The Indian Premiere League (IPL), as a Twenty20 cricket tournament, was founded by Indian cricket and business tycoon Lalit Modi, the then Deputy Chairman of BCCI (Board of Control for Cricket in India) in 2008. The following year the IPL moved to South Africa because the UPA government was unable to guarantee security due to the 2009 General Election. After the third edition in 2010, the BCCI suspended Lalit Modi thanks to a plethora of complaints and denunciations. crusades that culminated in 2013 when the BCCI banned it for life after a series of investigations. He moved to London in 2010 and has lived there ever since. Meanwhile, the IPL has become one of the biggest cricket tournaments in the world in terms of money, mostly in the billions.
From its inception, many cricket purists, including stalwarts and even politicians, criticized it as a ‘commercialization’ of cricket with the buying and selling of cricketers from around the world, called moderate-term auctions, and teams made up of Indian icons. , young Indian cricketers and international cricketers based on their ‘price’, which was calculated based on their performance or potential. Thanks to its ability to generate money and its growing popularity with popcorn cricket revelers, the BCCI adopted the IPL as one of its ‘must do’ activities and went to great lengths to lobby internationally at times. Even in the post-2010 period, the IPL was never free of controversy, including match-fixing and the like, leading to franchises or teams being banned from the tournament on a few occasions. However, the IPL grew and grew in importance, as international cricketers also began to count on it for the money they could win. National pride and franchise loyalties came into conflict.
Again, from the start, many cricket administrators and veteran cricketers, including stalwarts, saw the IPL as the gateway for young talent; it is unclear whether they simply approved of it naturally or because of money-oriented vested interests. There is no denying that the young Indian talents had opportunities during the tournament in terms of recognition and guaranteed money; but the point of concern was that the national selectors started considering the IPL as a criteria for selection in Team India even though the various national cricket tournaments have been available for decades. Obviously competitive cricket is played in the IPL with rivalries between teams for the coveted trophy; however, the intensity generated by national pride (representing one’s country in international cricket) can never be compared to the club-focused cricket of the IPL involving players of various nationalities. The problem is that revelers began to enjoy IPL matches as three-hour “cricket movies”, and the hype only increased over time. Now we will consider the scenario in the last two or three years.
Thanks to the IPL, an ocean of ‘talent’ was opened up to the national selectors, and the IPL became a kind of ‘entrance test’ to gain a foothold in the selection. In the roughly two-year period before the ICC Cricket World Cup-2019, the India team was ‘different’ in almost every match they played, in whatever format. In the name of ‘finding the perfect team for the World Cup’, a process of experimentation began which proved to be endless and often pointless with players of dubious track record repeatedly finding opportunities to play for the national team. An artificial syndrome called ‘the number 4 hitter’ was also created to justify this. As part of this process, various ‘lobbies’ also began to form around certain young cricketers with ‘talented’, even staunch cricketers joining them. One of the biggest examples was the peculiar case of ‘Rishav Pant’.
It is well known that Rishav Pant has nothing to show for it in terms of one day international cricket so far and yet when he was not selected for the World Cup squad a national uproar spread from local protests to social media. to the editorial pages of national newspapers. Perhaps due to such national ‘outrage’, Indian strongman and starter Shikhar Dhwan was injured in the first half of the World Cup. And what happened? Naturally Rishav Pant was selected replacing several other ‘established’ options like Ambati Rayadu, Ajinkya Rahane and the like. And what did Pant do in the games he played afterwards? Well, he only contributed to the process of ‘decimating’ MS Dhoni, who he persisted with during the period just because of his ‘experience’, and so-called hitters like Pandya and Pant came to bat before the ‘experienced’ Dhoni , repeatedly. , including in the crucial semi-final against New Zealand that paved the way for India. It was ridiculous to see the Pandya-Pant duo trying to win matches after only 3 or 4 wickets. This is also to mention here that Team India had 3-4 wicket-keepers, 4 if we include KL Rahul, playing in certain one-day internationals on a number of occasions. This absurdity even extended to some World Cup matches. As a devout lover of cricket for centuries, I must say that any team that includes 4 wicketkeepers in the starting eleven can never hope to win a major tournament.
With less than a year to go until the ICC T20 World Cup-2020, the experimentation process started again and the IPL became the most important platform to choose. In the first match of T20I against Bangladesh on November 3, 2019 in Delhi, the India team did not look like a national team, it was more like an IPL franchise. That the match was lost was a foregone conclusion, despite the fact that Bangladesh were playing without Shakib and Tamim.
If such pointless IPL-focused experimentation continues unabated, only Team India and millions of fans will suffer from the syndrome of snatching defeats from inevitable victories, as well as demoralizing so many other proven cricketers. The essence of IPL is trading and it must be accepted by all interested parties. Domestic cricket should regain its lost relevance. Against this background, it is reassuring to see the new BCCI Chairman Sourav Ganguli making such a promise for a new era of Indian cricket. Otherwise, the IPL will remain a huge asset in terms of revenue and a liability in terms of Team India’s winning ability internationally. This writer had previously expressed the opinion that any cricketer who excels in Test cricket can easily excel in all formats of the game; many legendary players have proven it. The upcoming introduction of the Pink Ball Test of Day and Night Cricket between India and Bangladesh in India this month is sure to increase the interest in the classic format.