The 17th edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL 2024), the marquee event of the Indian cricket calendar, will roll out in Chennai during this week. The attention of cricket fans throughout the world will be focused on this “mother of all T20 leagues” during the next two months till May-end, when the final is scheduled to be played. The tournament will be held in two phases this year, on account of the Lok Sabha elections, which will also be held in the same period. The schedule of only the first 21 matches, till April 7, has been announced at present. The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), which runs the championship, has informed that the details of the remaining games will be announced after discussion with the agencies concerned to optimise the movement of security forces.
The 10 franchisees taking part in IPL 2024 have been divided into two groups of five sides each. Each team will play against all five sides in the other group twice, while taking on the remaining four squads in its group once. Thus, each side will play 14 matches in the group phase, with seven each on home ground and away. The top four sides, determined based on aggregate points in the group stage, will advance to the playoffs, where the top two teams will play the first Qualifier, with the winners advancing to the final. The losing side in the first Qualifier will get the chance to take on the winners of the Eliminator tie between sides placed third and fourth in the group phase. The winner of this game, titled the second Qualifier, will proceed to the final. Thus a total of 74 matches are set to be played during this cricket extravaganza, which will be held across 12 venues.
A peep into the history of the IPL reveals that only six sides have won this championship so far. Chennai Super Kings (CSK) and Mumbai Indians (MI) have won five times each, Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) finished on top on two occasions while Gujarat Titans (GT), Rajasthan Royals (RR) and Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) have been crowned champions once. Deccan Chargers, who won the tournament in 2009, was terminated from the championship and their place was subsequently taken by SRH. The remaining four franchisees - Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB), Punjab Kings, Delhi Capitals (DC) and Lucknow Super Giants - are yet to win the coveted trophy.
Right from the first edition of the championship in 2008, when an unfancied RR upset all pre-tournament predictions to clinch the title, the IPL has displayed a remarkable tendency to come up with surprising results. Though critics might point out the success of CSK and MI to challenge this statement, the fact remains that no side can claim to have enjoyed a smooth journey to the pole position ever. The long duration, large number of matches played by each side, incessant travel across the length and breadth of the country, the requirement to play in different grounds during the heat of Indian summer all combine to make the IPL a supreme test not only to the cricketing prowess of the sides but also of the physical fitness and mental strength of the players. It can be safely said that only those teams that have demonstrated more grit, resilience an fortitude than their fellow competitors have lifted the trophy.
For the up and coming cricketers across the country, the IPL provides an excellent platform to showcase their talent. This is an event watched by millions of followers of the game in the country and covered extensively by the domestic and international media. A couple of good performances on this stage is a surefire guarantee for winning the attention of all and sundry connected with the game, including the selectors of the national squad. From Ravichandran Ashwin onwards, many a young player has used the IPL as a springboard to secure a place in the national side. Some of the better known players who used this tournament to win national attention are Jasprit Bumrah, Suryakumar Yadav, T Natarajan and Yashasvi Jaiswal. The latest example of this breed is Rinku Singh, the fearless striker of the ball, who became an instant celebrity with his uncanny ability to hit sixes and plunder runs in the death overs.
As the franchisees move across the country extensively in search of talent, this championship also provides an opportunity for players to bypass the elaborate route established by the BCCI for reaching the level of national reckoning. Talent scouts from all sides playing IPL watch T20 matches played at state and local-level to identify talented cricketers, who are provided chances to hone and sharpen their skills. Unlike selectors of the BCCI and state and even district associations, who are bound down by the policies of these bodies with respect to age and background, the representatives of the franchisees have only two criteria - ability to perform and capacity for producing results. This has helped in unearthing a pool of raw and exciting talent from across the country, whose members are hungry for success and possess minds not bogged down by fear of failure. The emergence of a new set of players every year, discovered in this manner by the franchisees, has been one of the highlights of each edition of the IPL till date.
Irrespective of the final results of this edition of the championship, one player whose performances will be observed closely by followers of the game the world over during the current season will be Rishabh Pant, who is making a comeback to the game after a gap of close to 15 months. Pant survived a near fatal accident near Dehradun in December, 2022, and underwent intricate surgical procedures on the ligaments of his knee followed by extensive rehabilitation in the months since. He missed not only IPL 2023 but also the ICC World Cup held in India. The prolonged period away from the game led him to state that he was feeling as if he was making his debut again. Pant’s return will certainly bolster the fortunes of DC for whom he is not only their wicketkeeper and main batsman but also the captain of the side. But, far more important for Indian cricket will be the speed with which his body adjusts to the demands of competitive cricket and the effect of his injury and long break on his cricketing skills and temperament.
This time also there is a long list of players who are staying away from the IPL on account of injury and other reasons. This is led by Mohammed Shami, the fast bowler, who is recovering after undergoing a surgery to his leg. His absence will certainly be felt by GT, his franchisee, who had earlier lost the services of Hardik Pandya, to Mumbai Indians, through a pre-season trade. RR's Prasidh Krishna, the fast bowler who is a member of national side in white-ball cricket, will also miss the IPL due an injury to his quadriceps muscle. Harry Brook, the England middle-order batsman contracted to play for DC and Devon Conway of New Zealand, who signed for CSK, are other top players who will miss this edition of the championship. While Brook has cited demise of his grand mother as the reason for missing the tournament, Conway is yet to recover from a surgery to his thumb.
Over the years, the IPL also had its share of controversies, with the spot-fixing scandal of 2013, where S Sreesanth was one of the accused, being the biggest among the lot. Lalit Modi’s dictatorial governance of the championship during the initial years, the “sweat equity” issue involving Shashi Tharoor and his deceased wife Sunanda Pushkar and the conflict of interest row over then BCCI chief N Srinivasan owning CSK franchisee had all created headlines for the wrong reasons. There were incidents involving players as well. The silver lining in this regard is that there has not been any cloud of controversy during the last few editions of the tournament.
It is time to sit back and enjoy the prime time entertainment that the IPL brings when action starts in the middle at the M A Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai on Friday, where CSK take on RCB in the inaugural match. Let us hope that IPL 2024 throws up new stars on the cricketing horizon, in addition to providing edge-of-the-seat excitement, while also staying clear of controversies.
(The author is a former international cricket umpire and a senior bureaucrat)
