A truck load of matches in the IPL have gone by and due to the length of the format, it is still tough to establish a clear cut team that would probably win the tournament. Such as been the swinging fortunes of this format.

As far as players of the tournament goes, two guys stand out well with their consistent performances.

Gautam Gambhir, the orange cap and highest run maker of the tournament has been slowly but surely staking his claim for virtually all formats of the game for the Indian team. There is enough to show how this guy can adapt and be quite consistent.

And the other one has been Shane Watson, the utility all-rounder, who is also “hoping”..i.e ‘james hoping’ to make it to the Australian side. Watson immediately draws a parallel to Ian harvey from the ICL… similar kind of utility cricketer with truck loads of talent. Their style and performances for their respective side are almost identical in terms of sheer value.

So far, the quality behind the Australian players in the tournament has a clear, distinct division from the likes of the Indian domestic players. The difference I see is not in skill… in terms of skill, it may be fair to say they are quite evenly matched. But in terms of sheer mental application, the ability to not get overawed and apply common sense to the match situation, the Australians have taken it to another level and that is with due credit to an excellent domestic structure in their country.

My favourite player in this tournament is Shaun Marsh. What a visual treat… a sheer delight watching him bat. Am blown away by his composure, grace and shot selection. With the exception of Mark Waugh, it has been quite a while to see any Australian batsmen who are graceful and elegant in their batting. There are many great and highly effective players in the last few decades but none with grace. This guy is gonna make it big time at the international stage and a visual delight for every cricket fan in the world is in the offering. Apparently, he has been called up for the Windies tour and these are good signs to come for Australia.

Special mention need to be showered on Lakshmipathy Balaji. I was moved to watch him come back and simply bowl a ball in his first match. That by itself was a remarkable achievement for someone with such a serious injury. Perhaps the fiver was life’s way of rewarding good people. I do not know how Balaji can work and figure himself into the scheme of things for India. The magnitude of his injury is devastating and it is not funny having nuts, bolts and wires all knotted up inside your body. He definitely is in no position to bowl in a regular domestic match and would still require a long time of healing and sheer hardwork from this lad. But he has remarkably come this far, hopefully we all will be behind him when he well and truly comes back into action.

On a serious note, some of the experts have remodeled his action due to his injury. However, am concerned that the current open chested action which he has remodeled on, will actually cause him more damage to his lower back. I do hope as he regains strength on his back, he may be able to change his action as the current one does not look feasible to me. His wrist position was always good and he has retained that but there is a clear mismatch between his bowling action and the wrist, as though they are working totally uncoordinated and independent of each other.

A note on the controversies in this tournament:

Coming to the Royal sloshers sore loser maestro, Mr. Mallya himself and all the pot shots he is digging at Dravid. Even though some of these events are not at all nice, perhaps Rahul Dravid thoroughly deserved it. As a fan aptly quoted “Rahul Dravid tried to prove a point to the world. Unfortunately, he used someone else’s money for that and that is not nice”. Accountability seems to have been the mantra now and interestingly this fan who is also a share holder of the UB group, summed it up beautifully. What Mallya did or is doing is not nice but then nor his Dravid. I somehow am losing my respect for him, as it all seem to be evident that he perhaps needs to see a shrink.

And on these two idiots, Harbhajan Singh and Sreesanth… I heard the WWE wrestler, the Great Khali was in town. Perhaps the BCCI should have asked this towering 7 foot tall wrestler to drive down some choke slams to these two.

But I have something even better…. This!

Please flush them out of the cricketing system. Enough is enough… a cricket field is not a place to discover your first strands of puberty.

A note for the bowlers… the highest run getter gets an orange cap… all right… fair enough… how about an orange sweat band at least for the best bowler in the tournament.

And now we are running contests in cricketfizz… yup, you heard them right… contests.

Here is the first one:

Difficulty: Hard
Player: Shoaib Akhtar

Question: How many times does Shoaib Akhtar says the word “I think”, whenver he is wired up with the commentators.

Ok… that’s a tough one… how about this?

Difficulty: Easy
Player: Venkatesh Prasad

Question: Count the times Venkatesh Prasad says the word “Um.. uh”, whenever he is wired up with the commentators.

Best of luck.