“The tournament will definitely see some high scores soon. Every tournament has high and low scores, I guess it’s time we see the scores coming,” says Pollock. “The teams are just trying to get their feet together at the moment. It’s difficult, especially when you are travelling all the while and there are no home games, but I’m certain that the big players won’t disappoint.”

There have been some flashes of big hitting — Abhishek Nayar slamming 35 from 14 balls, Karan Goel’s 38 against Delhi, and Sehwag’s shots in that one over from Yusuf Abdulla. But overall, it has been a tempered batting approach so far. “It’s really hurting that with people like me, Gayle, and Ganguly around, we couldn’t quite get to the start we wanted. But I’m sure there will be several occasions for us to rectify that,” says Kolkata Knight Riders skipper McCullum.

Unstoppable

Yuvraj, meanwhile, believes it is impossible to stop Sehwag when he’s hitting. “One just has to stand and wait for him to get out,” he adds, while Kings XI Punjab coach Tom Moody feels that Sehwag and Gambhir have already proved that they are the world’s most destructive opening pair at the moment.

Durban is often called “mini India” because of its vast population of people of Indian origin. That compelled the IPL organisers to slot as many matches as they could here over the next fortnight, and prior to this tournament, the eight teams were vying for the city as their home base because of the crowd the games are expected to attract.

... contd.