The Pakistan Captaincy: Part XV
Misbah-ul-Haq is now officially the 15th captain of the Pakistan ODI team since Imran Khan. I know, because I’ve been keeping track. It’s an obsession with me.
Deep Backward Point
Blog against the machine.
Category: Link List
May 18, 2011
Citations for the Willow TV Story
My integrity is being questioned, so here is a partial list of sources for the Willow TV article:
- Willow TV was acquired by GCV in 2010: Reuters
- GCV had the rights to CLT20 and IPL: Reuters
- Elephant Capital invested in GCV, and pulled their investment out: DealCurry
- Elephant Capital pulled their investment out: Elephant Capital
- GCV sub-licensed the IPL rights from WSG: VC Circle
- WSG loses rights over improper facilitation fee: NDTV
- Lalit Modi is the father-in-law of Gaurav Burman: VC Circle
- Gaurav Burman is the director of Elephant Capital: Elephant Capital
- IPL rights went to Indiatimes: IndiaTimes
- All GCV onilne properties went silent: (at time of writing, all links here pointed to sites not updated for a few months): GCV
- BCCI and WSG go to court, court instructs to settle: NDTV
May 17, 2011
The B Team Goes to the West Indies
Kartikeya is disappointed in the Indian seniors for choosing not to play the ODI series in West Indies:
I hope the West Indies teach India a lesson in the upcoming ODI games. I understand the need for rest, but to choose the IPL over International Cricket is unconscionable, especially when playing for India is high paying employment.
I empathize. But I also find it interesting that while the rest of the world frets over the health of Test cricket, the top Indian players choose to ignore meaningless ODI series.
May 12, 2011
Finally, a Test Match
Good morning. At long last, we have a test match.
Personally, I’m interested to see how Bishoo, Rampaul and Simmons fair in the longer game. That will tell us a lot about the future of West Indies cricket.
May 11, 2011
The Continuing Curse of the Pakistani Cricket Captain
After Afridi hinted at trouble between himself and Waqar, rumors began that he would not be the ODI captain on the next tour.
If so, they better start looking for #15. Perhaps Pakistan is ripe for the Buchanan’s multiple captains theory!
May 11, 2011
Zaltz
Andy Zaltzman is back blogging after a month of cricket detoxification:
In an effort to make the pre-Twenty20 era of cricket retrospectively more exciting, the IPL is being officially backdated. The 1976 IPL has been won by the now defunct Visakhapatnam Visigoths, led by Indian Test legend Gundappa Viswanath and part-owned by legendary film director Satyajit Ray and Scottish pop stars the Bay City Rollers. In a tense final in Madras, they defeated the Delhi Daredevils, for whom Geoff Boycott scored an undefeated 23 off 65 balls as his team narrowly failed to chase down the Visigoths’ total of 93 for 4, an imposing total for the time. The losing semi-finalists were the Punjab Pranksters and the Chennai Benevolent Dictators, later rebranded as the Super Kings.
May 6, 2011
IPL: 100% Recycled Material, Dispose Without Guilt
Tariq Engineer reports for Cricinfo:
[A] cumulative total of 146.4 million viewers have watched all the games so far, a number that exceeds the 143.7 million that saw the entire 2010 season (60 games). This suggests that while the IPL continues to attract new fans, they are watching each game for shorter periods.
Two reasons come to mind:
- If you train your audience to respond only to the thrills, and not the sport, then sooner or later they will only tune in for the thrills. The IPL becomes one of the many programs to channel-surf through, between musical reality show #31 and political shouting match #33.
- Even in this short, thrilling format, most games are one-sided and decided early.
Of course, there’s always the possibility that audiences are just suffering from cricket or IPL fatigue.
April 27, 2011
The Objective of Playing in the IPL
Ducking Beamers asks: what is the objective of a domestic player in the IPL?
But does it ever really translate into something more meaningful for these players? [..] Is it worth it for most of these players? Look at the top run getters and wicket-takers of 2009 — not many no-names there. A cursory look at the other seasons shows the same trends — a few low-fame players (Vinay Kumar, N. Ohja, A.T. Rayadu) — but not much else.
So, what is the objective?
Short answer: to increase your salary next year.
Long answer:
- There’s an off chance they make it to the internationals.
- They make a considerable amount of money.
- It’s not like they don’t contribute to a win, just because they don’t figure in the top 10 wickets/runs. Just take a look at today’s RCB v. DD match: Ojha, Rao, Mithun, Mohammed all played significant roles. And that’s where it gets interesting– if they do well this year, even if they don’t get selected for India, their IPL salary next year will go up considerably.
In fact, I would argue that in a tournament like the IPL where there is no real allegiance to the team, the goal of every single player is to be worth more next year.
April 26, 2011
How the IPL Helps the International Game
Image by Dhammika Heenpella / Images of Sri Lanka via Flickr
Malinga on his return to the international game in 2009:
“Because of the IPL I got a chance to come back to the national team,” he said at a media conference in Colombo. “After the injury nobody looked after me and I was not offered a contract. But thanks to the IPL I didn’t lose anything but I improved my cricket a lot. I’m saddened the way I was treated but not disappointed.”
The IPL takes a lot of heat for ruining the international game. Malinga’s retirement has been held up as an example of everything that’s wrong with the IPL, but without the IPL he may not have had a career to retire from.
April 20, 2011
Yorkshire v. England
David Hopps on Yorkshire:
One of the oddities of English cricketing life is the underlying hostility felt towards the national team from a section of the Yorkshire cricket-loving public. The assumption is that supporting England is somehow not entirely wholesome, and is likely to be followed by other errors of life such as marrying someone from Kent and buying a four-bedroom detached in Tunbridge Wells.
∞
Any guesses why:
- Yorkshire is my favorite county cricket team?
- Tunbridge Wells cricket ground has a mythical quality?
Hint: The answers to these questions had a batting partnership mentioned in this blog post.
Deep Backward Point 