The present IPL table looks very confusing. Rajasthan Royals, who probably have one of the best teams on the basis of current form are not in the top 4. MI who look confused with their non cohesive unit of shiny stars are number three. Chennai despite being number five look a shadow of the team they used to be. May be these teams have thought a few things in not exactly the right way or so the trends of IPL 5 show!
I won't use my batsmen, come what may!
What baffles me the most in this IPL is the under utilization of batting fire power from the big teams. CSK should ask themselves a question, is Badrinath suited to bat ahead of Albie Morkel? Or why do they need to play Mr. Cricket in all the matches as if its an obligation. It's a T20 game. MI is no exception to this trend. Every batsman that plays for MI seems to be playing only for himself. If everyone will be a sheet anchor, who will attack? May be Harbhajan Singh! And if they have to play Robin Peterson, they have to use him as a bowler. I am sure he shall do better than the skipper himself. Even Raina is bowling better than Bhajji these days. Thankfully, KXIP got their screws tightened in time. Now they play Hussey at 4. And what a blessing in disguise has Gilly's injury been. Or has he been faking it. Anyway, this was his last season as a player ;) KKR, why do you send Kallis ahead of Pathan. Either ways, Pathan gets caught at the boundary. Try him in the powerplays for once! Give him the license to kill when escaping is easy not when you have the city barricaded. PWI just won't play Smith ahead of Ganguly and Clarke, who is undoubtedly their best batsman this season. Whoever is coaching PWI should ask Uthappa to stop acting like Ranbir Kapoor and play some shots in front of the wicket. If i had shoulders so strong and a chest so wide, I bet I would have hit bowlers back over their heads. I mean this whole thing is so contagious, even RCB sent Gayle to bat at number 4. What happened to Resource Based Strategy??? Conclusion, If you got assassins, let them kill. Thank god, we have DD who exhaust all their batsmen :D
Left Armers with no turn are the ones!
There used to be a time when left arm orthodox spinners in cricket were like non engineers in a B school. IPL has changed things. There is Appanna (Yes, that is a name!), A, B, C, Murali Karthik, D, E, F, Nadeem (he is a country cousin :D ), ...., X, Y, Z. I wish there were more letters in alphabet! And somehow, most of the batsmen have been trying to play them inside out all the time where there has been non existent turn (Ravindra Jadeja!), loop, bounce and an almost deep extra cover fielder who looks like an irritant step brother of the good old position of "Long-off". So the cover drives which were meant to go for fours are yielding singles, bowled(S), inside edges to midwicket which is again void of fielders due to some inexplicable reasons. Where have the slog sweeps gone? Steve Waugh and Hansie Cronje, I wish you played this battery of overrated slow bowlers who use the other hand to bowl!
What happened to Fast bowlers?
There was "Dale Steyn", then there was sunlight and the rest followed! It gives me goose bumps, when I see a 6 feet plus Pollard in his run up, approaching the crease like the calmness of Holding and then bowling a delivery at a speed which Afridi can touch without even twisting his shoulder. Or for that matter, Amit Singh from RR, who runs like a 35 yards and bowls at a speed which is slower than the speed of his own run up. And what kind of bowlers are "Rajat Bhatia", "Siddharth Trivedi" and there are others. Last heard, Trivedi is a slow bowl master. These slower balls have spoiled the pacers. The purpose of a slow ball is to mark a change of pace. So, someone who bowls at 125 kph is already slow. Thanks to our curators, even these bowlers are making an earning. Everyone has the right to bread! And by the way, I like Dinda for at least trying to be a fast bowler, even if an ordinary one. There are so less of them these days, we need someone who at least lives with this belief that he can be the one!
My personal advice to MSD: Please come back to Ranchi. We miss you. And you will get a life. It's ok not to play an IPL. You can do that MS, if you can miss a test series, so can you miss an IPL. You do look tired and more than just 30!
Its match time, almost. Only 5 minutes of "Extra Innings" today. See, life finds a way!
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