IPL - Indian Premier League

               The current IPL edition has started and I am sure you are glued to your TV as soon as you freshn up after a completing another mundane day at office. The day when IPL was started as an answer to the rebellious Chandra Group's T-20 game format, no body expected it to attract us apart from the big players from our Indian Team. As usual the glamour world of Bollywood followed cricket players here too. Bollywood beauties and cricket players are really un seperable since the days of Gary Sobers to Mansur Ali Khan Pataudi to  Viv Richards to Ravi Shastri to Imran Khan, bollywood stars have followed cricket players everywhere. even if they dont follow cricket. You may not know half of these old flings now. The only difference in the current scenario is even Shah Rukh Khan is in the group of bollywood girls.  LAWS OF ATTRACTION, YOU CAN SAY!!  :)

               When IPL was launched on the lines of English Premier League (football), we hardly understood the tournament format and the team composition. The main thing highlighted was who was which player was paid how many crores!!

           As the game unfolded, we thronged infront of the TV to see the stars and most importantly to see players of different nations playing with our Indian team players celebrating together on a fall of wicket, like Mathew hayden and MS Dhoni jumping in joy when Bhajji is out. Or say when Gilchrist, laxman and Symonds jumping in joy when Ricky Ponting aks Punter is sent back to pavilion. What we had never ever imagined started happening in our television at our home and we were Aww!! Welcome to Indian  Premier League.

             In the first edition after every ball was bowled the cameras would turn to owner celebs. Infact the celebs ruled the TRPs  more than the players and the game in the first edition. For instance, in the first edition few men followed Kings XI Punjab only to see Preity Jinta hug her team players tightly till they suffocated.  Sometimes she used to wait near the boundary lines to catch hold them even when the guys were busy feilding. With two more editions following it, today the game rules more than their celeb owners. Today nobody cares much for Preity Jinta, Shilpa or Shah Rukh - all people are interested now is how their teams are playing.  The only exeption you can note here is Vijay Mallya. He was there for the initial few games in first edition like the others, after seeing his test team's performance in 20-20 matches he flew safely to his Edinburg Castle only to fly whole night to see the game when the same test team entered the finals in 2nd edition at SA. 

              The way IPL is moulding itself is really amazing. When 20-20 games were introduced in India, it was said and followed the it is the game of younsgters and our famous trio opted out of the team thinking in the same way. And today the most successful players are 30 plus players like Dravid, Kallis, Ganguly, Sachin, Vaas, Jayavardhane,  Hayden, Jaysuriya and our favorite Jumbo Anil Kumble. People laughed when these so called aged players started being part of IPL 1st edition. Today the same bunch of old shoulers are the most bankable and succesfull so far. I am really impressed with their performance, especially our Jumbo a lot. Until he took over captaincy of the team of test players from Kevin Pieterson, the team was not cared, I completely ignored  and never followed a single game of the team of the city where I live in, until Anil turned around the same guys into a match winning team and the team which was ranked 7th out of 8 in the 1st edition went out to challenge the title at finals. Is'nt is amazing? Same players, same team, same conditions performed differntly under the leadership of a different man who had retired from cricket. That's Anil Kumble for you and he is 39!

            I am hard core Royal Challenger Bangalore fan now, thanks to Jumbo. Dont be surprised if you see me cheering for our boys at M Chinnaswamy stadium. Anil Kumble, apart frombeing a captain, even as a player he has contributed the best for the team. He is very stingy in giving runs and he likes to take more than what he gives. Less runs, more wickets from game to game. (He is also a gentleman even off the field, I met him accidentally in London last year, intentionally I spoke in Kannada  asking for an autograph for my sis, with a smile on his face he said "ಆಯಿತು pen ಕೊಡಿ " and after giving his autograph he said ಅವರಿಗೆ ಫೋಟೋ ತೋರಿಸಲ್ವಾ? and voluntarily obliged for a snap with me )

          None of us ever imagined that Royal Challengers would transform like this, even their owner Vijay Mallya. Now Mr Mallya is busy doing what he is famous for, with the players of his team, partying hard!! Now these guys are really lucky to be in Vijay Mallya's party. LOL :)

         With another one month of gala extravaganza of IPL continuing to entertain and exite, I am sure you will enjoy the game. End of the day none of the owners, no franchise, no team, no player wins - it is only the game of cricket that wins. Maja madi..... but, dont forget to cheer for Royal Challengers Bengaluru. 

Your's

Raju Hiremath