The Times' Simon Wilde, who is in India to cover the IPL, says that the England board has faltered by not allowing its players to take part in the tournament's first edition. He begins his piece with a humorous elegy.
In affectionate remembrance of the hope that the England cricket team would soon win a global one-day tournament, which died, at home, on April 18, 2008, while the rest of the world celebrated the birth of the Indian Premier League at the Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bangalore. The health of the team itself had been undermined by the loss of grave quantities of money offered by a circle of Indian friends. The body will be cremated and the ashes scattered on the Ganges. - with apologies to Reginald Shirley Brooks, the Times, 1882.
Scyld Berry, while analysing the impact of the IPL, feels the tournament needs "major surgery to survive. His article in the Telegraph has more.
But the organisers of the IPL seem, at this stage, to have missed a couple of tricks - and they could prove extremely, perhaps terminally, damaging. Yesterday, sandwiched between the successes in Bangalore and Delhi, came a match in Mohali in front of a stadium that was half-full - a match which saw a superb century by Mike Hussey set up a 33-run victory for the Chennai Super Kings.
The first drawback is that too many unremarkable Indian cricketers are making up the numbers: a problem which can be solved either by reducing the number of franchises (impossible in the short term) or increasing the quota of foreign players from the existing four-per-side. Indian spectators and television audiences want to see stars, whether in films or on the cricket field. It was a point made last year when India staged 20-over matches between state sides, and the country became the only place in the world where the format did not take off. The second point is the IPL organisers are asking too much of fans in expecting them to exchange old instincts for new loyalties.
Meanwhile, Vic Marks, in his blog in the Guardian, critisises the scheduling of the match between Surrey and Lanchashire in the middle of April after the entire fourth day's play was washed out. He also hopes the IPL will force a change in the hectic county schedule.
