The pulsating Virat Kohli–AB de Villiers show in Bengaluru last week could not have come at a better time for the ninth edition of the Indian Premier League. If Season 9 of India’s premier club tournament is a movie, the murmuring in the front rows has already begun just a few minutes into the film. Because for a product that claims to have entertainment at its core, the first few games have been anything but exciting.
To be fair to the Board of Control for Cricket in India, the task was not easy. Kicking off the IPL barely a week after an enthralling World Twenty20 was foolhardy, almost akin to releasing a superhero movie a week after the release of the Batman classic The Dark Knight. However hard you try, you’re never really going to match up.
A look at the first few games reveals that the BCCI has a fair bit to worry about. Instead of the action on the field, everyone has an eye on what’s happening off it. The Bombay High Court ruled last Wednesday that all matches scheduled in Maharashtra after April 30 have to be moved out in light of the severe drought situation in the state. The verdict leaves the organisers in a precarious position. And before that, just on the eve of what is their biggest tournament, the BCCI made itself look even worse by quietly sacking the very popular Harsha Bhogle from its commentary team.
Muting the remote
Thanks to Harsha Bhogle’s sacking, an already cringe-worthy commentary experience has become intolerable. Navjot Singh Sidhu has returned to the fold, reminiscent of those Johnny Lever cameos in trashy films in the 1990s. Viewers were treated to this gem when a batsman got a thin edge on a delivery – “Ball ko pappi de ke boundary bhej diya (He kissed the ball and sent it to the boundary).”
But even setting aside commentary, the BCCI, with all the money at its disposal, was expected to create the best cricket viewership experience for its television audience. Instead, they’ve decided to act out their favourite science-fiction fantasies – the graphics depicting the score have a weird, confusing Terminator-esque font, and computer generated drones hover over the games, ostensibly to provide statistics, but basically looking like cheap props from a low-budget movie.
Everything else would have been forgiven had action on the field been compelling. The first four matches were drab one-sided affairs with the results obvious much before the match ended. Despite the customary razzmatazz and the cheerleaders, the crowds have been noticeably thinner. In contrast, full houses witnessed the England-New Zealand World Twenty 20 semi-final at Delhi and the England-West Indies final in Kolkata, despite the absence of the Indian team.
Drab affairs
To put it bluntly, it’s been boring so far. The players have looked distinctly jaded – with the exception of Dwayne Bravo of course, who did his signature “Champion” dance albeit with a little less élan, after he picked up 4/22 against the Kings XI Punjab. The only bright spark came in the fourth match last Tuesday when AB de Villiers and Virat Kohli got together for an eye-pleasing 157-run partnership. The batting was brilliant – Kohli, as has become his wont, was in sublime form as he hit a 51-ball 75 while AB de Villiers turned on the magic in his 42-ball 82.
But the lack of context was unnerving. Kohli’s innings, despite its brilliance, lacked the emotions of his performances in the World Twenty20. At that tournament, the stakes were far bigger and Kohli single-handedly took the team to improbable victories. After defeating Australia with yet another brilliant performance, he sunk to his haunches, overwhelmed by the emotion of his achievement. Contrastingly, whatever he does in the IPL is likely to be a one-night affair, done and dusted, perhaps never to be remembered again. It almost feels like his quality is just being wasted on an insignificant platform.
But this is not a new complaint and not something which the BCCI has ever been overly concerned with. But what they should really be worried about is the lack of entertainment value of a product once billed as “Manoranjan Ka Baap”. There is no novelty anymore about Twenty20 or domestic franchise-based leagues, and if this season of the IPL is any indication, fatigue has set in. With a hail of off-field controversy, the entertainment needs to come back – or the crowd might just walk out at the interval break.