For longevity, IPL needs to stay on back pages

If you wanted to use the old word association game to profile the IPL, you would probably get 'hectic', 'spectacle', 'in-the-news' (even if that isn't strictly a word). To think longer would be to become analytical which isn't the objective. First thoughts are the key and these are not bad for a young, ambitious, in-your-face league that enthralls and alienates, but which no one can ignore.

But eventually the IPL has to be a cricket tournament. If IPL 15 and IPL 25 or, for that matter, IPL 50 have to exist, they have to be constructed on a strong cricket base. The great leagues of the world have their share of drama and scandal around them but they are remembered by the quality of the action they produced. The tabloid reporters swarm around but the serious writers find it worth their while too; irrelevant starlets seek to worm their way in but the superstars play on the field too. The cricket was very good this year, it began acquiring a rhythm of its own, but it must necessarily be seen as a distinct entity not as, depending on which way you look at it, a glamourous or a scheming cousin of the traditional game. And it will be a challenge for the IPL: to keep an increasing tribe of wannabes at arm's length and prevent them from hijacking the image of a sporting contest.

The IPL also needs to be an indicator of India's cricketing depth, for it allows many young players, some completely unknown, to play on the big stage. The Ranji Trophy should do that too, but it doesn't pit a young man against an international star; it cannot throw up comparisons, contrasts.

So who caught the eye in this year's IPL? There were four young men among the top 20 batsmen and these are people who we should be talking a bit more about. At No. 3 was Shikhar Dhawan who has promised much over the years but has rarely embraced consistency — the one quality that separates the best from those that occasionally flash by. But he is a powerful batsman, and if he can just be a bit more involved in the deep can become a far better fielder. If you pick horses for courses, and in T20 you must, he has to be in a short list. As indeed should Ajinkya Rahane who came in at number 4. For two or three years there was a feeling that he wasn't cut out for instant cricket, but he has adapted brilliantly and if anything, needs to be careful not to allow this style to infect his chances in the longer versions which he seems more naturally cut out for. For Rahane, managing different formats will be a challenge but it is one only the best are entitled to have.

... contd.

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