Originally published in the Mirror Click here

Just because you’re not watching it, doesn’t mean that you should miss out on all the fun that’s been on in this year’s IPL. Barely nine days and a dozen matches into it, the tournament has already thrown up some star performers.

Here’s this week’s picks.

1.Munaf Patel
When Mrs. Nita Ambani said that Mumbai Indians is like a family to her, Munaf Patel seems to have taken it far too literally. Munna’s been behaving like his father earns 5% of India’s GDP.

Tu jaanta hai mera baap kaun hai?

Other than that, Munaf has been brilliant in the two matches he’s played at Wankhede under the watchful eyes of Bobby Darling. He took a diving catch, the kind he doesn’t even attempt when he plays for India, and is now proudly wearing the purple cap, which should do his looks a world of good.

2.Murali Vijay
Murali Vijay, this season, has a completely different look about him. Gone is the swagger that carried him from that lone century in 2010 till the dropped sitter of 2011. Gone is the cockiness of the man signaling the world to shut up after taking another sitter.

This season, Vijay has the same look that Dinesh Karthik and Abhishek Nayar wore last season – a look of desperation.

At the opening ceremony, he looked like a school kid being punished. Little did he know that the real punishment was to come later.

Vijay started by running out his partner in the first game. Was clean bowled by a little known left-arm spinner in the second. Was runout without facing any ball in the third. And, in the last match he showed that there are batsmen who try to hit their way out of trouble and there’s Vijay who stays right there.

Vijay doesn’t seem an appropriate name for him at the moment.

3.Ravindra Jadeja
At the start of the season, everyone wanted to know how the $6 Mn man would do. Generally, he’s lived down to the expectations India cricket fans have off him. Except for that one match against Deccan, the franchise that drove CSK to a tiebreaker over him.

4.Yusuf Pathan
Over the years, Yusuf Pathan has built a reputation of someone who feasts on IPL’s substandard bowling and fails at the international level. He’s been desperately trying to change that.

This season promises to be the one when he finally sheds that reputation by failing even in the IPL.

5.Piyush Chawla
Plates of rajma-chaawal drop on the floor more elegantly than Piyush Chawla did while attempting a back peddled catch in his opening game.

Yo Piyush

“Even though Piyush Chawla got lucky in the warm-up matches of the world cup, he showed his true bowling quality in the real World Cup. He played only 2 matches because his bowling was extremely pathetic. His participation in the World Cup was due to a new government policy that requires at least one idiot to be part of the team.”

This paragraph has been removed from Wikipedia due to factual inaccuracy. There’s no such government policy in place.

You can hear the Fake IPL Player’s live commentary during match hours on www.pitchinvasion.in

Published in the Mirror Click here

After 130 days of cricket in the 270 days since last IPL, it’s finally back to real cricket for India. ‘Yeh IPL hai boss,’ the voice on TV says, followed by a collective groan from all corners of the country.

Much like the car behind you hell bent on honking the life out of you, the gala opening ceremony in Chennai is designed to make so much noise that the country will have no choice but to take notice. Salman Khan has been brought in just so people watch Shahrukh Khan for the next 50 days. Big B is lending the perception of bigness. And there’s the customary foreign artist.

If this is the evidence to go by, this season of IPL will be no different from the previous one. Except that this time we will be denied even the sight of Romesh Powar dressed in orange and purple.

Fan is king
After four seasons of subjecting their audience to shameless advertising plugs, a series of clownish anchors, commentators exhibiting signs of serious midlife crises, and generally mediocre cricket, IPL stakeholders are finally waking up to the needs of the fan. Going into this season, every team finally has a fan program in place.

Deccan Chargers is first off the blocks. Their recently launched fan blogs are of such high quality that opinion is divided on who is writing them – Ishant Sharma or Saeed Ajmal?

Ishant Sharma - Writer par excellence

Now, who’d watch IPL when writing as entertaining as this is available freely on the net?

Kings XI Punjab has tied up with Indraprastha All India Sports Foundation to come up with a cricket-reality show. After all, with a name like Indraprastha All India Sports Foundation, you are bound to be the best in the reality-show business. In the show, budding cricketers can showcase their talent to millions of viewers by dancing with Piyush Chawla and playing cricket with Preity Zinta.

Viewers will be allowed to vote as soon as they figure out where the show is being aired.

Kolkata Knight Riders has already unveiled its ‘New Dawn New Knights’ campaign, which is resonating strongly with their fans.

Owner Shahrukh Khan, though, is upset with typos in the new tagline. Apparently, the version that Khan had communicated on the phone was ‘New Don. New Nights. Ask Shirish Kunder’.

With the excuse of ‘Not enough space on the website Sir’ not cutting ice, the management is trying to come up with a believable explanation for why the third part of the line was omitted.

Royal Challengers Bangalore has formed a ‘fan advisory board’ to co-ordinate various activities of the RCB Fan Club. The Board consists of 20 “die-hard” fan-members who will facilitate all activities.

This management style worked so well with Kingfisher Airlines. Exactly the same results can be expected for RCB too.

The Dilshan effect

Dilshan - Not exactly Tom Cruise

“England is ashamed that it could not perform well in the World Cup,” Nupur said explaining why The Sunday Times has dragged her name into the match fixing controversy.

Dating Dilshan can surely lead to an exalted perception of self-worth and delusional grandeur.

You can hear the Fake IPL Player’s live commentary during match hours on www.pitchinvasion.in

Originally published in the Mirror Click here

Today is likely to be a big day for Indian cricket. Rahul Dravid and BCCI president Mr. N. Srinivasan are set to address the press at the Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore.

Since good things rarely happen to Indian cricket fans, one can safely assume Mr. N. Srinivasan won’t be announcing his retirement from cricket, but India’s greatest ever No. 3 batsman will bring down the curtain on a glittering 16-year international career.

The man who Sourav Ganguly called his biggest match winner, Dravid was the bulwark of Indian batting during India’s golden run in overseas tests in the 2000s.

Amongst many other memorable knocks, Dravid will always be remembered for the 180 he scored in Kolkata when Laxman scored 281, the 153 in Hyderabad when Sachin scored 186, and the 145 in Taunton when Ganguly scored 183.

Given the track record, punters are betting on something else happening today that’ll push the Dravid retirement off the front pages.

Some of the events being punted on are:
1. Tendulkar finally scores the century. Arjun Tendulkar, that is.
2. In an epic battle between two slappees, Shirish Kunder slaps Sreesanth.
3. Poonam Pandey finally does what she has been promising for a year, only to reveal that she is actually a he.
4. As a show of solidarity for his good mate Mahela Jayawardene, Kumar Sangakarra changes his name to Kumari Sangakarra.
5. A TV channel launches a reality show called Mayawati ka Swayamvar.
6. The other Rahul, who shall remain unnamed to avoid Kapil Sibal’s wrath, retires.

Experts believe that Dravid’s modest returns in the Australia tour in which he scored 194 runs in 8 innings may have led him to the decision.

In a case of mistaken identity, Congress leader Digvijay Singh has taken responsibility for Rahul’s Australia series.

Social media impact: Facebook to rename its Wall ‘The Dravid’.

Chris can. And he does.
Former New Zealand all-rounder Chris Cairns may soon be immortalised in India.

A proposal within the BCCI recommends renaming them as the Board of Chris Cairns in India. The honour is in recognition of Cairns’ achievement in doing what the BCCI has failed to do over the last two years – drag Lalit Modi to court.

Chris Cairns is suing the former IPL Commissioner in London over a 2010 tweet that suggested his involvement in match-fixing activity during his time as captain of the Chandigarh Lions in the ICL.

This is the root of all evil - Lalit Modi

Social media impact: Twitter, in memory of Lalit Modi, has decided to add a self-destruct button. They will call it ‘The Modi’.

Oh no, it’s Greg again!
India is to Greg Chappell what clothes are to Poonam Pandey. Every time he wants to be in the news, he takes off on India.

This time round, while peddling his new book that obviously needs some desperate peddling, Chappell said that Indians lack leadership skills.

Junk this Greg

Social media impact: Gmail renames its junk folder ‘The Greg’.

You can listen to the Fake IPL Player’s live wacky cricket commentary during match hours on www.pitchinvasion.in

Originally published in the Mirror Click here

It all started on that cloudy morning on August 10, 2011.

It was the first day of the third test match between India and England at Edgbaston. It was the day Virender Sehwag, aka The Messiah, was destined to bring the English bowling attack to its knees and resurrect India’s defense of the world number 1 position. It was the day the whole country had been waiting for with bated breath.

But, as fate would have it, it turned out to be the day when it all started to go wrong.

A disastrous day led to a disastrous test match, which led to a disastrous series, which eventually led to a disastrous season. All culminating in the Indian team being split wide open.

And, at the centre of it all that fateful morning, was a missing piece of Indian bread, better known as Paratha.

Paratha in the Indian team?
Knowing his fondness for anything that accentuates his naturally curvy frame, Sehwag’s mother had sent him to England with a set of stuffed Parathas, neatly packed in microwavable silver foil.

A nearly paranoid Sehwag kept the package close to his chest, saving them for special occasions only.

The first day of the test match was one such occasion. But, no sooner than he bit into the first Paneer Paratha, he was called upon to go out and bat.

And, in the time that it took for Sehwag to walk into the middle, face one ball and return to the pavilion, his Paneer Paratha was gone. And nobody knew who the perpetrator of the crime was.

To protect his prized possession, Sehwag returned after another golden duck in the second inning only to find another Paratha missing.

Thus began the biggest manhunt since Veerappan. And, just like the Jungle King, the Paratha Prowler continued to evade the long arms of the law.

The Unusual Suspects
Over the next few months, despite India’s fluctuating fortunes, Sehwag’s Parathas kept disappearing with unerring regularity. A distraught Sehwag started to suspect everyone.

Sehwag’s initial list of suspects included Bhajji whose abdominal muscle pull, he thought, was a consequence of eating stolen Parathas. Also on the suspect list was RP Singh, whose legendary first over of the test match stank of the same stuff that Sehwag’s fielding efforts do.

Eventually, Dhoni turned out to be suspect number 1 after comparing Sehwag’s running to aunties’ running behind buses. “A result of eating too many Aloo Parathas,” he had commented.

Sachin and Gambhir, for obvious reasons, were in the clear, the main reason for Sehwag accepting the rotation policy. With one of the three always in the dressing room, the Parathas, he thought, would be safe.

The Loyalty Test
It all came to a head on the morning of India’s ODI versus Australia in Brisbane when players were forced to take sides.

Viru’s chelas showed their loyalty by taking an extra serving of butter. Dhoni’s ponies responded with an extra glass of milk.

Raina, true to form, swung both ways and asked for Butter Milk. Parthiv too was seen stuffing butter into his feeding bottle.

But most others made their loyalties very clear. Amongst them was Rohit Sharma, who soon paid a price for it.

Sehwag saw Rohit’s scores of zero as his way of mocking him, given the similarity between the shapes of a zero and a Paratha. No wonder Sehwag dropped him at the first opportunity.

As Dhoni returns, those who chose butter over milk await similar fate.

And the Paratha Prowler is…
It turns out that the Parathas were stuffed the entire time in the one place nobody bothered to look. Unfortunately, Duncan Fletcher would still not open his mouth for us to confirm.

You can hear the Fake IPL Player’s live audio commentary during match hours on www.pitchinvasion.in

Originally published in the Mirror

Last week, Bangalore was host to a cricket event that took the country by storm. Observers say that it was the most exciting and compelling cricket that India has produced since the world cup win. It was the IPL auctions.

In fact, so exciting was it that the BCCI is mulling the idea of scrapping the unnecessary cricket matches and converting IPL into a series of auctions.

N. Srinivasan’s astrologer is expected to decide on this soon.

Smart boys making smart buys
As has been customary over the last four seasons, the IPL teams showed up in full force with a collective IQ of one Chihuahua, with due apologies to all Chihuahuas around the world.

Sample this:
• World cup giant slayer, Irishman Kevin O’Brian, pegged at $50,000, went unsold. But, West Indian all-rounder Andre Russell was bought for $450,000
• Two players available for the entire tournament, Big Bash League hero Owais Shah went unsold and big hitter Herschelle Gibbs went for $50,000. While, Mahela Jayawardene, who is juggling national captaincy and is unlikely to be available for the entire tournament, was bought for $1.4 million.
• Pace sensation Vernon Philander was unsold, while Sri Lankan medium pacer Thisara Perera was bought for $650,000.
• Vinay Kumar went for $1 Million and RP Singh for $600,000. Enough said!

Classic KKR
Following up on the great success Mumbai-based spinner Iqbal Abdullah has had with the team, Kolkata Knight Riders wanted to add another spinner from western India to their ranks.

So, in their collective wisdom they decided to buy West Indian leggie Sunil Narine for $700,000.

“May be we can invoke the principles of ‘natural justice’ and pass him off as an Indian player,” they were overheard saying later.

Patriotism stretched too far
The teams ignored all recent India tormentors, including Englishmen like James Anderson, Ian Bell Graeme Swann, and Australian Peter Siddle.

Why Ravi Bopara was included in this list of tormentors is proving difficult to understand.

Bopara had first shunned the IPL to focus on his international career, only to be shunned by the English team forcing him to focus on his IPL career, only to be eventually shunned by the IPL as well.

Now he must truly know what it feels to be an immigrant.

The mysterious case of Sahara
As the mystery unfolds, the reason behind Sahara’s melodramatic pullout is finally coming to light.

It turns out that the last straw for Sahara Shri Subroto Roy was the midnight phone call he made to BCCI chief N. Srinivasan to tell him that he was pulling out. And Srinivasan allegedly responded with “Well done!”

“It was Subroto. It was midnight. What else do you expect me to assume?” Srini asked as he threw up his hands in exasperation.

In Srini’s defence, the term ‘pullout’ deserved better clarification.

Viru, the teacher
Apparently, Indian opener Virender Sehwag has been giving batting lessons to actor Randeep Hooda, preparing him for the role of a cricketer in his upcoming film ‘Heroine’, which also stars Kareena Kapoor and Arjun Rampal.

As news of Sehwag’s involvement spread across film circles, director Madhur Bhandarkar was bombarded with phone calls from across the country asking if he was making a short film this time.

You can listen to the Fake IPL Player’s live wacky commentary during match hours on www.pitchinvasion.in