Making IPL Relevant

IPL in it's sixth edition is doing pretty well for it's own good. All 9 teams, at the halfway stage, still have a chance to make it to the playoffs. Delhi Daredevils, one of the top four teams in the last editions languish in the 9th spot. Pune Warriors, team that made the 9th spot its own now is at no 8. Rajasthan, Punjab and Hyderabad teams have surprised a few with their strong shows. Not all would make it to the play offs though. Bangalore, Chennai, Mumbai have looked strong, yet vulnerable in situations. Kolkata seems to still be finding its feet in this edition after the Championship win last year. Foreign players like Gayle, Narine, M Hussey, de Villiers, Watson, Dwayne Smith, Finch, Kallis, Steyn & Miller have done exceptionally well for their franchises. Whilst on the other hand only few Indians namely; Kohli, Dhoni, Mishra, Karthik, Gambhir, Vinay Kumar have shown any consistency with bat or ball.

The tournament every years starts with a bang and and ends with a relatively lesser enthusiasm yet still manages to get the buzz going. Its the middle stages that mostly disappoint. The better teams go about asserting their dominance and the weaker ones get into a rut of defeats. What's more? Indian Premier League is a platform to showcase talent. With the term Indian being prominent in it, it comes across as a platform to showcase Indian talent. Where's that?

Let's look at some areas that could be looked into that can increase the viewer's interest and more so relevance of the IPL to Indian and world cricket over all.

Captains

IPL, in the year 2008 started with most franchises being captained by Indians, most of them being termed 'marquee players'. Who are the marquee players now? Okay, that's not even the point. Ricky Ponting for Mumbai Indians, Sangakkara for Sunrisers Hyderabad, Gilchrist for Kings XI Punjab, Jayawardena for Delhi Daredevils, Angelo Matthews for Pune Warriors, all first choice captains for their teams have mostly failed to get going, thus leaving their franchises short of a foreign talent in the XI. Ponting, Sanga, Matthews have gone a step ahead and have dropped themselves in the interest of the teams. Great sacrifice, but why even give way to that? Bring in young Indian talents to captains the sides. Rohit Sharma was made captain when Ponting's continued failures began to hurt the team. Virat Kohli being named captain of Royal Challengers Bangalore has got to be the best decision so far in this IPL. With the presence of the likes of Dilshan and Vettorri in the squad, it would've been easy for the management to name one of them. Kohli's elevation to captaincy will bode well for the franchise and for Kohli himself who can hone his captaincy skills which maybe required in the future for the national team when Dhoni is unavailable or sacked. Each franchise could take up the responsibility of naming a youngster as captain and have them trained by a senior.

Chennai Super Kings - Suresh Raina/Ravichandran Ashwin
Delhi Daredevils - Irfan Pathan
Kings XI Punjab - Piyush Chawla
Rajasthan Royals - Ajinkya Rahane
Kolkata Knight Riders - Gautam Gambhir (existing captain)
Royal Challengers Bangalore - Virat Kohli (existing captain)
Pune Warriors India - Yuvraj Singh
Mumbai Indians - Rohit Sharma (existing captain, replacing Ponting)
Sunrisers Hderabad - Shikhar Dhawan

The above list is just an example of what kind of players can be elevated to captaincy. Post the 2014 auction shuffle, some of these guys may not even be a part of their existing teams. But what this essentially does is encourage younger players, maintains team balance by allowing them four best performing foreign talents, hone captains who could lead the national team in the future if needed. If it's Indian Premier League, franchises must have Indian captains. To me, it was kinda strange to have Ponting lead Tendulkar. Unreal to see Jayawardena leading Sehwag in a Delhi franchise.

Indian Talent

Jalaj Saxena, Shami Ahmed, Parvez Rasool, Ishwar Pandey, Wriddhiman Saha are all good enough to be named amongst the probables for the Champions Trophy but are not good enough to represent their franchises in IPL? Cheteshwar Pujara just finished as India's best batsman in the recently concluded international season, yet can't find a place in the playing XI for his franchise. Abhimanyu Mithun, Abhinav Mukund after brief stints with the national side have gone off the radar so much, they can't get a game for their sides. Sreenath Aravind, in reckoning for the national side in 2011 hasn't played a game in IPL 2013. Where do these guys showcase their talents and come back into reckoning? They play their heart out in domestic games, but who watches them? Wasn't IPL supposed to be the platform where talents which don't get visibility have a chance to make it big? Strange, the franchises and the organising committee, in the bid to get more money out of the cash cow is forgetting the premise on which the tournament was founded. Rahul Sharma, Ashwin, Jadeja are example of talents that got recognition through IPL. Even this year the few new guys given the rare opportunities to have flourished. Mandeep Singh, Ajit Chandila, Jasprit Bumrah, Dhawal Kulkarni, Mohit Sharma, Karan Sharma to name a few.

Loan Players

What is Wriddhiman Saha, a top wicket keeper in the domestic circuit in the running for national selection doing in Chennai Super Kings, captained by Dhoni? Why can't he be loaned to Pune Warriors who are having to do with Robin Uthappa as a wicket keeper or even Kolkata Knight Riders who are putting up with very average Manvinder Bisla behind the stumps? Delhi Daredevils have been playing with poor spin attack and being forced to keep out Morne Morkel to play foreign spinners Botha, Jeevan Mendis or van der Merwe. They could easily exercise the loaning option to seek a unused spinner from one of the other franchises. Loaning of players should be introduced immediately to the IPL.

IPL 2014, with refreshed teams should also alter some rules to make the going ons more interesting for the viewers and followers. Brands have already been cashing in on the IPL and have been making the most of its popularity amongst the views. Be it contests giving away match tickets, meet and greet with players, IPL is a new boon to marketers and consumers both. But without innovations and tweaks it could fall into a rut and slowly rot. That's why its important there are dynamic changes made to the way things are.

This IPL could well be the last time we see the likes of Dravid, Tendulkar, Ponting, Muralitharan, Gilchrist play any kind of cricket on Indian soil. Big salute to the stars and hope they make the most before bid farewell. Cricket will be poorer by some of the greatest talents but the show will, as it always has, go on.

India's African Safari

Till not so long ago India, not-so-proudly held the tag of "poor tourists". And in that period, till 2007, amongst other countries, India toured South Africa four times and played 12 test matches; won 1, lost 6 and drew 5. A record that doesn't really befit a team which sits atop the Test rankings.

South African pitches offers Indian batsmen what they arent too comfortable with; the twin troubles of Pace & Bounce. Indian batsmen have traditionally suffered at the hands of South African bowlers in these pitches assisting pace and bounce. Even the mighty Sachin Tendulkar has looked a mere mortal in South African conditions. With three centuries in 12 test matches, South African bowlers have offered him the least to get away with in their backyard. Even Dravid, Laxman & Sehwag havent struck gold against the Proteas. But things might be slightly different this time around. India have a settled opening combination in Gambhir & Sehwag for the first time in all their tours to SA. A middle order which has three legends. A wicket keeper batsman & captain who can more than just bat. Two promising youngsters, Raina & Pujara, battling for the sixth batsman spot. Its Steyn, Morne Morkel & the less known Lonwabo Tsotsobe they'd need to negotiate. Paul Harris, the Protean spinning option shouldnt pose much of a threat to the Indian batting line up.

Indian bowlers though have been slightly more successful than their bat wielding team mates. Prasad & Srinath were a deadly combo during the 1996-97 tour. Sreesanth was lethal & Zaheer supported him well in the 2006-07 tour. But what these bowlers lacked was support from rest of the bowlers and batsmen. The pressure exerted by Prasad & Srinath was usually undone by the third seamer who let the Proteas counter attack and take runs before the pair came back to hunt. India this time has Zaheer in prime form, Ishant and Sreesanth finding rhythm and Harbhajan not in the wiliest of phases. But Sreesanth is a mercurial bowlers and can find rhythm in one good spell and once he does he can be dangerous. Zaheer will bank getting his bunny Graeme Smith cheaply consistently. Trouble is when they run into the Protean middle order, next only to Indian middle order if not equal. AB de Villiers, Kallis & Amla are all in sublime form and are determined to go into the World Cup with victory against India.

This series will be watched by all cricket enthusiasts for its between the two most successful teams in recent times. With the one sidedness of The Ashes, the significance of India versus South Africa has increased multi folds in the context of the game. India has no reason to not feel confident about their chances. They have achieved success in the bounciest wicket in the world at WACA, Perth against Australia in 2008. To do well and achieve success here will be the best preparation India could ask for before the World Cup and a perfect adieu to Tendulkar, Laxman & Dravid who have traveled thrice to South Africa without achieving a series win and quite certainly are playing their last series in South Africa.

Author of this post also writes on http://www.isport.in/