I haven’t been feeling very English lately. I do my best to conform to expectations. I never cry in public, unless I’m drunk. I don’t complain about poor service in shops, unless I’m drunk. At the first sign of a sunny spring day, I rush out and buy ten pairs of ridiculous three-quarter length shorts. All the same, in recent days, I have the uncomfortable feeling that I am letting my people down.
You see, I’ve been watching an awful lot of the IPL, which in English cricket circles is a bit like admitting that you failed all your exams. People look at me with a mixture of horror and pity. “But what about Michael Vaughan,” they say, in an effort to lure me back to the straight and narrow with a nice, decent bit of cricket chat, “Do you think he’ll get back into the England side? And what about Ian Bell?”
But I have a confession to make. I don’t care about Michael Vaughan right now. Nor do I have any feelings one way or the other about Ian Bell. At the merest mention of Andrew Strauss, Alistair Cook, Stuart Broad and the rest, I feel a yawn rising deep within me and an overwhelming desire to drink a glass of warm milk and go to bed. It all seems so parochial, so narrow and well, so very very dull. When all the best cricketers in the world are gathered together in one place, why on earth would anyone want to talk about Ryan Sidebottom?
It was brought home to me how much the IPL is changing the shape of my cricket brain on Sunday. Whilst waiting for a strategy break to end, I was channel surfing and came across what looked very much like a game of cricket. There were players in coloured clothes. There was a bowler, a batsman and some fielders. Somewhere in the ether, Mike Atherton was talking. But something wasn’t right. It took me a while to figure it out. Then it dawned on me. THERE WAS NOBODY THERE.
Meanwhile, out in South Africa, large numbers of people have been turning out to see apparently made-up franchises with no history and no sense of tradition play a disgracefully vulgar version of the great game. And what’s worse, they appeared to be enjoying themselves. There was a lot of music, trumpets, fancy dress, drinking and dancing. Whisper it quietly, particularly if there is an English cricket journalist in the room, but these people were experiencing something almost unheard of in county cricket. They were being entertained.
Sadly, the commentary has continued to be more Bangalore than Deccan this week, though Harsha Bogle did pull a master-stroke during Thursday’s play by asking Neil McKenzie whether he thought Kevin Pietersen was really a South African. Suddenly there was tension in the booth as McKenzie mumbled his way through a few syllables of feigned disinterest, whilst trying to choke back his urge to yell, “Traitor!” at the top of his voice. “If he thinks he’s an Englishman, then he must be,” said the temporarily unemployed opener, through gritted teeth.
But Bogle aside, the broadcasters seem to be doing their best to minimise our viewing pleasure. During the first week, the camera would lazily pan over the jubilant crowd between overs, perhaps lingering on the cheerleaders before returning to the action. In week two, this relaxed scene-setting has been replaced by the scourge of sports coverage the world over: the player interview. A never-ending stream of non-combatants have been miked up and prodded wirelessly to read from the official IPL Cliché Manual, whilst being unsure which camera to look at.
And then there’s Jeremy Coney. On Monday he blagged his way into the manual scoreboard.
“There are all sorts of things here,” he began, breathlessly, “Numbers and er…”
He could have added ‘letters’ but that would have been it really. He cornered the chief scoreboard operator, a serious-looking chap, who seemed slightly bemused that the broadcasters would want to go live from the inside of a score box.
“How long have you been working here?” asked Coney, a la Prince Charles
“Since 1979,” replied the number king.
Coney the Comedian spotted an opening;
“You don’t live up here do you?” he asked, with a chuckle.
“No, I do not live up here,” deadpanned the interviewee.
It turned out that the man watched the cricket through a small peep hole.
“I see, and what do you do then?” asked Coney.
“I tell this man who operates the scoreboard.”
“And what does he do?”
“He changes the score.”
It was gripping television.
And in between episodes of the Jeremy Coney Show, Setanta have redoubled their efforts to give us all a yellow-tinted headache. It isn’t just that their studio guests are awful. It’s the fact that every five minutes we are snatched away from the stadium and dragged kicking and screaming back into Setanta world, not because the man in the shirt and slacks has anything useful to contribute, but simply because, rather like Bangalore, they’ve paid out good money and they’re damn well going to use him.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Saturday, April 25, 2009
IPL Day Eight - The Deccan Charge
Mr Modi’s continuing inability to bring the unruly heavens to heel is threatening to undermine this tournament just as it gets going. The Supreme Lalit wakes up in his penthouse hotel suite in Cape Town to find it has been raining all night. He goes out onto the balcony in his IPL pyjamas and has a few strong words with the errant clouds. The rain abates. His Modiness goes back inside to organise his executive breakfast. Immediately it begins to drizzle again. He simply can’t be everywhere. (And he certainly can’t be in Rajasthan right now, where the heavy black clouds of justice are amassing particularly ominously.)
So our evening entertainment was cut short by a soggy square that bubbled up water every time Robin Jackman pressed his big foot into it. Meanwhile, the sun beats down on the streets of Blighty. Here we are with perfect weather and only county cricket to play it in. Frankly, it is wasted on us. We don’t need it and we don’t know what to do with it, whereas dampness fits snugly around the four day game like a familiar old cardigan.
But having already pocketed a day’s entertainment it is perhaps a little churlish to complain about the abandonment of the night’s festivities. This afternoon it was the blue derby, the azure tussle. It was the craft, guile and high technology of Mumbai, their shirts the colour of summer skies, pitted against the grimy heavy industry of Hyderabad, their pyjamas the shade of a mechanic’s overalls after a busy day spent nostril deep in oil and soot.
Deccan prevailed and the consensus on television was that they wanted it more. This is lazy thinking. When the game is heading inexorably in one direction, body language is not a fair guide to the relative merits of the two teams. The losers-elect will appear to be sullen, stiff of limb and unconvincing, whilst the winners zip about the field in pursuit of the fruits of victory. As the last ball was tamely popped into the onside by Zaheer, the Deccan hordes flooded the pitch and piled into a celebratory scrum. Mumbai would probably have done the same.
Still there is something inexorable about Deccan’s progress. They are the epitome of no-nonsense. There are no flashing white teeth, no fancy haircuts and not even a whiff of Hollywood. The bowlers are crane operators, the batsmen panel beaters and everybody fields with the finely drilled efficiency of a Formula One pit team. From RP Singh’s manfully hairy chest to Venugopal Rao’s unfeasibly hairy face, they are the epitome of function over appearance, led by the Jimmy Stewart of world cricket. For me the story of the afternoon was summed up in one television image. It was of Harmeet Singh trotting up to bowl, the gleam of honest toil on his brow as he peered bravely into the sun, into the blazing brilliance of Sachin.
That isn’t to suggest that Deccan are all endeavour and no class. Their heavy machinery was assembled at considerable expense and their main men more than matched their pale blue opponents for gravitas and reputation. Everywhere there were heavyweight clashes, as though several boxing divisions were being unified at once. We had Malinga versus Gibbs; Gilchrist versus Zaheer; Jayasuriya facing Edwards and RP Singh fronting up against Tendulkar. Both had golden-armed spinners. Both had lithe, versatile West Indian allrounders.
Where they differed was in their batting manner, their modus operandi. Deccan, you imagine, have been drilled in the virtues of ensuring the pigeon they’ve got hold of by one leg is safely bagged, plucked and in the pot as quickly as possible. Mumbai on the other hand are content to let it go, confident that their skill and experience will enable them to snaffle the brace of pheasants that are sure to be hiding in the nearby shrubbery.
So it was that Gibbs and Gilchrist lashed, slashed, dashed and earned themselves large portions of Luck Pie, but didn’t stop swinging. Had Mumbai unleashed their inner Deccan, the moderate total they were chasing might have been scaled down to puny proportions. Instead, they were patient, sedate, nurturing momentum, but never quite ahead of the game. It left them vulnerable to Dame Misfortune, who duly turned up like an unwanted aunt, after the strategy break. Gilchrist roared the departure of Tendulkar and from that point on, Mumbai’s faith in craft, judgement and pure science proved insufficient to withstand the Charge.
The human brain is an unreliable recorder, for all that it operates in HD and 3D. Often all we can recall after a day’s play are unrelated, random moments, from which we have to reconstruct events. In Test matches, these moments are spaced out clearly and framed like pictures in an art gallery. In Twenty20, they are jumbled up like flashbacks to a chaotic night at a drunken club.
I can recall Gibbs bouncing the white ball off his thigh, juggling it like a footballer, looking as relaxed as a lottery winner on a Caribbean cruise. But I can’t remember who gave him the catch. There was the sudden appeareance of the statesmanlike profile of VVS Laxman gliding fleetingly into shot, having presumably just returned from his holidays. I don’t remember any of the twenty runs Harbhajan clattered from eight balls, but I do recall smiling at his arrival, as I usually do. And I smiled too at the dedication of the man furiously banging his little cymbals together for Mumbai. Unfortunately the delicate tinkling could not be heard above the Hyderabad roar.
Finally, just to underline that Deccan might be an irony free zone, it emerged that they had an American baseball coach working with them. He was duly wired up to commentary central and Harsha Bogle gave him a typically over-the-top billing as The Man Who Had Revolutionised Fielding. “Thank you very much,” he replied, with a lack of modesty that might even have caused Geoffrey Boycott to blush. There are lots of foreigners in the IPL, but none are quite so foreign as Americans.
So our evening entertainment was cut short by a soggy square that bubbled up water every time Robin Jackman pressed his big foot into it. Meanwhile, the sun beats down on the streets of Blighty. Here we are with perfect weather and only county cricket to play it in. Frankly, it is wasted on us. We don’t need it and we don’t know what to do with it, whereas dampness fits snugly around the four day game like a familiar old cardigan.
But having already pocketed a day’s entertainment it is perhaps a little churlish to complain about the abandonment of the night’s festivities. This afternoon it was the blue derby, the azure tussle. It was the craft, guile and high technology of Mumbai, their shirts the colour of summer skies, pitted against the grimy heavy industry of Hyderabad, their pyjamas the shade of a mechanic’s overalls after a busy day spent nostril deep in oil and soot.
Deccan prevailed and the consensus on television was that they wanted it more. This is lazy thinking. When the game is heading inexorably in one direction, body language is not a fair guide to the relative merits of the two teams. The losers-elect will appear to be sullen, stiff of limb and unconvincing, whilst the winners zip about the field in pursuit of the fruits of victory. As the last ball was tamely popped into the onside by Zaheer, the Deccan hordes flooded the pitch and piled into a celebratory scrum. Mumbai would probably have done the same.
Still there is something inexorable about Deccan’s progress. They are the epitome of no-nonsense. There are no flashing white teeth, no fancy haircuts and not even a whiff of Hollywood. The bowlers are crane operators, the batsmen panel beaters and everybody fields with the finely drilled efficiency of a Formula One pit team. From RP Singh’s manfully hairy chest to Venugopal Rao’s unfeasibly hairy face, they are the epitome of function over appearance, led by the Jimmy Stewart of world cricket. For me the story of the afternoon was summed up in one television image. It was of Harmeet Singh trotting up to bowl, the gleam of honest toil on his brow as he peered bravely into the sun, into the blazing brilliance of Sachin.
That isn’t to suggest that Deccan are all endeavour and no class. Their heavy machinery was assembled at considerable expense and their main men more than matched their pale blue opponents for gravitas and reputation. Everywhere there were heavyweight clashes, as though several boxing divisions were being unified at once. We had Malinga versus Gibbs; Gilchrist versus Zaheer; Jayasuriya facing Edwards and RP Singh fronting up against Tendulkar. Both had golden-armed spinners. Both had lithe, versatile West Indian allrounders.
Where they differed was in their batting manner, their modus operandi. Deccan, you imagine, have been drilled in the virtues of ensuring the pigeon they’ve got hold of by one leg is safely bagged, plucked and in the pot as quickly as possible. Mumbai on the other hand are content to let it go, confident that their skill and experience will enable them to snaffle the brace of pheasants that are sure to be hiding in the nearby shrubbery.
So it was that Gibbs and Gilchrist lashed, slashed, dashed and earned themselves large portions of Luck Pie, but didn’t stop swinging. Had Mumbai unleashed their inner Deccan, the moderate total they were chasing might have been scaled down to puny proportions. Instead, they were patient, sedate, nurturing momentum, but never quite ahead of the game. It left them vulnerable to Dame Misfortune, who duly turned up like an unwanted aunt, after the strategy break. Gilchrist roared the departure of Tendulkar and from that point on, Mumbai’s faith in craft, judgement and pure science proved insufficient to withstand the Charge.
The human brain is an unreliable recorder, for all that it operates in HD and 3D. Often all we can recall after a day’s play are unrelated, random moments, from which we have to reconstruct events. In Test matches, these moments are spaced out clearly and framed like pictures in an art gallery. In Twenty20, they are jumbled up like flashbacks to a chaotic night at a drunken club.
I can recall Gibbs bouncing the white ball off his thigh, juggling it like a footballer, looking as relaxed as a lottery winner on a Caribbean cruise. But I can’t remember who gave him the catch. There was the sudden appeareance of the statesmanlike profile of VVS Laxman gliding fleetingly into shot, having presumably just returned from his holidays. I don’t remember any of the twenty runs Harbhajan clattered from eight balls, but I do recall smiling at his arrival, as I usually do. And I smiled too at the dedication of the man furiously banging his little cymbals together for Mumbai. Unfortunately the delicate tinkling could not be heard above the Hyderabad roar.
Finally, just to underline that Deccan might be an irony free zone, it emerged that they had an American baseball coach working with them. He was duly wired up to commentary central and Harsha Bogle gave him a typically over-the-top billing as The Man Who Had Revolutionised Fielding. “Thank you very much,” he replied, with a lack of modesty that might even have caused Geoffrey Boycott to blush. There are lots of foreigners in the IPL, but none are quite so foreign as Americans.
Friday, April 24, 2009
IPL Day Seven - First Week Reflections
Today has been a traumatic day for me, the first on which I have been unable to watch any IPL action. It happens to all of us, of course. However much we commit to a sporting event, we are always unfaithful, even if it’s only to nip into the kitchen to make a cup of tea (which is how I missed the first ball of the first game on Saturday). Today I was detained in Birmingham, the details of which I shall not bore you with.
A similar determination not to bore the viewer seems to have gripped the IPL commentators in recent days. There has been a marked increase in punnery, similies, metaphors and verbal wordplay. Jeremy Coney led the way. A Hayden lob to mid-on was described as, “a chip shot...but not a blue chip shot.” In the background, Mark Nicholas and Harshe Bogle spontaneously combusted with mirth.
And though obliged to grasp the corporate nettle with both greasy palms, they have at least tried to minimise the pain with some brain-numbing grammatical gymnastics. Thus we have had DLF as a unit of measurement (“That didn’t register on the DLF scale,”) an abstract noun expressing a quality (“That had DLF written all over it!”), a verb in the past tense (“That’s the first time that Kumble’s been DLFed!”) and as an interjected synonym for a six, (That’s a DLFer!”).
There are still some cricket matters thought, that continue to stump the imaginations of Gavaskar and Co. In particular, the booth-dwellers seem unable to get past their fascination with Andrew Flintoff’s hands. It appears that he doesn’t have normal hands, like you or I. He has buckets. His hands are like buckets. He has bucket hands. So often is the word bucket used in conjunction with pictures of Freddie that I am unable to think of the one without the other. Last night I dreamt of a film called ‘Freddie Buckethands’ in which the England all-rounder, unable to reintegrate into society after his stint in the IPL, exists a lonely outcast until he finds his true calling as a sandcastle construction assistant at the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium, Antigua.
Of course, dear reader, Freddie doesn’t really have big red plastic containers attached to his wrists. It’s a metaphor, see. Tricky blighters though, metaphors. They tire easily. And rather like Praveen Kumar, they aren’t at their best when bashed repeatedly over the head. I understand that social workers concerned for the health and wellbeing of this particular metaphor are flying out to South Africa this weekend to interview Mark Nicholas and Robin Jackman
It has also been a disorientating few days in which many of the things to which we clung for comfort have been taken away from us. I am particularly struggling to come to terms with the dumbing down of Jeremy Coney. Once a be-suited, sardonic but compelling studio guest on Sky, his transfer to the IPL seems to have necessitated the fitting of a brain implant, by which he can be transformed into a performing monkey at the flip of a switch.
The nadir was reached on Thursday. There was Coney, pitchside. Three Chennai cheerleaders stood in front of him. You couldn’t look. Like David Lloyd being asked to review Les Folies Bergere, you knew there was no way this could end well. A little light banter to start with. “How long have you been dancing?” he asked the stationary blondes, who to their credit resisted the temptation to say, “We’re not dancing, we’re talking to you.” With that, the conversational well dried up. There was only one place for the interview to go. Don’t dance, Jeremy, we screamed. To no avail. The camera lingered on the twitching, gurning Coney for just long enough to frame his humiliation.
But he wasn’t done yet. He soon popped up in a control room somewhere high in the stands, to tell us about a camera. This was no ordinary camera. Oh well, alright, it was, but still, it took two men to operate it. Jeremy, adrenalin still pumping, squeezed between the two understandably alarmed men. “Can you make it go blurry?” he asked, jumping up and down like a five year old full of fizzy pop. “Yes we can,” replied the Obama of camera operatives. The screen blurred, mercifully.
The disorientation continued away from the IPL. At one point last weekend, I found myself watching county cricket. I forget the teams involved. Actually, I’ve also forgotten what competition it was in or where the match was taking place. I do remember a sleepy, droning Nasser Hussain, the low hum of distant traffic echoing across row upon on row of empty seats and then the sound of someone snoring.
Next thing I knew, it was Monday afternoon and I was waking up on my sofa. Of course, I only had myself to blame. Last year, my doctor had advised me against watching county cricket whilst operating a laptop and I had foolishly ignored his advice. So remember, kids, if someone sidles up to you in the playground and offers you free tickets to Northamptonshire versus Gloucestershire in the Sleepy-Time No-One-Gives-A-Toss Charity Knock Out Shield, just say no.
A similar determination not to bore the viewer seems to have gripped the IPL commentators in recent days. There has been a marked increase in punnery, similies, metaphors and verbal wordplay. Jeremy Coney led the way. A Hayden lob to mid-on was described as, “a chip shot...but not a blue chip shot.” In the background, Mark Nicholas and Harshe Bogle spontaneously combusted with mirth.
And though obliged to grasp the corporate nettle with both greasy palms, they have at least tried to minimise the pain with some brain-numbing grammatical gymnastics. Thus we have had DLF as a unit of measurement (“That didn’t register on the DLF scale,”) an abstract noun expressing a quality (“That had DLF written all over it!”), a verb in the past tense (“That’s the first time that Kumble’s been DLFed!”) and as an interjected synonym for a six, (That’s a DLFer!”).
There are still some cricket matters thought, that continue to stump the imaginations of Gavaskar and Co. In particular, the booth-dwellers seem unable to get past their fascination with Andrew Flintoff’s hands. It appears that he doesn’t have normal hands, like you or I. He has buckets. His hands are like buckets. He has bucket hands. So often is the word bucket used in conjunction with pictures of Freddie that I am unable to think of the one without the other. Last night I dreamt of a film called ‘Freddie Buckethands’ in which the England all-rounder, unable to reintegrate into society after his stint in the IPL, exists a lonely outcast until he finds his true calling as a sandcastle construction assistant at the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium, Antigua.
Of course, dear reader, Freddie doesn’t really have big red plastic containers attached to his wrists. It’s a metaphor, see. Tricky blighters though, metaphors. They tire easily. And rather like Praveen Kumar, they aren’t at their best when bashed repeatedly over the head. I understand that social workers concerned for the health and wellbeing of this particular metaphor are flying out to South Africa this weekend to interview Mark Nicholas and Robin Jackman
It has also been a disorientating few days in which many of the things to which we clung for comfort have been taken away from us. I am particularly struggling to come to terms with the dumbing down of Jeremy Coney. Once a be-suited, sardonic but compelling studio guest on Sky, his transfer to the IPL seems to have necessitated the fitting of a brain implant, by which he can be transformed into a performing monkey at the flip of a switch.
The nadir was reached on Thursday. There was Coney, pitchside. Three Chennai cheerleaders stood in front of him. You couldn’t look. Like David Lloyd being asked to review Les Folies Bergere, you knew there was no way this could end well. A little light banter to start with. “How long have you been dancing?” he asked the stationary blondes, who to their credit resisted the temptation to say, “We’re not dancing, we’re talking to you.” With that, the conversational well dried up. There was only one place for the interview to go. Don’t dance, Jeremy, we screamed. To no avail. The camera lingered on the twitching, gurning Coney for just long enough to frame his humiliation.
But he wasn’t done yet. He soon popped up in a control room somewhere high in the stands, to tell us about a camera. This was no ordinary camera. Oh well, alright, it was, but still, it took two men to operate it. Jeremy, adrenalin still pumping, squeezed between the two understandably alarmed men. “Can you make it go blurry?” he asked, jumping up and down like a five year old full of fizzy pop. “Yes we can,” replied the Obama of camera operatives. The screen blurred, mercifully.
The disorientation continued away from the IPL. At one point last weekend, I found myself watching county cricket. I forget the teams involved. Actually, I’ve also forgotten what competition it was in or where the match was taking place. I do remember a sleepy, droning Nasser Hussain, the low hum of distant traffic echoing across row upon on row of empty seats and then the sound of someone snoring.
Next thing I knew, it was Monday afternoon and I was waking up on my sofa. Of course, I only had myself to blame. Last year, my doctor had advised me against watching county cricket whilst operating a laptop and I had foolishly ignored his advice. So remember, kids, if someone sidles up to you in the playground and offers you free tickets to Northamptonshire versus Gloucestershire in the Sleepy-Time No-One-Gives-A-Toss Charity Knock Out Shield, just say no.
Thursday, April 23, 2009
IPL Day Six - Down to Business
Day Six is where the IPL got down to business. The lacquer of hype had started to wear off; the cheerleaders had sorted out their routines and most of the players were onto their third set of clean pyjamas. This was a day not of warm-ups, ice-breaking and star-gazing, but real cricket; real tense cricket, as it turned out.
A match has an existence beyond the activities of the players out on the pitch; it is a creation of the intellect and imagination of all those who witness it. To be truthful, many of the games thus far have been rather sickly creatures, fading out of existence long before the final ball.
But the tussle between Chennai and Delhi was a more robust entity, a snarling, twisting tug of war in which neither side would budge. There was slack play here and there. There were dropped catches, fluffed stops and sloppy shots. The players, still moving through the gears, are yet to reach top speed. But bat didn’t smash into ball without reply and each wicket in turn was answered with a flurry of boundaries.
A B De Villiers was the thread stitching the Delhi innings together. He, with his middle order associates, hauled the Daredevils off their knees after early knock-downs, but Dilshan and Karthik fashioned only amusing cameos, mere trinkets, compared to the elaborate masterpiece being created by the South African at the other end. And the creative process can be cruel, as Andrew Flintoff will attest.
But Chennai’s chase began with rocket-like velocity and was sustained by Raina, Flintoff and Morkel. The yellow Chennai worm climbed above its blue cousin, then fell below it and in the end, viewers found themselves squinting at a tangle of graphical invertebrates, neither with the statistical strength to poke its pixelled head above the other. In the end, the engine began to splutter and Chennai ran out of gas, not for the first time this tournament.
The second game was closer. Chasing under lights is supposed to be difficult and Kolkata duly made it so, wilting under Rajasthan’s trademark harrying. But dogged Ganguly, relisher of scraps, fought on. Every move by the grandmaster Warne of the white teeth was parried by the black-shirted Prince of Kolkata. Warne delayed whilst he directed traffic. Ganguly stalled by walking down the pitch to explain to Yashpal Singh the importance of not getting out. Traps were set; sprung; re-loaded with bait.
Last ball of the sixteenth over. The required run rate is over ten. Munaf oversteps and Ganguly helps the reluctant ball to fulfil its destiny over square leg. A free hit. Munaf coughs up a wide half volley which is brutally persuaded deep over long off by Dada’s flailing chunk of willow. The required rate is now eight.
But, drenched in sweat and dew, Warnie wasn’t done. He enticed Yashpal into a dash at glory and with the scent of victory incense invading his nostrils, the youngster fell short of the boundary and his senior partner’s expectations. Ganguly roared his anger, swinging his bat at the blameless ground, demolishing imaginary mole hills of disgust. But a few balls later, he was nicked off by Kamran Khan and, with a last ball dive, a fumble and a scramble, we had arrived at an agony-prolonging tie.
In truth, the Super Over was not a complete success. A cardinal sin on occasions like these is to allow even one iota of tension to evaporate and the inordinate delays whilst bats were found, pads strapped on, rules explained and fields set, conspired to make the final over showdown a game-resolving formality rather than a crescendo of thrills. Gayle smashed big fours, but Pathan, down on one knee, heaved bigger sixes and Rajasthan had won, a reprise of their many glorious escapes of 2008. Shahrukh disappeared into the shadows, Shilpa Shetty looked incredulous and the tournament had truly begun.
A match has an existence beyond the activities of the players out on the pitch; it is a creation of the intellect and imagination of all those who witness it. To be truthful, many of the games thus far have been rather sickly creatures, fading out of existence long before the final ball.
But the tussle between Chennai and Delhi was a more robust entity, a snarling, twisting tug of war in which neither side would budge. There was slack play here and there. There were dropped catches, fluffed stops and sloppy shots. The players, still moving through the gears, are yet to reach top speed. But bat didn’t smash into ball without reply and each wicket in turn was answered with a flurry of boundaries.
A B De Villiers was the thread stitching the Delhi innings together. He, with his middle order associates, hauled the Daredevils off their knees after early knock-downs, but Dilshan and Karthik fashioned only amusing cameos, mere trinkets, compared to the elaborate masterpiece being created by the South African at the other end. And the creative process can be cruel, as Andrew Flintoff will attest.
But Chennai’s chase began with rocket-like velocity and was sustained by Raina, Flintoff and Morkel. The yellow Chennai worm climbed above its blue cousin, then fell below it and in the end, viewers found themselves squinting at a tangle of graphical invertebrates, neither with the statistical strength to poke its pixelled head above the other. In the end, the engine began to splutter and Chennai ran out of gas, not for the first time this tournament.
The second game was closer. Chasing under lights is supposed to be difficult and Kolkata duly made it so, wilting under Rajasthan’s trademark harrying. But dogged Ganguly, relisher of scraps, fought on. Every move by the grandmaster Warne of the white teeth was parried by the black-shirted Prince of Kolkata. Warne delayed whilst he directed traffic. Ganguly stalled by walking down the pitch to explain to Yashpal Singh the importance of not getting out. Traps were set; sprung; re-loaded with bait.
Last ball of the sixteenth over. The required run rate is over ten. Munaf oversteps and Ganguly helps the reluctant ball to fulfil its destiny over square leg. A free hit. Munaf coughs up a wide half volley which is brutally persuaded deep over long off by Dada’s flailing chunk of willow. The required rate is now eight.
But, drenched in sweat and dew, Warnie wasn’t done. He enticed Yashpal into a dash at glory and with the scent of victory incense invading his nostrils, the youngster fell short of the boundary and his senior partner’s expectations. Ganguly roared his anger, swinging his bat at the blameless ground, demolishing imaginary mole hills of disgust. But a few balls later, he was nicked off by Kamran Khan and, with a last ball dive, a fumble and a scramble, we had arrived at an agony-prolonging tie.
In truth, the Super Over was not a complete success. A cardinal sin on occasions like these is to allow even one iota of tension to evaporate and the inordinate delays whilst bats were found, pads strapped on, rules explained and fields set, conspired to make the final over showdown a game-resolving formality rather than a crescendo of thrills. Gayle smashed big fours, but Pathan, down on one knee, heaved bigger sixes and Rajasthan had won, a reprise of their many glorious escapes of 2008. Shahrukh disappeared into the shadows, Shilpa Shetty looked incredulous and the tournament had truly begun.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
IPL Day Five - In Praise of Pietersen
There was a thunderous, angry edge to Day Five of the IPL. Perhaps it was the sight of an ominously dark Table Mountain wreathed in broiling orange clouds as the sun set behind Cape Town. Maybe it was the guttural roar from a nameless man in red as a lofted shot from Rohit Sharma landed yards from a Bangalore fielder. Or perhaps the percussive savagery of flashing willow on white leather as Gilchrist, Sharma and Dravid strained at the bonds with which so many batting Gullivers have been tied down by bowlers of Lilliputian reputation.
Whatever it was, there seemed to be steam building up under this IPL at last. And the man stoking the boiler was the Pietermaritzburg Maestro himself. Kevin Pietersen was today not just captain of Bangalore but pumper-up-in-chief. He roared encouragement, he clapped his hands ferociously, he demanded snappier fielding from the dilatory Praveen Kumar and he generally strutted about the field as though he not only owned it, but everyone on it and their houses, their wives and girlfriends too. And it was no fitful or fair-weather performance. He was a constant pressuring force. None could rest.
This was not the Pietersen who had been so eager to please last August; who had taken pains to try and win over the England dressing room, who had agreed to work with a coach he didn’t think was the right man. This was not the Pietersen who put out mixed messages about the Stanford debacle; who stood forlornly at mid-on as Yuvraj gave England an ass-whupping in India; who wanted Michael Vaughan back in the team to help him with the job he had accepted.
Some thought that this restless, intense individual would chuck in captaincy altogether when it turned out to be something he couldn’t immediately excel at. They were wrong. For Bangalore and with the help of Ray Jennings, he has returned to it with renewed ferocity, with the ruthless determination he applies to perfecting his batting technique. And with every game, he improves. The moment when he jogged thirty yards to the stricken Karan Sharma to tell the youngster to keep his head up after dropping a catch, was pure, natural captaincy.
But Mike Brearley himself could not have saved the Royal Challengers today. Adam Gilchrist deftly dismembered the Bangalore bowling with the brutal expertise of a butcher reducing a carcass. And then Rohit Sharma smeared the remains all over the Cape Town sky. I’d swear that for the biggest of his sixes off Jesse Ryder, the ball paused for a second at the peak of its steepling trajectory, as though the gods themselves had slowed the flight of the ball to wonder at what pure timing and trained muscle can do. Bangalore will not be the last to feel the Deccan Charge this IPL.
Whatever it was, there seemed to be steam building up under this IPL at last. And the man stoking the boiler was the Pietermaritzburg Maestro himself. Kevin Pietersen was today not just captain of Bangalore but pumper-up-in-chief. He roared encouragement, he clapped his hands ferociously, he demanded snappier fielding from the dilatory Praveen Kumar and he generally strutted about the field as though he not only owned it, but everyone on it and their houses, their wives and girlfriends too. And it was no fitful or fair-weather performance. He was a constant pressuring force. None could rest.
This was not the Pietersen who had been so eager to please last August; who had taken pains to try and win over the England dressing room, who had agreed to work with a coach he didn’t think was the right man. This was not the Pietersen who put out mixed messages about the Stanford debacle; who stood forlornly at mid-on as Yuvraj gave England an ass-whupping in India; who wanted Michael Vaughan back in the team to help him with the job he had accepted.
Some thought that this restless, intense individual would chuck in captaincy altogether when it turned out to be something he couldn’t immediately excel at. They were wrong. For Bangalore and with the help of Ray Jennings, he has returned to it with renewed ferocity, with the ruthless determination he applies to perfecting his batting technique. And with every game, he improves. The moment when he jogged thirty yards to the stricken Karan Sharma to tell the youngster to keep his head up after dropping a catch, was pure, natural captaincy.
But Mike Brearley himself could not have saved the Royal Challengers today. Adam Gilchrist deftly dismembered the Bangalore bowling with the brutal expertise of a butcher reducing a carcass. And then Rohit Sharma smeared the remains all over the Cape Town sky. I’d swear that for the biggest of his sixes off Jesse Ryder, the ball paused for a second at the peak of its steepling trajectory, as though the gods themselves had slowed the flight of the ball to wonder at what pure timing and trained muscle can do. Bangalore will not be the last to feel the Deccan Charge this IPL.
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
IPL Day Four
What is Mr Modi playing at? I haven’t forked out £10.99 for a Setanta subscription (connection fee extra) merely to watch moisture accumulate on green canvas. We were led to believe his supreme Modiness was a superhuman, an omnipotent being, able to relocate an entire tournament hundreds of miles in the blink of an actress’s eye. Why then, does he permit this continued precipitation? Your people are losing faith, Lord Lalit.
Fortunately, there were one or two golden nuggets to be panned from the relentless torrents that washed away Day Four of the IPL. I particularly enjoyed Chris Gayle’s mountainous sixes, each launched higher and further than the last; gloriously bloody minded refusals to give in to that strip of devious Durban turf.
Thank goodness too, for Preity Zinta. Of course, we knew that she took an interest in the affairs of mortal men, even picking one side over another, just as Aphrodite rooted for the Kings XI Trojans on the field of Ilium. But nothing could prepare us for the sight of this silver screen Goddess cursing like a sailor on live television. The cause of her fall from heavenly grace? Ravi Bopara. As his chubby cheeks filled the replay screen, the Goddess gave vent to a four letter outburst that shook the heavens.
As we reeled with shock, the cameras were quickly switched away from the potty-mouthed Preity and our gaze alighted on the saintly Shahrukh Khan. High up in the clouds, the floppy-fringed one looked on, intent upon the field of battle. Yet what was that? An ugly, stubby cigarette lodged between the fingers of the immortal Lord of Kolkata, as he fretted nervously over the result, looking for all the world like a taxi driver on a fag break; all the carefully presented glamour of Bollywood dispersing into the smoky Durban air.
Even the Gods let their humanity show, on occasion.
Fortunately, there were one or two golden nuggets to be panned from the relentless torrents that washed away Day Four of the IPL. I particularly enjoyed Chris Gayle’s mountainous sixes, each launched higher and further than the last; gloriously bloody minded refusals to give in to that strip of devious Durban turf.
Thank goodness too, for Preity Zinta. Of course, we knew that she took an interest in the affairs of mortal men, even picking one side over another, just as Aphrodite rooted for the Kings XI Trojans on the field of Ilium. But nothing could prepare us for the sight of this silver screen Goddess cursing like a sailor on live television. The cause of her fall from heavenly grace? Ravi Bopara. As his chubby cheeks filled the replay screen, the Goddess gave vent to a four letter outburst that shook the heavens.
As we reeled with shock, the cameras were quickly switched away from the potty-mouthed Preity and our gaze alighted on the saintly Shahrukh Khan. High up in the clouds, the floppy-fringed one looked on, intent upon the field of battle. Yet what was that? An ugly, stubby cigarette lodged between the fingers of the immortal Lord of Kolkata, as he fretted nervously over the result, looking for all the world like a taxi driver on a fag break; all the carefully presented glamour of Bollywood dispersing into the smoky Durban air.
Even the Gods let their humanity show, on occasion.
Monday, April 20, 2009
IPL Day Three
The IPL is not just a demanding event for players. It presents the ultimate challenge for commentators too. If a Test match is a gentle Sunday morning jog around your local park, the IPL is a gruelling marathon across a military assault course, complete with crocodile pits and nine foot high obstacles.
Test match commentators are allowed to wax lyrical, to speculate, to fall asleep, even to snore occasionally. There is no such respite for your IPL microphone jockey. They are given a script and at regular intervals, prodded by the muzzles of the rifles wielded by the Lalit Modi Revenue Maximisation Squad, must correctly acknowledge certain benevolent corporate bodies.
This coercion has taken its toll on the minds of those held captive in the commentary booth. Sunil Gavaskar is no longer able to screw in a light bulb without declaring it a Citi moment of success. Mark Nicholas involuntary greets the popping of his toaster with the words, “DLF Maximum!” And Ravi Shastri wakes up screaming in the middle of the night from a dream in which he forgot to read out the list of tournament sponsors.
Perhaps the cruellest ordeal of all for these prisoners is that they are not allowed to tell the truth about a particularly hideous piece of merchandise that regularly appears on our screens. No, not Kevin Pietersen; I’m referring to the IPL Trophy.
When I first saw it, I assumed it was a homage to the IPL prepared by some Cape Town schoolchildren using plastic cups, pipe cleaners and glitter pens. But no, it is the reward for winning the richest tournament in cricket. Apparently it is covered in diamonds. Rarely can so much money have been spent to such little effect (and I include Surrey’s signing of Shoaib Akhtar).
And yet, presented with an image of this monstrosity, Robin Jackman is not allowed to point out that it is the tackiest piece of decoration you are likely to see outside of David Beckham’s third living room. Nor can Greg Blewett politely suggest that it might have been better if they’d simply piled the diamonds up on a silver plate. Instead, they must show due deference and declare it a stunning piece of trophyware.
Truly, we should feel their pain and give thanks that they have sacrificed their commentating careers for the good of the IPL.
Test match commentators are allowed to wax lyrical, to speculate, to fall asleep, even to snore occasionally. There is no such respite for your IPL microphone jockey. They are given a script and at regular intervals, prodded by the muzzles of the rifles wielded by the Lalit Modi Revenue Maximisation Squad, must correctly acknowledge certain benevolent corporate bodies.
This coercion has taken its toll on the minds of those held captive in the commentary booth. Sunil Gavaskar is no longer able to screw in a light bulb without declaring it a Citi moment of success. Mark Nicholas involuntary greets the popping of his toaster with the words, “DLF Maximum!” And Ravi Shastri wakes up screaming in the middle of the night from a dream in which he forgot to read out the list of tournament sponsors.
Perhaps the cruellest ordeal of all for these prisoners is that they are not allowed to tell the truth about a particularly hideous piece of merchandise that regularly appears on our screens. No, not Kevin Pietersen; I’m referring to the IPL Trophy.
When I first saw it, I assumed it was a homage to the IPL prepared by some Cape Town schoolchildren using plastic cups, pipe cleaners and glitter pens. But no, it is the reward for winning the richest tournament in cricket. Apparently it is covered in diamonds. Rarely can so much money have been spent to such little effect (and I include Surrey’s signing of Shoaib Akhtar).
And yet, presented with an image of this monstrosity, Robin Jackman is not allowed to point out that it is the tackiest piece of decoration you are likely to see outside of David Beckham’s third living room. Nor can Greg Blewett politely suggest that it might have been better if they’d simply piled the diamonds up on a silver plate. Instead, they must show due deference and declare it a stunning piece of trophyware.
Truly, we should feel their pain and give thanks that they have sacrificed their commentating careers for the good of the IPL.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
IPL Day Two Summary
Yesterday Setanta employed noted former cricketer and radio persona Ronnie Irani as their IPL in-studio instant analyser. His mission: to give us the inside track, to be our mole, our secret agent; letting us in on what really goes on behind the scenes and explaining the nuances of the wonderful game to the uninitiated.
And we learnt many things yesterday. We now know, for instance, that Kevin Pietersen and Shane Warne have something of a rivalry. Yes it’s true and apparently that meant that both of them were really trying to win the game for their respective teams. We discovered that playing in the IPL is a great opportunity for the players; the IPL is quite exciting; Tendulkar is a really good batsman and Freddie will be a bit disappointed with his performance.
So obviously, I was keen today to add to my store of knowledge and when the new studio guest was unveiled as one Darren Gough, my cup ranneth over. A fine bowler, a belligerent blade swinger and a good mover in the ballroom, Goughie was sure to embroider the fine cloth of the afternoon’s entertainment with the golden thread of insight.
It is difficult to sum up the full effect of an afternoon with Goughie, but I will give you just a flavour. Early on, he ruffled a few feathers by tipping everyone’s favourite losers the Kings XI Punjab. Hello, I thought, this is more like it. Controversy. A maverick opinion. Excited, the studio presenter pressed him further. What was it about the Kings XI that made him pick them out as tournament winners? Turned out that Goughie liked Brett Lee, he liked the boy Sreesanth and he was enamoured of Marsh and Hopes.
It matters not that one of them will miss the whole tournament and the other three will be unavailable until the second half. Their influence will be felt strongly in their absence. Unfortunately, on this occasion, the phantom Lee, the invisible Sreesanth and the cardboard cut-outs of Hopes and Marsh proved unable to overcome the Delhi Daredevils and Punjab received a predictable and not entirely unenjoyable spanking.
Of course, Yuvraj had other players available, such as the talented Indian batsman Kamran Goel who blazed away so effectively at the top of the order. What, the studio presenter wondered, did Goughie think of him? “To be honest,” opined the Dazzler, “I’ve never heard of him.” Eat your heart out, Nasser Hussain.
Now to anyone who thinks that this is just a cheap shot at the expense of a great player, they are of course correct. But I would offer one slight mitigating circumstance in my defence. If the only requirement for obtaining a seat in a Setanta studio is the capacity to state the bleeding obvious, or to look down a list of names and spot the good players, then I’m sure there are many cricket fans out there who would happily do the job for a fraction of the fee earned by Mr Irani or Mr Gough. Heck, I’d do it for nothing.
And we learnt many things yesterday. We now know, for instance, that Kevin Pietersen and Shane Warne have something of a rivalry. Yes it’s true and apparently that meant that both of them were really trying to win the game for their respective teams. We discovered that playing in the IPL is a great opportunity for the players; the IPL is quite exciting; Tendulkar is a really good batsman and Freddie will be a bit disappointed with his performance.
So obviously, I was keen today to add to my store of knowledge and when the new studio guest was unveiled as one Darren Gough, my cup ranneth over. A fine bowler, a belligerent blade swinger and a good mover in the ballroom, Goughie was sure to embroider the fine cloth of the afternoon’s entertainment with the golden thread of insight.
It is difficult to sum up the full effect of an afternoon with Goughie, but I will give you just a flavour. Early on, he ruffled a few feathers by tipping everyone’s favourite losers the Kings XI Punjab. Hello, I thought, this is more like it. Controversy. A maverick opinion. Excited, the studio presenter pressed him further. What was it about the Kings XI that made him pick them out as tournament winners? Turned out that Goughie liked Brett Lee, he liked the boy Sreesanth and he was enamoured of Marsh and Hopes.
It matters not that one of them will miss the whole tournament and the other three will be unavailable until the second half. Their influence will be felt strongly in their absence. Unfortunately, on this occasion, the phantom Lee, the invisible Sreesanth and the cardboard cut-outs of Hopes and Marsh proved unable to overcome the Delhi Daredevils and Punjab received a predictable and not entirely unenjoyable spanking.
Of course, Yuvraj had other players available, such as the talented Indian batsman Kamran Goel who blazed away so effectively at the top of the order. What, the studio presenter wondered, did Goughie think of him? “To be honest,” opined the Dazzler, “I’ve never heard of him.” Eat your heart out, Nasser Hussain.
Now to anyone who thinks that this is just a cheap shot at the expense of a great player, they are of course correct. But I would offer one slight mitigating circumstance in my defence. If the only requirement for obtaining a seat in a Setanta studio is the capacity to state the bleeding obvious, or to look down a list of names and spot the good players, then I’m sure there are many cricket fans out there who would happily do the job for a fraction of the fee earned by Mr Irani or Mr Gough. Heck, I’d do it for nothing.
IPL Day One Summary
The thing about Twenty20 is that you only have a limited time to strut your stuff, to show what you can do, to justify the time and money that has been lavished on feeding, housing and entertaining you. It would be all to easy to write-off these performers as shaggy-haired or mongrels of dubious pedigree performing tricks for whichever owner rewards them most.
So credit to the undoubted star of IPL Day One who gave such prolonged entertainment to the Cape Town crowd. In an energetic show, he covered every blade of grass, showing the kind of fitness and eagerness in the field required to excel at Twenty20. His reluctance to leave the field may yet mean he loses some of his match feed but that can be forgiven as the exhuberance of long-haired youth.
The rest of the opening day was a bit of an anti-climax. Unfortunately Setanta’s live coverage of the cheerleaders was too often interrupted by some nonsense involving a bat and a ball. The commentators too were inhibited from reading out their lists of adverts by the necessity of describing what was occurring on the field. And Ravi Shastri’s stand-up routine was sadly cut-short by a chap with a coin.
Still, there’s time for things to pick up. I’m particularly looking forward to Yuvraj the Poodle on Day Two. I think he is a shoe-in for Best in Show.
So credit to the undoubted star of IPL Day One who gave such prolonged entertainment to the Cape Town crowd. In an energetic show, he covered every blade of grass, showing the kind of fitness and eagerness in the field required to excel at Twenty20. His reluctance to leave the field may yet mean he loses some of his match feed but that can be forgiven as the exhuberance of long-haired youth.
The rest of the opening day was a bit of an anti-climax. Unfortunately Setanta’s live coverage of the cheerleaders was too often interrupted by some nonsense involving a bat and a ball. The commentators too were inhibited from reading out their lists of adverts by the necessity of describing what was occurring on the field. And Ravi Shastri’s stand-up routine was sadly cut-short by a chap with a coin.
Still, there’s time for things to pick up. I’m particularly looking forward to Yuvraj the Poodle on Day Two. I think he is a shoe-in for Best in Show.
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