IPL Stadia and their capacity

 

City	Stadium Name	IPL Team	Capacity
Kolkata	Eden Gardens	Knight Riders	1,20,000
Bangalore	Chinnaswamy Stadium	Royal Challengers	70,000
Mumbai	Dr. DY Patil Stadium	Mumbai Indians	60,000
Hyderabad	Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium	Deccan Chargers	55,000
Chennai	MA Chindambaram Stadium	Super Kings	50,000
Jaipur	Sawai Mansingh stadium	Rajastan Royals	48,000
New Delhi	Feroz Shah Kotla	Daredevils	47,000
Mumbai	Wankhede Stadium	Mumbai Indians	45,000
Mohali	Punjab Cricket Association Stadium	KIngs XI Punjab	25,000

 

 

 

Pidge is getting younger by the day

Glenn McGrath, and his uncanny resemblance with a bowling machine is rewarded in a big way. In a game format which is heavily dominated by batsmen and being a bowler is a cardinal sin, Pidge survived and triumphed. He took the fight to the opposition. He also proved the critics wrong who argued that bowlers are mere puppets to glamourize the batsmen. If you bowl wicket to wicket when batsmen are trying to score quick runs you always have a chance. He picked up four important wickets in 4 overs. When he finished his spell, his figures read 4-0-29-4. He was not happy after he bowled the last ball. Why? Because there was a misfield and the last ball went to a four. It should have been a single. Any other bowler would have been happy. But not McGrath. That is how much this aussie values the runs he gives away. In addition to that he has dived desperately to stop a boundary and touched the rope during the process. The video evidence was inconclusive to decide anything and they gave it in favor of the fielder. He saved 2 runs for his team.

This efforts have earned him the man of the match. Quite rightly so. I think Gautam Gambhir might be disappointed after his blistering knock of 86 runs which placed him in the top 10 run scorers. But, he wouldn’t complain. As we have seen 17 matches and not even a single time was a bowler rewarded. This is the first time in the tournament. I hope there will be many more to come.

If any younster has to learn any one thing from the tournament, I want them to learn this : discipline. No, sledging is not as glamorous as you think it is.  Staring at the opponent might be fine for one time but not bad mouthing. It is the utter discipline and healthy respect for learning the naunces of the game is what a youngster should learn. If you want a role model emulate McGrath, not Sreesanth. Sreesanth is like monkey whose tail is caught on fire and doesn’t know how to douse it. He is a lousy bowler, pathetic fielder above all a crying wuss. I repeat, please emulate McGrath, not Sreesanth. 

Rahul Dravid has this to say at the end of the match : “McGrath made the difference” — Indeed.

Daredevils won the match by 9 runs and move up a notch on the points table to second spot.

Lone English player joins IPL

That is Dimitri Mascarenhas. He is the lone english player who was allowed to play in IPL. Mascarenhas has attracted a bid of $100,000 from Rajastan Royals.  He is a batting all-rounder and his explosive batting skills are a welcome addition to the IPL which has lost some of the powerful hitters this week. Othe english players have expressed that they would like to play for IPL, Kevin Pietersen was very vocal in his desire. None of them were allowed to play because of the central contract. Mascarenhaswas the only english player and will be available for 5 games. It would be interesting to see how Shane Warne uses Masceranus and will he play against Knight Riders tomorrow.

It will be a tough for Shane Warne tomorrow, because he has to choose 4 from a pool of 7 players, including himself. Assuming Warne, Graeme Smith and Kamran Akmal as the obvious choice he has to fill the last spot from 4 players. I think he will choose Mascarenhas ahead of Sohail Tanvir, Morne Morkel and Younis Khan.

Mascarenhas will be leaving to England on May 12.

 

Tamil movie industry adds itself to the growing list of IPL haters

Not exactly haters but people who either don’t like it or dont want to like it. Looks like the movie industry has no audience for the late evening shows, courtesy IPL. Well, can you blame the audience. You have a team that plays good cricket, you have roped your favorite star (Vijay), you have the most wanted player in the international arena (Dhoni), above all you are playing good cricket and winning the matches. Why would anybody watch a movie when you can stay back and watch live cricket on TV.Both movie and an IPL match take the same time. I would prefer the match for the sheer entertainement value it is providing. Few matches were close so far but I think we are yet to see the best.

This is not a reason to really worry. You just have to time your release around IPL.

It is just not ICC who needs to provide a window for IPL. Movie industry too has to provide a window for IPL.

Shoaib Akthar free to play IPL, but IPL said no

Pakistan cricket board has said the Shoaib is free to play anywhere outside pakistan and he can play in DLF-IPL. But, IPL is not ready to take him as they wanted to stand by international discipline. I am not sure what that means. If their board has cleared him to play outside pakistan what is wrong with taking him. Knight Riders are standing by IPL. Do they have a choice. I think he should have been allowed to play to add a new dimension to the game. We are missing bowlers who can throw the ball at some serious pace.

IPL Century makers leave IPL

It is sad, but true. The 3 of the 4 century makers of IPL so far will be leaving tonight to play for their respective teams. The century makers of IPL so far are :

1. Brendon McCullum (Knight Riders)
2. Andrew Symonds (Deccan Chargers)
3. Mike Hussey (Super Kings)
4. Adam Gilchrist (Deccan Chargers)

Of the above list McCullum, Symonds, Hussey are leaving tonight. Symonds and Hussey who belong to Australia are leaving to Australia to get ready for their carribean tour. McCullum who plays for New Zealand will be leaving for his team’s England Tour. Gilchrist who has already retired from international cricket will be staying back.

It is ironic that all the four century makers are from outside India and the only Indian who came close to a century was Virendra Sehwag. It would also be interesting to see how the respective teams perform now that they will be gone. Let us check out who will be better served and who might miss out.

Super Kings will be worst hit as they will be losing Mike Hussey and Mathew Hayden. They still have Stephen Fleming who has already retired but that might not be enough. They are falling short of an international batsman. They might fill the other spot with Makhaya Ntini but that do not help with their batting. It all goes back to MS Dhoni’s form and how Fleming will perform along with Suresh Raina.

Kolkata Knight Riders will be hit as Ricky Ponting and Brendon McCullum will be leaving the team and there is not enough firepower left. Salman Butt and Brad Hodge might fill up the spots left by Ponting and McCullum but they might not be as devastating as Ponting or McCullum would be.

Deccan Chargers,  you might believe that they would be affected by $1.35 million player Andrew Symonds leaving, but it can work in favor of them. They have Herschelle Gibbs warming the benches. Do you remember the six sixers he hit in a one-day international? That is a very dangerous prospect. I think he was on the bench for the last match because they did not have an option or they were having too many options. That looks resolved now. Other thing is they are chosing between Scott Styris and Shahid Afridi. But now that Styris is gone they have an easy option of picking Afridi. This might make their bowling look a little weak but Symonds was expensive in earlier matches and any other player would have done the same.

Now that the current top teams Super Kings and Knight Riders are grappling with the australians leaving, Deccan Chargers and Rajastan Royals could be the new favorites.

Superstar’s daughter as ambassador for Super Kings?

It is reported that Tamil Superstar’s daughter Saundarya might be roped in as the new ambassador along with Vijay for the Super Kings team. Rising star Arya is in the discussion too.

Graphic Designer by profession Saundarya runs a company called Ocher Studios. Her animation works include tamil films like Chandramukhi, Padaiyappa, Ah Aah : Anbe Aaruyire. She is directing her first full-length animated film, Sultan : The Warrior. Rajni Kanth, her father renders voice to the main character in this movie. She has also entered into multi-film deal with Warner Brothers.

Earlier they dropped Nayanathara as their brand ambassador for not attending the home matches in chennai and also a not attending the shooting of a promotional video.

 

They have already roped in :

1. Siva Mani (drummer)
2. Hari Haran(singer)
3. Naresh Iyer
4. Suchi (RJ)

 

Related Posts :

Nayanatara is not Super Kings ambassador

Chennai Super Kings brand ambassadors

Video links not working

I have changed the theme on wordpress and am checking all the links if they are working fine. I found that the video category is not working. It is not showing the youtube video pane in the site. I will try other things to get that back. If not, I will go back to the previous theme.

Super Kings are the unstoppables

Defending 178 was never easy. Super Kings did not have the kind of fire power to defend a modest total. Wasim Jaffer was dropped twice, on 7 and 18. Super Kings might have thought that Jaffer would not make any difference and it might be to their advantage if he stays on as few runs will be scored. Jaffer proved them wrong. He pulled off a decent innings and the first half-century of the IPL for him and also for Royal Challengers.

Ross Taylor followed Jaffer for second fifty of the innings to keep Royal Challengers in the hunt. It was not a fluent innings from Ross Taylor as there were few hits and misses, but hits were counted big. At this moment it looked like Challengers has to do not one thing but many stupid things. They did just that.  Taylor was out and then started the drama. They lost 5 wickets in 22 balls.  All they needed was run a ball and an odd boundary. Is that so hard to do in a 20-20 format? Royal Challengers thought so. They lacked the fire to win, the skill to chase and above all the common sense to prevail. They have only themselves to blame and no one else. They were all out with 2 balls to spare and 13 runs to score.

Super Kings win by 13 runs.

This is really disappointing stuff from the Challengers.

Dhoni’s captaincy and Joginder Sharma’s last over miracle are working well for Super Kings.

Dhoni is back

Just when the tournament is losing its shine and the australians ready to leave the tournament for their carribean tour Dhoni decided he had enough. He batted with his trademark not scoring in the first 15 balls and then boom. Dhoni has arrived. It has been a while since Dhoni played an innings like this. I am not sure what exactly is the reason. Is it the captaincy or the hair cut. I am not too sure but Dhoni did not do justice to his talent in the past year or so. That is going to change in this tournament. With Hayden and Hussey leaving and there is no one to fall back on for the big innings he decided it is time he took out his armour.

All the sixers and fours he hit have two common qualities, sheer power and exquisite timing.  This performance has taken Super Kings to a total of 178. That does not look like much but they were looking at a total of  150 runs at one stage.

Royal Challengers might fancy their chances against Super Kings attack and a modest target. Super Kings need early wickets to stand any chance