wind (2005-2013): After going through a lull in the 2005-2007 phase where there were mutterings about whether this would force him to draw the curtain on his long and storied career, his second wind officially started when he scored a couple of sublime 150’s against Australia in the series that will always be remembered for monkey-gate. He ended a hundred drought (by his standards anyway) by smashing a century and followed it up with a 91 to help India seal what would be the last triangular series to feature on the Australian summer calendar. As was his wont, he saved his best for Australia and the 214 he scored against them at Bangalore in an oddly arranged 2-test series in 2010 was as close as he came to perfection during his later years. It’s fitting that his 146 against Dale Steyn’s South Africa at Cape Town will remain his final test century. By then, he was probably not the great player he used to be (still a very, very good one) but used all his cricketing wisdom and experience to hang around and fight his way to what could’ve been a series winning hundred against South Africa.

He also had a couple of fantastic ODI performances during this time. Special mention must go to his 160 against NZ in Hamilton where he showed utter and complete mastery of the format and his 175 against Australia in a losing cause. This period also featured his ODI double century and the 2011 World Cup win. You got the sense that not winning a World Cup always hounded him and that night in Mumbai went a long way to exorcising the ghosts from Eden Gardens ‘96 and Wanderers ‘03.

The lasting memory of Sachin from this phase will always be the heartfelt words of Virat Kohli (“He has carried the nation on his shoulders for 20+ years”) and Yuvraj Singh (“We did it for Sachin”) and the grace Dhoni displayed in letting Sachin-mania take center stage in Mumbai after India had won him the trophy he had craved more than any other in the course of his career.

So how will Sachin be remembered? As the most complete cricketer of his generation. As one of the best role models a young kid could ask for. He has transcended an invisible line to become what I would call a super-sportsman where it’s impossible to mention a sport without thinking of him. It’s like what Pele and Maradona are to football, Federer is to tennis and Schumaker is to F1. He is an ambassador for the sport and cricket is lucky to have an ambassador like him. During his farewell test series characterized by fawning aristocrats tripping over each other, his calm and grace brought sanity to what could have otherwise been an unbearable, over-the-top affair.

So, thank you Sachin. We have taken you for granted for the last 24 years and we now wish you the best of luck to enjoy the next chapter of your life with your family, out of what has been a continuous reality show of an existence. Thanks for the entertainment, thanks for the memories. You were a large part of our childhood growing up and have brought us a lot of happiness over the years, so thank you for that.

So this is what the end of an era feels like. I feel all grown up ...

The tale of two tests

The first couple of matches of the India-England series might remind shrewd observers of elections in R Ashwin's home state of Tamil Nadu. The resemblance is striking. To people who have not been observing Tamil Nadu politics since the beginning of time, I'll explain. Not that I'm an expert but the general principle is fairly straightforward - the AIADMK wins by an absolute landslide margin and as soon as the government finishes it's 5-year term, the opposition party, the DMK, win by an equally mind-boggling majority. Curious onlookers find this behavior extremely perplexing. Future historians might point to the first two test matches of the ongoing India-England series in a similar way: a 9-wicket loss for the visiting team followed by an equally crushing 10-wicket victory. The jury is still out. 

The first morning of the first test match was an interesting sight. Started off being a typical slow, low Indian wicket that Sehwag and co have practically grown up on. A fired up Anderson really put his back behind the first ball and it got up to Sehwag's knees. Barely. Anderson looked broken. Cook might have looked up to the dressing room to see if he could sneak Panesar on to the field and hope that no one would notice. The distance between Lords and the Sardar Patel ground in Ahmedabad is over 4500 miles. At that point, it must have seemed even farther. Finn might have been forgiven for uttering a slight prayer of thanks for his injury. If Freddie Flintoff was watching, he might have thought of his new career as a pugilist as less soul-crushing. I think you get the point by now. 

Pujara reaffirmed his status as one of the best young players to have come out of India off late. Sure, his truer tests will come when he eventually tours on bouncier pitches but he's been up to whatever challenge he's faced thus far. His current average of 71.10 places him firmly between Tendulkar and Bradman (leaning slightly on the Tendulkar side of course, but let's not hold that against him). To quote a Ravi Shastri cliche, he definitely "puts a price tag on his wicket" and at least in the first test, the price was too high for the English attack. When Swann finally got him stumped in the first innings of the second test, his wicket was already worth about 380 runs at that point. He had to wait an eternity to break into the team despite scoring mountains of runs in domestic cricket. When you score a triple century and Ravindra Jadeja shows up and scores a triple on the same pitch, your triple does lose it's sheen a little bit. Most people would've been disheartened but not Pujara. He scored another triple, a few doubles along the way and big hundreds on his off days. Now that he's finally here, he'll make sure he makes it count. Here's hoping the other big scorer in domestic cricket, Ajinkya Rahane, gets his chance soon. 

You can't write a piece of England in any form of cricket without mention of Pietersen. Whether he's acting clueless against spin to lose his middle stump and then goes one step further in the second innings to get bowled behind his legs to a left arm spinner when the ball barely pitches in line with leg stump, it is either extremely entertaining or mighty infuriating, depending on what side you are on. But after he scored a masterful 186 in the second test, almost toying with the attack on a more difficult pitch, you wondered if it was all part of his Grand Plan of luring the Indian spin attack into a false sense of complacency, getting them to play an extra spinner and then pulling off the ultimate hustle. And of course, there can be no mention of the England batting without mentioning their captain courageous Alistar Cook, who joins a long illustrious list of left-handed opening batsmen including the likes of Saeed Anwar, Hayden, Jayasuriya and Gary Kirsten who have been near impossible to dislodge and like villains in a movie who do their job splendidly, you end up hating them despite knowing that it isn't anything personal. 

While Hayden and Sanath would be the kind of villains who would tie you to a rusty iron pillar and badger you with a blunt instrument to get information out of you, Cook is more in the Gary Kirsten mould of baddies. They believe in the long, elaborate forms of torture. Cook is the sort of Bond villain who wears an impeccable tuxedo and does not believe in crude violence. He is more likely to torture you by making you watch The Matrix Revolutions one hundred times in a row. He has been an utter nightmare to bowl to so far. He has managed to dead-bat his way through spin, pace, Harbhajan and anything else India have thrown at him. Honorable mention must also go to Matt Prior. For these two, I have developed a mixture of fear, loathing and eventually grudging respect. I do believe that India's spinners, especially Ashwin, should bowl a lot fuller at Cook and do away with the absolutely senseless strategy of bowling short and keeping a deep point. He has scored a couple of hundreds already - that's a hint that whatever the master plan is, it isn't working. 

At the mention of spinners, it's heartening that Ojha has probably been the pick of the bowlers so far across both tests. Swann hasn't been far behind, but that was expected of him. Ojha would've been more threatening in the second test had here been more pressure from the other end - something that Ashwin failed to create. Messrs Dhoni and Fletcher really need to work out their plans else the series could slip away from them faster than you can say 'Mudhsuden Singh Panesar'. What can you say about that guy? That he took to the Wankhede pitch like a fish would take to water is an understatement. He took to it like a particularly showboating dolphin would take to a water-themed amusement park. The ball left his fingers at the perfect pace, had the perfect dip and bounce and spin and it left the so-called great players of spin clueless. After watching him bowl this well in a country where Shane Warne and Murali have been made to look ordinary, you wonder whether Monty was actually part of a lab experiment by England who have been working on a perfect weapon for the last 30 years with a view to unleashing him on an unsuspecting India in the Mumbai test. You may think I'm smoking something but YouTube his wickets from Wankhede and it won't sound like crazy talk anymore.

So where does this leave us for the rest of the series? Firstly, Dhoni needs to learn his lesson and stop hiding behind the pitch excuse every single time. The bottom line is this: regardless of what kind of pitch you play on, you need to bowl and bat well. Also, displaying any sort of competence with the bat and gloves by the Indian captain would be immensely helpful. England still look shaky against spin barring Cook, Prior and the Wankhede Pietersen (I believe the KP on show in the first test was a different person). If India get their tactics right and bowl the right lengths to England, they should still go ahead and win the series. Gambhir has shown promise in the second test and hopefully Pujara can carry his form through the remaining tests. Kohli is bound to produce at least one good innings, but Yuvraj still leaves me unconvinced. There is a giant Sachin Tendulkar sized hole in the middle order at the moment that Sachin Tendulkar seems unable to fill. How he does in the next couple of matches might force him to evaluate his future. 

I'm going to stick my neck out and predict an Indian series win - 3-1 is possible but 2-1 is more likely. However, something that India would do well to observe is the grit that England have shown in the first 2 tests. They have shown more fight than India showed in all 4 tests of the England series. Only Pujara has been able to grind out steady, if unspectacular, runs when the going has been tough. India only need to look at Cook and learn some lessons that will help them, not just in this series, but in many series to come. 

Notes from India-NZ

India’s first assignment in whites after getting washed in the same colour in the previous two series that they played couldn't have come at a better place, or against better opposition. After being bullied and outmuscled by two taller and stronger kids in their own backyard, there is nothing quite so refreshing as the sight of a scrawny kid at least a foot shorter than you challenging you to a fight in your backyard with one hand in a cast. India dealt with New Zealand the way they were expected to, which was refreshing. Before the series began, MS Dhoni’s team might have had some misgivings playing a team that had given them a fair amount of trouble the last time they visited and the Indians had to rely on a couple of centuries from none other than Harbhajan Singh to bail them out of a few pickles they found themselves in.

The series continued the way their last one in India had ended – with fairly comprehensive wins for India with R Ashwin continuing to do no wrong. With Ojha providing admirable foil, he ripped through kiwi batsmen who were about as clueless when it came to playing spin as the English teams of the 1990’s. They were so far outplayed in the first test that they had to be content in taking  positives about putting India under some pressure in the second. Although their bowlers tried their best and the relatively inexperienced Boult and Bracewell looked really good in patches, the batsmen had generally dug themselves into a hole deep enough that an army of sherpas couldn’t have dug them out in time.

Ashwin is similar to Kumble in some ways – he is tall, relies on bounce for a lot of his wickets, does the same jump and clap celebration that Jumbo trademarked and amazingly enough, displays the same dive-over-the-ball technique that Kumble also made his own (Ganguly and Siddhu may contest that claim, but this is not an argument that can be ended very quickly). Fielding aside, however, he seems to be a great package at number 8. Finally, we may have stumbled upon a lower order batsman the sight of who does not have boundary fielders placing orders for cucumber sandwiches in anticipation of an early snack and shower. He promised to fill the Anil Kumble shaped hole that Harbhajan could not fill. It may be too early, but he has shown potential. Let’s not count his struggles in Australia and England against him since it took even the great Kumble a few years to come up with a good plan while bowling overseas. In any event, India will rely on the faster men to do more damage overseas and it while we have some distance to go before solving the fast-bowling puzzle, Umesh Yadav again showed encouraging signs. Baby steps, as they say.

Talking about human sized holes, there was a Laxman-sized hole that had formed just before the series began in addition to the already large Dravid-sized one in the ceiling. That was the one area which had everyone fairly nervous. Kohli had already calmed a few nerves with his exceptional batting against Australia en route to claiming one middle order spot. Pujara rose to the challenge and displayed the necessary technique and temperament to indicate that he may be the long term replacement for Dravid at #3. Gambhir and Sehwag were a touch too flamboyant and while they might get away with it in Indian conditions, it makes the role of the #3 critical, especially outside the subcontinent and that’s what makes Pujara an extremely vital cog because he is the link between the top order and the stroke-filled middle order.

The Great Indian Middle Order is already a think in the past and you can possible see a giant ‘Work in progress’ sign around it at the moment. As long as Sachin occupies the #4 spot, Sehwag will continue to open. I personally think it’s time for Sachin to make way so Sehwag can take up the middle order spot he’s wanted for a while. Although there have been clandestine whispers in certain circles about mentioning the R-word in relation to Sachin, there have been others in the media who have likened such talk to nothing short of treason. While there is no taking away the great man’s genius, it’s better for India in the long term to build a team with an eye on the future. Discussions about his age and his technique are irrelevant – he is gifted enough that he will continue to be an above average international batsman – but he isn’t as flawless as he once was and he’d be the first to admit it. Irrespective of the Sachin issue, it’s time the selectors decided once and for all that Raina is probably not going to cut it as a test player. He is extremely valuable in the shorter formats and it would be worthwhile for him to focus on making himself the best player he can be in those formats and letting someone else more technically equipped to test match batting take a turn.

While there are still some questions unanswered and sterner tests await, this series was definitely a step in the right direction. Hopefully, the series against England will help answer a few more of those questions. That series is especially significant considering the walloping that India took there last summer. With the Pietersen saga unfolding in the British isles at the moment, this is a good opportunity for India to seek another R-word that the media is sure to bring up at some point. Hint: Quentin Tarantino thinks it’s best served cold. Personally, I prefer it a la mode. I’m licking my lips already.