Ireland beats West Indies ~ IPL Auction Cariappa - who ?

Have you ever heard of Cariappa ? ~ and what do we do read today about Cariappa or about Ireland pulling out a sensational win !

Lendl Mark Platter Simmons has been around for sometime and he made a century – 304 is a good enough total.  Ireland pride themselves on their fielding.  Andy McBrine, the offspinner, who had been a surprise selection ahead of another pace-bowling option ensured that Darren Bravo was run out without facing a ball off a leading edge of  Chris Gayle – and they call it a diamond duck !!!  Ireland’s coach is relative of Lendl Simmons, the more famous Phil Simmons; Bret Lee is the bowling coach. 

In an interesting article Ed Smith states that modern Captains have less power than ever but are held fully accountable for decisions arrived at by backroom consensus.  He brings out the comparison of treatment meted to Alastair Cook and Eoin Morgan. Having survived a media storm as Test captain in the summer of 2014, Cook was eventually sacked as ODI captain at the 11^th  hour before the World Cup. Most pundits felt this was a good idea, even though it left Cook bereft of his dream of captaining in a World Cup, and left Morgan very little time to put his stamp on the team. Now Morgan has scored three noughts in his last four innings and four noughts in his last seven.  He says he is less convinced that Morgan's bad form exists in a different category from Cook's. Incidentally, Eoin Morgan debuted for Ireland against Scotland in Aug 2006. 

Today, against West Indies, Ed Joyce made runs.  Ed Joyce is best known as the Ireland batsman who played for two different countries in successive World Cups. Joyce had switched to England when the 2007 World Cup took place, having helped Irelands through the qualifying tournament, and became the first Irishman in the modern game to play for England. But he did not quite achieve the career he had envisaged and switched back to Ireland just in time for the next tournament in 2011. He had not quite achieved the four-year qualification period, but the ICC recognised a persuasive case and gave him special dispensation. Now he is in for Ireland.

The best of statistics was not found in Ireland papers such as The Irish Times / Irish Independent / Irish Sun but Cricinfo – great piece of info. Read on :

College Park, Dublin, 1928: Ireland beat West Indies by 60 runs. Holm Field, Sion Mills, 1969: Ireland beat West Indies on first innings having humbled a side including Clive Lloyd and Sir Clyde Walcott for 25. Stormont, Belfast, 2004: Ireland beat West Indies by six wickets chasing 293. Kingston, Jamaica, 2014: Ireland beat West Indies by six wickets in a T20 international. They were all surprise victories, although by the time of the 2014 win the shock factor was reduced. When Ireland completed victory against West Indies at Nelson, shock was, or at least should have been, a distant emotion. It says this effort  at the beginning of a World Cup campaign where not reaching the quarter-finals will be classed as a failure, was their most clinical batting performance against a Full Member.  The chase was not a contest. From the moment that William Porterfield and Paul Stirling laid the foundations with an opening stand of 71  and other players took over methodically. A great day for Ireland – sad for the team which virtually ruled the Cricket in 1980s. 

Richard Madley, is now a known man – the auctioneer did it in 2008 and in 2012 – was back in auction holding the hammer at Bengaluru….   For the second successive year, Yuvraj Singh attracted a record bid in the IPL auction, this time from Delhi Daredevils who purchased the allrounder for Rs 16 crore (approx. $2.67 million).  There were two other million-dollar purchases on the morning of the auction. Daredevils made another high-profile purchase, signing Sri Lanka captain Angelo Mathews for Rs 7.5 crore (approx. $1.25 million), while India wicketkeeper Dinesh Karthik - who had attracted a bid of Rs 12.5 crore ($2.08 million) last year - was signed by Royal Challengers for Rs 10.5 crore (approx. $1.75 million). Later Zaheer Khan was bought by Delhi for 4 crores and Trent Boult by SRH for 3.8 crores.

South Africa Test captain Hashim Amla, along with Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene were unsold in the marquee round of the auction. Sunrisers Hyderabad had the largest purse in the auction after Daredevils and added a few high-profile names to their roster. They purchased Kevin Pietersen, Eoin Morgan and Ravi Bopara - the three England players who were sold in the first half of the auction. While Pietersen was sold for his base price of Rs 2 crore ($330,000), Morgan was bought for Rs 1.5 crore ($250,000), and Bopara had a bid of Rs 1 crore ($166,000). Sunrisers also purchased New Zealand batsman Kane Williamson for Rs 60 lakh ($100,000) and quick bowler Trent Boult for Rs 3.8 crore ($633,000)

Among the uncapped players, Mumbai batsman Shreyas Iyer and Kishan Cariappa attracted the highest bids. Cariappa, a 20-year-old offspinner who is yet to play a single first-class game, was purchased by Kolkata Knight Riders for Rs 2.4 -  Who is KC Cariappa? That was the first question nearly everyone would have asked once Cariappa was bought by defending IPL champions Kolkata Knight Riders for an astonishing sum of Rs 2.4 crore ($400,000), 24 times his base price.

Konganda Charamanna Cariappa is a 20-year-old legspinner from Coorg in Karnataka. Curiously both the BCCI and the Karnataka State Cricket Association had him listed as an off-break bowler. However, Cariappa, known as Carri to his team-mates, confirmed he is primarily a legspinner with a grip that allows him to bowl off breaks and leg breaks.  At 5 feet 11 inches, Cariappa is tall for a spinner and bowls with an orthodox round-arm action. The leg break is his stock ball, and he has variations like the googly and the faster one. His other strength, that could make it difficult for batsmen to read him, is his ability to bowl off-spinners without changing the grip.

Knight Riders have always shown an interest in spinners with unusual actions, picking West Indies offspinner Sunil Narine, Sri Lanka offspinner Sachithra Senanayake and Indian chinaman bowler Kuldeep Yadav. So sooner World Cup ends, people will brace for IPL and …………. I can understand the feelings of those who do not like Cricket

With regards – S. Sampathkumar

16^th Feb 2015