I am not one of the IPL’s legions of DLF-howling fans. Only a remarkable performance by Pakistan’s Sohail Tanveer, the inaugural tournament’s highest wicket-taker, kept me remotely interested in a hyped-up, batsman-biased slugfest that featured hardly anything in favour of the bowlers and yet was not decided by the fat-bats but, perversely, by sharp bowling. I am not the only one who finds Bollywood’s plethora of overhyped film stars, and the addition of cheerleaders and big businessmen, repelling, though results show we may be of the minority. Is the IPL a bastion of cricket’s ruthless new expansion; big, bursting at the seams with money, and destined, as chairman Lalit Modi believes, to dominate and popularize the game? Or is it, as a team full of purists insist, the downfall of cricket, destroying conventional strokeplay, the balance between bat and ball, and all that is compelling about this wonderful sport?
The truth, as is usually the case, lies somewhere in between. Purists who scoff at scoops over the wicketkeeper’s head and sweeping fast bowling would do well to remember that the now classic on-drive, leg glance and sweep shots were once considered dangerous new innovations that would warp the game beyond measure. And it must take some guts to drop on a knee and lap an 85 mph cricket ball over your own head. Nor did anybody expect the victory of first the Rajasthan Royals and then the bottom-drawer Deccan Chargers over glitzy teams like Kolkata and Mumbai.
But there is little doubt, once carefully peeled of its hype balloon, cliched commentary and celebrity buzz, that the IPL’s standard of cricket is nowhere near as high or as exciting as its numerous sycophants would have us believe.
The boundaries are tiny, even in this day and age. There are some genuinely powerful hitters in the tournament, such as Brendan McCullum, MS Dhoni, and Chris Gayle. Then there are the eager young whippersnappers, most of them Indian domestic players, whose biggest swings just manage to loop over the 55-metre boundary and are eagerly termed “massive” by commentators.
Not to downplay the young Indians–after all, it is an Indian domestic tournament and not, as Lalit Modi reminds us despite his original statements, a global one–but there is a reason that none of the IPL teams could make it in the inaugural Twenty20 Champions League on their home soil. It’s because the tournament is more about money than matches, celebrities taking precedence over actual substance. And the worst aspect is, despite the clear skills demonstrated by foreign players, the IPL apparently goes to show the depth and verve of the Indian game. Give me Ranji, and I don’t even follow India.
The tournament has benefited from huge wells of hype. I know I’m using the word often, but that’s just to even out the “DLF” shouts that are scheduled to explode into your eardrums in a few days. Harsha Bhogle, the veteran commentator, in an otherwise balanced and incisive article has written that “the world awaits the IPL like it does nothing else”. A bold assumption, and it is largely to do with the furious discussion over the tournament’s alleged revolutionariness. Even critics eventually waste time and paper, as I am doing now, over the IPL, making it seem bigger and bolder than it really is.
Of course there are reasons to enjoy it. Once you strip it of its football-like gossip and wildly irritating price discussions, the IPL, after all, does feature cricket that as often as not goes down to the wire. In addition to the slogging–and let’s face it, most matches benefit from a good old whack–there is some superb strokeplay and some breathtaking performances. It’s not my cup of tea, but others will take it, and they have every right to. As long as they don’t jump onto the hype-wagon and start terming it the world’s biggest cricket event, of course.
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