IPL certainly has captured all media attention thanks to great planning, hype, big advertisement and more to the money flow. Apart from the television footage, with commentator screaming more of the blimp and non cricketing aspects promoting the sponsors more than the game, this is the first sporting event ever to be broadcast live on the popular video sharing website Youtube. It’s brand value is estimated to be around $4.13 billion (over Rs 18,000 crore) in 2010. According to global sports salaries review, IPL is the second highest-paid league, based on first-team salaries on a pro-rata basis, second only to the NBA league. Now lot of dust is flying around.
Lalit Modi who so far called things rightly and garnered media attention is in news again. The entry of two more teams was managed so well and crores of money continued to be pumped in. suddenly we had a little or almost unknown Team entering the fray in the last moment and the black horse pipped others to the post winning the Kochi franchise thanks to the support of Minister Shashi Tharoor. Modi has somewhat rightly kicked questions on the ownership pattern of the franchise Rendezvous Sports World. Modi has gone on record stating that even those who presented the bid documents were not aware of the ownership and much rumour is on the 19% valued at about Rs.70 crore in the consortium being the free equity of Sunanda Pushkar. Though not of any relevance, Sunanda hails from Bomai in Sopore district in Kashmir. Her father Poshkar Nath Dass retired as a lieutenant colonel in the army; her brothers are officers. She reportedly is a beautician and well connected.
Even as the controversy continued to rage, quoting the Prime Minister from Washington reports stated that ‘he does not have all the facts and will take any action if necessary”. Lot can be read into that.
On the play arena there are still 7 matches to be played and only one Team has entered the Semi final fray. The rest 3 spots are open – with RCB having 14 points; 4 teams having 12 and KKR having 10 – still theoretically having a chance.
As the season draws to a close, wearing pitches are becoming increasingly spinner friendly as Ashwin demonstrated the other day against KKR. Against KKR besides his traditional offies, he turned the occasional flipper as also carom ball. In another crucial match CSK play DD today at their home venue. Here is how the table stands :
With 2 home matches against RR & MI left, KKR are almost out of the tournament but calculations can prove wrong. KKR now have the lowest of the NRR. It is another aspect that none of the teams have displayed consistency. Assuming that they win both their matches, they will end up with 14 and if RCB, DC and CSK lose their remaining matches, all these will remain with 12. DD would end up with 16 and RR would share the spot with MI, DD and KKR. If RCB beats RR everything remaining the same, RCB would displace RR over there. If you are a dada supporter, don’t lose hope till the end of the 56th match is the message
Regards – S Sampathkumar.
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