Glasshouse dwellers on notice

So, Ravichandran Ashwin set the cat among the pigeons by Mankading Jos Buttler in an IPL match. Immediately, the spirit of the game was invoked (which the MCC officially shot down very quickly indicating there was no merit to that argument).

The ICC amended the rule concerning Mankading to clearly indicate that the batsman has to wait until the ball leaves the bowler's arm before venturing outside the crease. Ashwin was perfectly justified in doing what he did, legally as well as morally.

If a bowler bowls a no-ball, the umpire does not say, "Okay, that was your first offense so I'm letting you off with a warning." Then why should the batsman be accorded the favor of a first warning prior to being Mankaded?

If I were Ashwin, I would release the following statement before the next match:
From here on, EVERY opposition batsman is put on notice and warned. If you leave the crease before the ball is bowled, ANY bowler in my team WILL run you out. You have been warned so do not break the law by leaving the crease and we won't have to break the spirit of the law to fix your action.

Georgie Porgie

Here's Darren Sammy's take on how the recent Test series against India played out:

"In India, where teams don't go there and win, we went out and played and dominated India in two out of three Test matches. "

Darren Sammy

Are you reading this MS Dhoni?  Are your teammates in the Test team listening?  India won the 3-Test series 2-0 and the third one was an insane "draw" where the scores were level at the end!!  But Darren Sammy thinks that the Windies "dominated India in two out of three Test matches."

Do you know the sad thing, Masada?  Coming as the series did, sandwiched in between two 0-4 drubbings, I had to think for a few minutes before remembering how the series against the Windies played out.

More importantly, does it even matter to you that a vanquished opponent is now revising past history and no one even cares to remember that it was probably otherwise?  Do you care?

Oh wait, I forgot, you have more important matters to attend to...

Why do I even bother?

Why I hate Rahul Dravid...and other random musings

....I hate Rahul Dravid.    I hate him for making me believe that as long as he was batting we had a chance to save/win a Test match.  I hate him for being such a team-man that he sacrificed so many of his preferences just so the team could do well.  I hate him for timing his retirement so perfectly that even the BCCI could not botch it.  I hate him the fact that, for years, he prevented VVS Laxman from occupying the #3 spot that he was best suited for.  But the thing I hate most is that he is no longer going to be there in the Indian line-up at #3.  *sigh*  I hate that he has gone away and I will never see him in whites again.  Good luck, Rahul, may you find that retirement is just the starting point of the more meaningful phase of your life.

...VVS Laxman should be seriously contemplating playing county cricket in England.  Any sort of cricket to keep him "match-fit" for the Test matches later in the year will be a must.  Unless, of course, he already knows that he is going to retire soon and not play those Test matches.

...If folks can change their stance and switch hit, then I say we abolish the amnesty that batsmen get from being adjudged LBW to balls outside the leg-stump.

...I do not want Sachin Tendulkar to retire.  (There, I said it, BRB....bring it on!)

...I don't follow the IPL but I also do not follow the logic of folks who claim that the IPL is a domestic tournament.  As long as the strength of an IPL team is determined by the strength of the foreign players in the roster, it can never be a domestic tournament.   Having said that...let me know when the tournament ends so I can go back to reading CricInfo regularly again.

Cold dishes

365 day ago (or was it 366?) was the last time I cried.  One year removed from that day, it is hard to imagine that I may be crying for an altogether different reason.  What a price to pay!

The world has turned upside down and, yet, there is reason for hope.  New Zealand will be here for a tour, followed by England, before Australia comes back to face the music as promised by the miserable tourists when they were being pummeled by Australia.

But before that is the beast that needs to be fed, the IPL.  May the best team win.  I would rather watch Sri Lanka and England battle it out.

How SRT and the IPL ruined the Summer of George

(or) The Eternal Lament of the Spoiled Indian Cricket Fan

This was supposed to be the Summer of George. India had just won the World Cup and ahead of me, over the next 9 months, were no less than 14 Test matches, 6 against the West Indies, 4 against England and then the Big Daddy of them all – a 4 Test series against Australia.

On April 3rd, being a fan of Indian cricket was a good occupation to have. Then, two not entirely unrelated things happened that eventually ruined the happy ending.

First came the lure/pressure of the IPL, call it whatever you will. Virender Sehwag was injured but still played in the IPL, nursing his shoulder injury as best as he could. He played 11 games and, tellingly, only when the Daredevils were eliminated did he opt for shoulder surgery, rendering him inactive for the tour of the West Indies.

Sachin Tendulkar played every game (16 in all) in the IPL but felt compelled to seek rest after that from the West Indies series.

Gautam Gambhir got injured in the World Cup but was not totally aware of it until he re-aggravated it in the IPL. However, he continued to play with the injury until the Knight Riders were eliminated, and then rested, missing the tour.

Yuvraj Singh played 14 games but missed the West Indies tour because of a lung infection. All in all, four stalwarts of the the Indian World Cup campaign were rendered hors de combat for the Windies tour. However, I will not apportion any blame on the IPL for that.

Coming on the heels of a long and arduous World Cup campaign, the timing of the IPL was not the best. However, it is revealing that all the major players named in the previous paragraph did not seek “rest” or “treatment” for their ailments during that tournament, instead choosing to forego the West Indies series altogether instead.

I have absolutely no issues with a person choosing to make some more money at the expense of playing “for the country”. They have an obligation to themselves and their families and I am no one to tell them how they should go about maximizing their revenue or what their priorities should be. However, I do have an issue with the consequence of that choice and how it affected the rest of the campaigns over the next 9 months.

The second factor crept up on us during the World Cup, when Sachin Tendulkar was in sublime touch, continuing his rich vein of form of the past few years. He scored a couple of centuries, had a near-miss against Pakistan, failed in the final, but got the ultimate prize – courtesy a ride on the shoulders of his teammates. Somewhere along the way a new beast was unleashed by the media – the quest for the almost-mythical 100th international 100.

It is at that point that some of SRT’s choices become curious, especially in hindsight. By eschewing the Windies tour, SRT ensured that his next international match would be at Lord’s. Ooooooh, how perfect, his handlers (and he himself, maybe) crooned: a century of centuries at the Mecca of cricket. What a perfect setting for the feat. It made great business sense to score that century at Lord’s than, say, at Roseau.

After a fruitless Test series in England, SRT skipped the return ODI series at home. Why risk scoring the 100 in a meaningless ODI on an Indian highway, when Test matches at Kotla, Eden Gardens, and/or Wankhade were yet to come, each carrying an alluring ring for the media and his sponsors? When that did not work, the ODI series against the Windies was skipped since the Boxing Day Test at Melbourne beckoned. Longingly and achingly.

Now, bear with me while I imagine an alternate scenario. (Not a guaranteed scenario but still a very possible one.) SRT goes to the West Indies and scores a century in one of the Test matches (maybe at Kingston). Suddenly the stories go away, the pressure is lifted, none of the remaining Indian players have to field any more questions about whether SRT is feeling the pressure. Viru and Gambhir decide to skip the IPL, get rested during the Windies tour and are ready to play in England, fully healthy. With SRT playing the Windies series, the Indian batting order does not have to be reshuffled, and  since Viru and Gambhir are ready for the England Tests, VVS Laxman can continue to play at #5, and Rahul Dravid does not have to become an opener in England and the batting order is not unsettled. Since the batting order is more settled .... I can’t bear to carry that dream any further. It hurts too much to contemplate what could have been.

Damn you SRT and the IPL!  This was supposed to be the Summer of George. It really was...

Bleeding heart

A few years ago, I decided not to pay attention to the IPL indirectly because of one man - Lalit Modi. Paradoxically, in the past few days, I have started paying more attention to the IPL because of the same man.

Unfortunately, it is not the cricketing news that I am interested in. How sad.

Lest people think I have a grudge against the cricket in the IPL, let me clarify that I do not. The ICL/IPL model had three things going for it that pleased me immensely:

The air up there

This one's for you, AV/BRB. Enjoy!

Surf's up!

Trolling through the web I often come across things that I file away for future (posting) reference. Today is one of those days when I collate them and regurgitate the ones that still seem interesting enough to pass on to you.

Eye-eye-yo

"We (IPL) are only a two-year-old league but we had close to 3.8 billion eyeballs last year. Every game last year we had 100 million eyeballs."

Thus spake Lalit Modi.

I guess this is why it is named the Eye-PL.

What do you do with all those eyeballs, Mr. Modi? Make eyeball soup and serve it to Indiana Jones?

My IPL stance...

My stance on the IPL has not wavered. I wasn't in favor of watching it last year and the upcoming edition does not interest me either.

On many websites, newspapers, TV stations, and blogs people are debating the merits or demerits of the way the recent auction played out. I looked at the headlines and decided not to delve into it any deeper. I will continue to treat my eyeballs to Test cricket and give the IPL a skip.

Before you start talking about Hamlet and protesting too much, I want to clarify that this post is directed to those few faithful readers that I have. I am sure the IPL has some high quality cricket and splendid storylines but the off-field issues are off-putting and I don't feel like pandering to them.

The beauty of Test cricket is that I can see a protracted duel between two players unencumbered by over limits and scoring rates. It can inspire brilliant prose from the likes of Sambit Bal. Finally, when it ends like this, it makes me happy!

Luckily, the next Test match is less than 6 hours away. Onward ho!

P.S. I do know that Ponting was out caught at slip to end that spell of Ishant's. The photograph was not how the duel ended but I liked the image as it also featured Laxman. So there.

If you are interested, here's the highlight reel of that mesmerizing spell. 9 overs, 32 runs, 1 wicket.

Surround sound

The Kolkata Knight Riders recently fired the head coach, John Buchanan (big surprise there). The more interesting revelation in the article deals with Buchanan's entourage, the size of which would probably cause even Vincent Chase to blush. And that's saying something.

... Buchanan's support staff, which included Matthew Mott (assistant head coach), Andy Bichel (bowling coach), Wade Seccombe (wicket-keeping coach), John Deeble (fielding coach), Brad Murphy (assistant coach), Michael Buchanan (strength trainer), who is Buchanan's son, Andrew Leipus (physio) and Adrian Le Roux (trainer).

It took 9 coaches to guide a team to the last spot in a competition. I wonder how many coaches it would take to guide a team to the top.

Money matters

(This post is based on a discussion I had with Dr.CL, who brought these points to my attention. I did not follow the events closely but did some research, as is my wont, to see what the fuss was all about.)

1) From the numbers in this post, it looks like the tournament that I consider unmentionable for extraneous reasons is here to stay. And not just stay, but get even bigger and worse.

A lesson in basic economics might be worthwhile for the organizers. There's a reason people don't eat sweets all the time.

2) Was Gilly mollifying a forgotten and discarded player or was he genuinely praising Laxman?

Gilchrist also had words of praise for VVS Laxman, from whom he took over as captain after the team finished bottom of the league last season. "Although we made changes in the coaches and the captain, everyone in the squad bought into it, including VVS," Gilchrist said. "He went through a lot emotionally. The captaincy was taken away from him and he only played five games, then the selectors decided we didn't need him."

Laxman remained a good team man despite being dropped, Gilchrist said. "He continued to contribute around the group with his experience and his vast knowledge. He wants to learn to be a better Twenty20 player. That's a wonderful example to young players to see a player at his age wanting to evolve into a better player."

Gilchrist said Laxman even worked with the team's coaches to improve his Twenty20 skills. "It's not just the young kids who are learning all the time, it applies to all of us. VVS epitomises what this franchise is all about."

There's a backhanded compliment in there somewhere, I think. But then, in the past, Gilly has been very effusive in his praise for Laxman. (By the way, if you are a true Laxman fan, you will enjoy the article linked above; you will even find out his favorite book...but to know that you will have to read the whole thing!)

When ants meet sledgehammers

There is a temple in Nebraska which has been very good at fund-raising in the past few years. So much so that it is widely regarded as being the strongest temple, especially in these economically difficult times, by virtue of the monetary clout it possesses.

Last year a small group of individuals in this temple set up a separate prayer group. Some of the members of the temples in the state also joined this prayer group. The main temple did not approve of this move and banned any person belonging to their temple from fraternizing with the new group. The prayer group held steady and began to expand. However, the temple extended its reach by preventing other temples in Nebraska from letting members of this prayer group from attending or participating in any temple-related activity.

Soon, the members of this prayer group were ostracized and when a couple of them tried to organize charity events in the neighboring state of Iowa, the Nebraska temple strong-armed the Iowa temple into preventing these individuals from participating in the activity.

The Nebraska temple then successfully lobbied the main governing body that oversees the functioning of all temples in the country and has officially stopped any member of the prayer group from practicing their faith anywhere else in the entire US. Any temple not complying with this faces severe sanctions and worse.

Do you think this is unfair? If you do, here's the official website of the now-ostracized group.

If you are NOT affected by it, here's the official website of the all-powerful group. You may also want to see the clemency offer that was so magnanimously put forward to the splinter group.

For the record

A few of you have asked me privately about this and I want to go on record:

I will not write about the IPL Season 2, just as I shunned writing about season 1. I shall only do so when they start treating all cricketers the same - whether they belong to the ICL or not.

I cannot believe how long they have been allowed, with the backing of the BCCI, to run roughshod over the right of so many cricketers around the world. Every time a Board steps up and seems to be taking a stand (Sri Lanka and Pakistan come to mind right away) they disappoint me by then cowing down to the pressure exerted by the BCCI.

Shameful.

P.S. And this piece of news simply makes my resolve much stronger.

King-ly corner

Stealing an idea from Peter King (of Sports Illustrated), here are some things I think when I am not thinking other things:

a) Why don't frontline bowlers get the luxury of a nightwatchman at the end of a long day when they have been at the mercy of a lifeless pitch? Can Sachin Tendulkar give me an answer?

b) I have a strong suspicion that Rahul Dravid is going to retire from Test cricket at the end of the India-New Zealand Test series.

c) If Sachin Tendulkar is batting in the high 40's the best way to get him out is to bring on a slow bowler or spinner. His need to get there with singles, and not by playing the ball on its merit, is making him very vulnerable lately (think White, think Patel, in fact, look at the names of the bowlers who got him out when in sight of a personal landmark (in the late 40's) in the recent past.

d) I think there should be a ban on using certain puns with certain players, such as, Tiger Woods and prowl in the same sentence, Rahul Dravid and the wall, Chris Gayle and cool, Laxman and wristy.

e)  Who will man the slips cordon once Sachin, Dravid, and Laxman exit the Test stage?

f) If the IPL is played in South Africa, is it still the Indian Premier League?

g) I wish I could golf more fequently.  I bet RT would agree!

Cricket links

Here are articles that merit a few sentences but probably not an entire blog item. (Also, I think I will get lynched by some of my regulars, who are not as cricket-centric as I am, if I proceed to have 5 more posts on cricket today!).

a) If you haven't already gotten the message - I am thoroughly jealous of Sidharth Monga. Here's a sample of his tour diary from New Zealand while he has the arduous task of following the Indian cricket team and reporting on it. Grr-dom prevails. Someday....someday...

February 24
Norm has been driving the Indian team around in his coach. He has done the job for various sports teams for a long time now. The first time he went into the bus this time, he saw Sachin Tendulkar in his customary first seat, and his jaw dropped. "Jeez you are famous," Norm said.

A few of Norm's observations: the Indians are immaculately behaved; most of them put on their iPods when they board, except for Tendulkar, who is always seen laughing with Harbhajan Singh and Zaheer Khan. Norm keeps the bus keys away from Sehwag. Never know when he feels like a drive. Alone.

b) From the "Ripley's Believe It Or Not!" stable comes this entry - England has the world's #1 batsman and bowler. I kid you not!

Step into the spotlight - Isa Guha and Claire Taylor. (What?! You thought I was talking about Pietersen and Flintoff?). I watched England thump India yesterday (yes, I watch women's cricket, too!) and came away maha impressed with Guha, Taylor, and Mithali Raj.

c) Elsewhere, Sidharth Monga describes the inequity that exists in cricket these days between bat and ball, particularly in the shorter form of the game. ODI's first double century is coming, maybe in just a few hours from now (in the 4th ODI between India and New Zealand, but I will not rejoice when it does. Scoring runs these days is as easy it was to hunt a dodo back when dodo's were alive and thriving.

What is even more frustrating is that people like Sachin Tendulkar, who should know better, think this is a wonderful trend. Sickening, really.

There is an inherent flaw in the modern cricketing language too. Commentators, captains, experts instinctively call a flat track a "good pitch". A pitch which assists bowling is put in the "not-of-international-standard" category.

Tendulkar recently criticised the pitches on the last tour to New Zealand thus: "The wickets are great [this time around]. Not only players, but the spectators are also enjoying it. Last time we came here the bowlers got false confidence and the batters were looking for technical problems which didn't exist. I have at least not played on tracks like those and it wouldn't be ideal for the spectators either."

Most of it is fair comment, but the pitches are not great this time either. Not with the small boundaries at least, where edges and dabs go for boundaries and sixes. Won't the easy runs give some of the batsmen false confidence? Wouldn't bowlers be looking for faults that might not even exist when they look at their figures? The bowlers won't be thinking of all that though for they are facing the ultimate test of their skill and acumen.

d) The recent events in Pakistan have put some doubts into the latest season of the IPL. The IPL has successfully flexed its muscles, notably with respect to the ICL and the ICC. But now, the IPL may be trying to bite a bitter chunk than it can reckon with - the Indian electoral system, as Nirmal Shekar explains in The Hindu in a tongue-and-cheek way.

The Indian Premier League is about many things. It’s about money, money, money, money, money… and then, of course, about a bit of cricket, of the frenetic kind, too.

Given that fact, this column has a suggestion to Mr. Lalit Modi, the IPL’s high-profile head honcho. He should request the Central Government of the world’s largest democracy to postpone the general elections scheduled for April-May. Well, actually he should go beyond that: he should demand it.
(...)
There is a simple solution: postpone the polls, no matter what the Constitution says, no matter what the Election Commissioners may say. After all, can these blokes possibly bring in hundreds of millions to the kitty? Can they conceivably persuade Preity Zinta or Shilpa Shetty — draped in the finest their unabashedly expensive wardrobes can offer — to jive it live in front of TV cameras during the matches?

Did anyone whisper anything about priorities? By golly, who cares? After all, this is a nation where Parliament erupts in atavistic frenzy whenever the Indian cricketers lose a match in South Africa, and reverts to certain ennui as the odd member brings up an issue such as farmer suicides.
(...)
In a rational world, it would have been an open-and-shut case, a non-issue. If the governments of the States where the IPL matches are scheduled believed they would not be able to provide adequate security to the players because of the election pressures, then the Central Government should simply tell the Board of Control for Cricket in India that it would do well to postpone, or even cancel, the event.
(...)
Repeatedly we are told that there is far too much at stake for too many people, for the IPL Board to even so much as contemplate the idea of such a postponement or a cancellation. But who are these stakeholders, and why should elected governments stretch their security apparatus dangerously thin in order to protect their interests?

e) Asian players have long complained about a biased treatment from the match officials when it comes to handing out punishments. But news from West Indies would have heartened them when they heard that two English players were found guilty of excessive appealing. But before I could write about it here, Samir Chopra beat me to the punch on his blog.

But wait! The two Englishmen are named Madhusudan Singh Panesar and Amjad Khan! Curses. See? Its in the genes, the stars, the pitch, the water, the blood, the skies. Poor lads. Their parents moved so far away from home, put up with the trials and tribulation of migration, of an unsympathetic local populace, brought their kids up right, sent them to good schools, made sure they didn't have the wrong accents, and even got them into the English team, complete with the Four Lions sweater. But they still got hauled up for excessive appealing.

Sorry lads; you can run, but you can't hide.

Or in the case of Panesar, you can prance like an excited bird (or a happy seal as aptly described by the commentators on CricInfo) but you can never be a McGrath. Note how McGrath never turns around before the decision is given, but was he reprimanded? Are you kidding me?!

Inmates, prisons, and all that jazz

Mohammad Asif, the bowler I thought was best fit to replace the void left by Glenn McGrath, has been in all sorts of trouble - steroid-related trouble, that is. A few days ago his career hit another road bump when he was "banned" by the IPL from “participating in the sport of cricket for a period of one year after finding the player guilty of a doping violation.”

What hubris! How can the IPL ban him from anything except from playing in the IPL. The IPL is NOT the International Cricket Council? To top it, the ICC has taken a head-in-the-sand approach to this.

The ICC further says, in a release, “the ICC has yet to consider the written reasons for the decision in the matter and will make no further comment at this stage other than to confirm its expectation that all Member Boards will adopt the ban and as such the player will not be available for official cricket until the ban has been completed.

The question is, has the IPL got the authority to ban a player from the sport for any length of time?

The ICC anti-doping code, relevant to the year 2008, when the Asif doping offence occurred, does not extend to anything other than ICC events. Even if one were to take into account the clause relating to “mutual enforcement and assistance”, the ICC would be duty bound to enforce only a member unit’s regulations and not that of a tournament.”

More on this in the article here. Even as Season 2 of the IPL approaches, my distaste for the organization deepens.

Hacking at the jungle

"What the IPL did was to debunk some myths and the biggest of them all was about the infallibility of the Australian coaches. The franchise owners are not fools and unless they have an inferiority complex they will soon be issuing pink notices to most if not all these freeloaders masquerading as consultants or cricket officers or some such fancy designations."

Sunil Gavaskar
Jun 16, 2008

Not-so-surprisingly, Sunil Gavaskar managed to make his feelings clear about the money that was spent on Aussie "coaches" in the IPL. For a long time he has been anti-Australian in his diatribes and this particular one did not surprise me one bit. Delving deeper into the target of the attack reveals just who is the subject of Sunny's ire.

Here are the Australian-born coaches in the IPL:
Delhi - Greg Shipperd (reached semi-finals)
Punjab - Tom Moody (reached semi-finals)
Rajasthan - Shane Warne (winners of the IPL league)
Kolkata - John Buchanan

It is patently obvious who Sunny hates so much. I wonder if he even thought about the words he wrote (highlighted in bold in the comment above) before he submitted his article. I have great respect for Gavaskar as a cricketer but not much for the commentator or the writer. A few more uninformed comments like this and I will not be in the minority.

Gavaskar prides himself on calling a spade a spade. If so, why does he not come out in the open and declare that his grudge is against Buchanan. But no, this is not the way he operates. He makes bold statements but does not give the entire information. Some time back he said that some players in the Indian team abused John Wright. He brought this to light long after Wright had ceased to be the coach. Having done that, he stayed mum about who the players actually were. What was the point of raising that issue then? Either he should have named the players or kept quiet about the whole thing.

If trees had voices and you could hear them scream, would you be as callous about cutting them down? Yes, you would be if they screamed all the time and for no good reason. There's a lesson in there for Sunil Gavaskar.

Saying it like it might be

Osman Samiuddin discusses one of the ramifications of the IPL - the alarming decline of standards in the commentary booth.

What, someone joked during the IPL, is the difference between those dancing by the boundary downstairs and those in the commentary box upstairs? Only that those downstairs have nicer curves.

This is what it had come to. The brief for the men in the box was narrow - to make sure only one message got out: come what may, the IPL was God, Lalit Modi was Moses, and there wasn't a rest of it. To speak was to hype, but only if it came with the right sponsor. Each six was a "DLF maximum", each critical point in the game a "Citi moment of success". Ravi Shastri, Arun Lal, Ramiz Raja, Sunil Gavaskar and the rest didn't call matches, they sold brands, blindly promoting the IPL (and anything else that came their way).

One reason being touted for the breatheless plugging of the IPL is that with the action happening so fast, there isn't much time for the commentators to discuss strategy. Strange how that logic does not seem to apply to the players when they goof up, does it?

Mother tongue

When I call my parents in India, I usually do so in the daytime (nightime in India). For years and years, after the general introductory chit-chat, the topic of discussion has usually turned to books recently read, internet sites recently visited, and occasionally, TV shows being watched.

Then came the IPL...

Say what you will about the IPL (and I can say a lot of things against it) it changed the way TV was watched in millions of households in India for 45 days. My mother would tell me about feats that batsmen had performed, wickets that bowlers had taken, catches that fielders had snared, required run-rates, chances of making semi-finals, strategies that should be adopted, and even the fact that the cheerleaders in the ICL were superior to the IPL - everything was up for discussion!! The Deccan Chargers laid an egg but it did not matter to my parents who had a blast with the tournament.

But before Lalit Modi sprains his neck patting himself on his back, here's the catch. My parents were EVEN MORE excited about the ICL, to an extent because the Hyderabad Heroes were winning it all, but mainly because they cared more about these players, because of their pariah status. Alfred Absolem took 7 wickets in just four overs for the Heroes, but like the fictional Bhuvan, his feat may forever be consigned to the scrap heap, to be conveneintly forgotten in time.

So the winner here is not the IPL - it is Twenty20 cricket. Consuming just 3 hours (when the captains stick to the prescribed over-rates, that is) in the evening, it is the perfect length and compresses a lot of action in that time. What's not to like about a format that encourages interest in the game? Well, the proverb about the goose that lays the golden egg comes to mind.

Lalit Modi is already touting the idea of having two IPL seasons in one year. He will do well to read up on some economics, especially the Law of Diminishing Returns.