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.