County Cricket: Lightning Light up the North

It was all change at England this week, although Joe Root rescued his nation with another splendid Test century to deliver an early blow against New Zealand. In the Blast’s North division, the Birmingham Bears stuttered while Lancashire Lightning won all three fixtures. Northants Steelbacks are hot on their heels and could easily have been top of the table. Their clash at Old Trafford went down to the penultimate ball, when the otherwise admirable Jimmy Neesham bowled a wide and no-ball to hand the hosts a two-wicket victory. 

Two days earlier, against Leicestershire, the Kiwi had smashed six sixes in an unbeaten 75, along with Aussie Chris Lynn’s 106 not out to reach the week’s highest score of 227-1. Josh Cobb and bowler Tom Taylor also performed consistently for the Steelbacks. Lancashire’s rise to the lead has been more of an all-round effort. Runs and wickets have come from the entire team, and Liam Livingstone has exemplified this effort. 

I feel sorry for the Worcestershire captain Brett D’Oliveira. Like Livingstone, he has made top-order runs and spun effectively with the ball only, unlike the Lancs man, victories are proving more difficult to come by. Their only win to date was Friday’s thumping of the Bears. The Birmingham outfit’s only points this week resulted from an eight-over thrash against Nottinghamshire. This match was more memorable for two batters, Brathwaite (Bears) and Patel (Outlaws), making tactical retirements in a bid to herald someone more successful against leg-spin or with faster legs. Notts ended up losing by a solitary run. 

In the South, Surrey and Somerset are looking string at the moment, although these things can turn in a few key overs. Sam Curran and West Indian Sunil Narine turned on the style with bat and ball. The former took 5-30 against Hampshire while the leg-spinner lived up to his global reputation by conceding hardly any boundaries and scoring plenty himself. Somerset lost their first T20 of the summer against Sussex, for whom another Windies man Obed McCoy took a career-best 5-33. With Somerset ramping up the chase, he and Tymal Mills (4-32) captured five wickets for two runs in eleven frantic balls to win by 47. At least Somerset bounced back with a resounding defeat of Glamorgan. 

The highest individual score was Joe Denly’s 110 for Kent at home to Middlesex. However, the biggest blitz was hammered by Alex Hales against Derbyshire. He crashed five sixes and a dozen fours, dominating an opening stand of 115 with Joe Clarke. He fared less well against Yorkshire; David Willey bowled him first ball! A final shout-out to Leicestershire’s Naveen-ul-Huq. The Afghan paceman’s 5-11 did for Worcestershire and took him to the head of the wicket-taking table. 

In the coming days, a welter of local derbies are scheduled. The Roses, London and Avon contests in particular could deliver some interesting cricket.

Team of the Week: Lynn (Nor), D’Oliveira (Wor), McDermott (Ham), Seifert (Sus +), Hales (Not), Livingstone (Lan), S Curran (Sur), Narine (Sur), Naveen-ul-Huq (Lei), T Taylor (Nor), McCoy (Sus)

Fifteen degrees of separation

As nations gear up for next year's World Cup, some will be fretting over star players. For most, the concern is possible recovery from injury. However, Pakistan, West Indies and Sri Lanka could enter the competition without their leading spinners because they are banned.

Umpires 'calling' a bowler for a suspiciously bent elbow at the point of delivery is nothing new but the spate of big names currently undergoing 'remedial' work on their action is causing more widespread controversy than poor little KP. It used to be fast bowlers but now it's the slowies like Saeed Ajmal and Sunil Narine in the spotlight: the two most successful spinners around.

So are they being unfairly singled out? I don't think so. One of the positives I can pick out from the emergence of Twenty20 cricket is the rise of the wily slowie. Having the ability to mix up flight, pace and line and grip to bamboozle the batsman is imperative and spinners usually open the bowling to take advantage of the Powerplay. The quicker ball is the one which has caught the umpires' watchful eye, but any TV spectator can see that Ajmal in particular bowls with an obviously crooked arm.

Is he a cheat? That would be going too far? I remember trying to bowl off-breaks in a friendly and hearing opposition mutters of 'chucker' but I honestly didn't realise I was doing it. Soon reverted to my usual rubbish medium-pacers! However, whether the elbow bend is 5%, 10%, 15% or 45% if it's against the rules it's illegal. End of. Of course it's impossible with current technology to no-ball someone in a match situation. That's probably a good thing. Imagine how long matches would be to wait for the elbow angle to appear as well as speed, number of rotations (ludicrous!), etc, etc.

I don't know whether Ajmal, Narine and Senenayake come through and attain their previous success with a remodelled action for all deliveries but it is something they must do to avoid the unwanted tag of 'chucker'. Throwing is a form of cheating just as much as stepping over the no-ball line or changing the field when the batsman isn't looking (oh, hang on...). Therefore as a cricket fan I want reassurance that all bowlers are turning Gayle, Pietersen, Kohli and co to gibbering wrecks with legitimate deliveries every time.

Team of the Week: Browne Breaks Records

After missing the previous week while in Tenerife (not much interest in cricket in an international hotel during the football World Cup!), it was back to the usual mixture of the quick and quirky at home and abroad. While Yorkshire's L-men Lyth and Leez produced another big opening stand, they can't compete with young Nick Browne. He became the first Essex batsman to strike two unbeaten centuries in the same match, and they happened to be the first senior three-figure scores of his career! Meanwhile, the rather more experienced Hashim Amla was taking two consecutive hundreds off the Sri Lankans in SA's ODI series, no mean feat.

No room for Nick Compton in the England set-up but he twice passed 80 for Somerset in the Championship draw with Middlesex, followed by a brisk 46 in today's T20 win over local rivals Gloucestershire. Leicestershire skipper Josh Cobb was also in the runs in both competitions; a 137 versus Kent and 60 in the T20 against Lancashire. Luke Wright's 158 for Sussex was the highest score of the week, albeit against Northamptonshire, so he edges out other middle-order centurions Will Gidman and Dawid Malan. Paul Stirling's week consisted of three half-centuries for Middlesex, which should help him nail down a solid place in the side.

My wicketkeeper is not David Bairstow, despite his rapid T20 hundred today. His Championship duck cancelled it out! Jos Buttler also made some swift T20 runs for Lancashire but my gloves go to Surrey skipper Gary Wilson who scored an unbeaten 97 as well as captaining the county to another big Championship win which puts them right in the promotion mix.

I was tempted to add Andrew Flintoff to the team after his five wickets in the biff-bang stuff. However, he barely batted and was somewhat fortunate to get those wickets. Chris Tremlett, on the other hand, combined a five-four and late-order 56 for Surrey, while Mitch Claydon trumped that with 5-77 and 77 for Kent against Leicestershire. Anthony Ireland's 5-22 was the pick of the short-format bowling performances in England but Sunil Narine's stupendous return of 4-1-3-0 for Guyana in the CPL opener takes the biscuit for economy, and for a change also keeps Saeed Ajmal out of the XI.

Finally, in comes Steve Magoffin. Such a consistent wicket-taker in the first-class game for Sussex, he claimed 5-12 and 3-28 in the county's demolition of Northants. Sorry, Freddie, must try considerably harder!

He wasn't as good as: Amla (SA), Browne (Ess), Compton (Som), Cobb (Leic), Wright (Sus), Stirling (Mid), Wilson (Sur, + *), Claydon (Kent), Ireland (Leic), Magoffin (Sus), Narine (Guy)

KKR are the new Kings of IPL

Regular readers will know that the IPL and me are not natural bedfellows. I don't sit in front of BBC4 every afternoon in May yawning through the timeouts and ad breaks while the pitches gleam like coloured glass, the boundary ropes creep ever closer to the stumps, the cheerleaders shake their....pom-poms and that blasted trumpet trill punctuates seemingly every over.

Nevertheless, the IPL is part of the world cricket scene and I can't ignore it. Many players in the UAE and India have smashed or twirled their way into my Team of the Week and it's always interesting to see how many globetrotting T20 mercenaries fail while internationally unknown locals find themselves thrust into the spotlight, if only for a few months. I don't necessarily see it as a training ground for proper cricket, Test cricket, but it does produce some entertainment and excitement, the vital ingredient for any sport.

IPL 2014 definitely benefited from its truncated length. Maybe more franchises should go bust and keep the competition even more concise and less drawn out. Another positive from this year is the way the two best sides reached the final and produced a classic of big hitting, albeit not from the big names.

For once, Chris Gayle was useless, accumulating fewer than 200 runs at barely a run a ball. The Bangalore opener was presumaby unfit but an essential part of the IPL nonetheless, at least in the eyes of sponsors and the casual spectator. Kevin Pietersen fared a little better as Delhi skipper, yet a single 50 in 11 innings at a scoring rate of 126 was not a good return. Dare I suggest he was - er - distracted?!

Of the Aussie recruits, only Glenn Maxwell and David Warner did the business with the bat, while Watson, Bailey, Finch and Mike Hussey disappointed on the whole. The English counties will surely hope from more from their Antipodean investments this summer. South Africans Miller, AB and Duminy were their consistent selves, unlike De Kock and the once reliable Jacques Kallis. With no international cricket in his schedule, the Saffer legend produced only one score of note, a 72 in the very first game for KKR. At least he was part of the victorious squad.

With the ball, Sunil Narine took another 21 wickets at a typically miserly 6.35 an over, Mitch Johnson had some memorable days but Dale Steyn proved human, at times being clouted around the grounds he once ruled as a dangerous death bowler. Meanwhile Lasith Malinga restored faith in his ability to bowl fast and full to frustrate the big hitters when it matters.

Overall, numerous Indian players caught the eye. Sehwag, Raina and Yusuf Pathan might be remembered for their brutal landmark innings but they were not the outstanding performers of the tournament. Robin Uthappa demonstrated the consistency of a great Test opener rather than a Powerplay power merchant. He struck a sensational ten consecutive scores of 40 or more in a total of 660. Only 18 sixes yet a laudable scoring rate of 138 made him a deserving winner of whatever colourful trophy goes to the top run-getter.

Mohit Sharma took more wickets than anyone else (23), albeit conceding more than eight an over. Another seamer Bhuvi Kumar wasn't far behind, but his economy rate for the Sunrisers was a more impressive 6.65. The experienced Harbhajan Singh, Ravi Jadeja and Ravi Ashwin bowled creditably, but for me the star names were probably 20 year-old Akshar Patel and a man more than twice his age, Pravin Tambe. Slow left-armer Patel's 17 wickets at only 6.13 an over proved vital for Kings XI's progress to their first final. Meanwhile leg-spinner Tambe, whose age in years easily outnumbers the number of senior matches under his belt, usually proved hard to hit for the Royals. Tambe's time for a Test career has probably past him by - by about twenty years - but Patel is a promising prospect. He'll command big money at IPL 2015 and how he copes with that may determine his opportunities for international cricket, whatever the format.

Spin Veterans win the day

Twenty20 cricket is supposed to be a game for young whippersnappers who can whack the ball, hare around the outfield and deliver toe-breaking yorkers. However, today it was the turn of thirtysomething slow bowlers, whose wily variations of pace and flight spun their respective nations into the World Cup semi-finals.

Top of the pile was Rangana Herath, whose 5-3 in 21 balls looks more like a typing error than genuine statistics in a format where conceding under 25 runs is considered a mark of distinction. And yet this was his first opportunity in the competition, granted only after three nightmares for Mendis. Today, having been bowled out by New Zealand for 119, Sri Lanka looked likely to struggle but, Kane Williamson apart, the Black Caps were bamboozled for 60 all out. Off-spinner Sahithra Senanayake's figures of 2-3 in three overs would be sensational in any other match, but his left-arm partner Herath, recently turned 36, was the star of the show.

Unusually for a slowie, too, none of his five victims fell to a catch in the deep. Instead, all wickets were either stumped, caught behind or at slip, LBW or bowled. That's testament to the man from Kurunegala's skill at luring batsmen to their fate or spotting their early movement and changing length, flight or line to thwart attacking intent. For someone of advanced years in sporting terms and a form of cricket where slow bowling has become essential, Herath has surprisingly played only 40 T20 matches, just seven for his country. Maybe he is seen as too orthodox for the biff-bang game, but today's result demonstrates that experience and a bowling-friendly pitch can combine to magnificent effect.

Herath has now more than 1000 wickets to his name, the bulk of them in first-class cricket. 217 Test victims at 30 apiece ain't bad either, but perhaps today's performance could extend his career in one-dayers as has happened with Saeed Ajmal. In the Group 2 decider against the West Indies, the Pakistani suffered a rare bashing, conceding 41 runs against Bravo and Sammy. However, when his side batted, the Trinidadian duo of Sunil Narine and Samuel Badree were dominant. Like Herath, Badree recently celebrated his birthday, his 33rd, but his late blossoming as a T20 bowler was once again evident. He has taken a wicket in each of his last ten T20 appearances, and today's 3-10 was up there with the 4-15 he produced against Bangladesh last week. In the second over, he induced a rash stroke by Kamran Akmal straight to extra cover, followed by the stumpings of Umar Akmal and Shoaib Malik. Santokie, Russell and Narine did the rest. Of course, as ever, a batsmen (Dwayne Bravo) was awarded the Man of the Match, and now the Windies must be considered short odds to retain the trophy.

Next up, Badree and Herath will be competing face to face. Perhaps it will be the turn of the veteran Sri Lanka batsmen to win the day, but I reckon the carefree Caribbeans are on a roll and will probably advance to face India in the final once more. Forget Kohli and Sharma against Gayle and Samuels; it's about time the media recognised the competition between spinners Ashwin and Mishra versus Badree and Narine.

One-Day Cricketers of 2012

Rangana Herath's prolific wicket-taking apart, Sri Lanka's apparent disdain for Test cricket was evident in the lack of their batsmen in the run-scoring league. However, they seemed to be playing ODIs non-stop, which explains why SL men dominate the end-of-year tables for the 50-over format.

Kumar Sangakkara may have topped the 10,000 Test run barrier recently but 2012 also saw him reach the same landmark for ODIs, and nobody scored more runs last year in this form of cricket, international or otherwise (1184 at 43.85). Team-mate Tillekeratne Dilshan was just behind him. Aussies played only half the number of one-dayers in the gold and green, but David Hussey, David Warner and George Bailey scored freely for club and country.

Virat Kohli smashed no fewer than five ODI hundreds in 2012, aggregating more than 1000 runs at an impressive average of 73 and close on a run a ball. He was third, too, on the T20I run leaderboard, making 444 runs at the equivalnet of eight an over. However, he wasn't such a successful globetrotting T20 franchise star in the mould of Chris Gayle, who compiled more than 1,500 runs around the world, comfortably ahead of the nearest challenger, Azhar Mahmood, the Pakistani all-rounder. The shift from 50 to 20 overs in the cricketing calendar was best illustrated by the T20 diary of Kieron Pollard. He notched up fifty matches, incorporating 1,041 runs at a strike rate of 163 plus a fair few wickets.

New Zealand pair Martin Guptill and Brendan McCullum looked feeble in this week's Test defeat but nobody scored more T20 international runs in 2012, each notching more than 450 at SRs of 130+. Shane Watson was the outstanding T20 all-rounder, claiming 406 runs and 17 wickets at a commendable economy rate for a fast-medium pacer.

South Africa played relatively few international one-day matches yet Hashim Amla and AB De Villiers still dominated the year's stats as well as opposition bowlers. Amla appeared in only 10 ODIs but scored 678 runs, while the redoubtable AB thrashed 645 whilst achieving the amazing double of 100+ average and strike rate. Chandimal may have scored more runs but I'd have AB as my one-day wicket-keeper any day of the week!

Don't forget that two of the finest Test batsmen of 2012 were also successful ODI performers. Alastair Cook and Michael Clarke combined captaincy with 699+ runs with healthy strike rates of around 80.

Watson, Dwayne Bravo, Pollard and Luke Wright are always useful members of a T20 side, but perhaps the most impressive ODI all-rounder was Thisara Perera. His 32 ODI wickets were augmented by 246 lower-order runs.

My decision not to consider T20 and List A cricket separately is supported by the fact that most bowlers who excelled at one format also did so at the other. Lasith Malinga took more wickets globally in both than anyone else. Curiously, while his his 10-over stints tend to be quite expensive, Malinga's T20 brilliance enshrines wicket-taking ability and economy, along with that enthusiasm which makes him such a valuable player, even with only four overs at his disposal. West Indian spinner Sunil Narine is another who starred in all one-day cricket. His economy rates of 3.63 (List A) and just 5.64 (T20) are phenomenal. Possibly the cricketer of 2011, Saeed Ajmal must also be a contender for the same unofficial accolade in 2012. He was amongst the top ten international wicket-takers in ALL three formats.

Englishmen worth noting include young spinner Danny Briggs and paceman Steve Finn who each harnessed strike and economy rates for county and country. Australia has plenty of bowlers but most seem to be on the treatmemt table. It was therefore amusing to see 40-something Brad Hogg play more than 50 T20 matches, in which he took 47 wickets, conceding barely a run a ball. Young fast bowler Mitch Starc looked a T20 man for the future, taking more than two wickets a game across the year, finishing with only four fewer wickets than Malinga in twelve fewer games. Clint McKay was particularly effective in the List A format.

So, for my combined List A/T20 team of the year, I'll go for:-

Gayle, Watson, Amla, Kohli, Sangakkara, De Villiers (+), Perera, Malinga, Finn, Narine, Saeed Ajmal (with Starc standing by in case Finn breaks down again!)

Successful West Indian Spinners - A Rare Breed

It's great to see the West Indies fielding two full-time spinners in the current Test series against Bangladesh. Veerasammy Permaul had a satisfactory debut last week but Sunil Narine, the darling of T20, is struggling a bit despite being a veteran of five matches. Their chances of being a potent partnership are probably quite slim. History is against them, too, as it's fifty years since Ramadhin and Valentine last played together for the Windies.

Apart from those two, only Lance Gibbs (for many years the world record holder with 309 wickets) and Carl Hooper have taken more than 100 scalps in Tests. The latter was really a batsman who bowled a bit, as his woeful average of 49 would indicate. His career (1987-2002) spanned much of the greatest period in Caribbean cricket history, especially in terms of fast bowling. For two decades, spin was used only to give the pace quartet a rest, to fill a gap before lunch or tea, and to increase the over rate to avoid a big fine! With the likes of Holding, Marshall, Bishop, Walsh and Ambrose dominating the attack, innocuous off-spin was mainly supplied, in addition to Hooper, by Roger Harper (46 wickets in 25 Tests)and batsmen like Viv Richards and Jimmy Adams (27 in 54). Chris Gayle has continued the practice into the past decade.

In the past ten years of so, selectors have dabbled with Shillingford, Banks, Hinds, Deonarine and Mohammed with very little success. It seems as soon as someone with Asian heritage starts to show promise in Trinidad or Guyana, they get called up. Narine, of course, first found fame in the 2011 T20 Champions League, and justified his hefty price tag in the IPL. Test cricket is a different beast, of course, but I think he deserved the opportunity to prove himself at the highest level. However, Bangladesh are hardly the creme de la creme, yet the young Trinidadian is so far finding it difficult on Asian pitches. Now into his fifth Test, Narine has claimed fifteen wickets at a dismal 45 apiece so I wonder how he'll fare in, for example, South Africa or Australia.

Darren Sammy doesn't have a Marshall, Garner or Ambrose at his disposal. Edwards, Rampaul, Best and the skipper himself are hardly a frightening seam attack so now is a great time to experiment. I just fear that a poor performance by the team in Bangladesh could herald a switch back to traditional selection policies and a return to T20 specialism for Narine. Permaul actually boasts an impressive first-class aggregate of 156 wickets at under 25 apiece so is arguably a better bet than Narine. Let's hope he gets a decent run in the Test side.

Man of the Moment: Sunil Narine

Last autumn, I first heard the name of Sunil Narine, when he performed heroics in the T20 Champions League for Trinidad & Tobago. OK, so they didn't win the tournament; that was always set up for Mumbai. However, the young leg-spinner also came to the attention of the IPL franchises, his auction value was one of the highest in 2012, and he helped spin KKR to victory.

Twenty20 has helped bring the art of slow bowling to the forefront of world cricket. Teams regularly feature at least three spinners, and often open the attack with them, relegating the quicks to the post-powerplay overs. Shahid Afridi has become a more successful bowler than batsman, while the likes of Sharma, Ashwin and various other young Indians have delighted in making their mark in front of huge crowds and TV audiences. Look at me, I can concede only seven runs an over, maybe get someone to thump my mystery delivery high to an outfielder and - I know this sounds crazy - if I'm really on fire bowl a dot ball!

Hmm. Does that really make you a great bowler. As with some of the T20 batting superstars, the same young Indians find it very hard to move up even to the 50-over game, let alone the Test scene. The likes of Muralitharan, Warne, Mushtaq Ahmed, Harbajhan Singh and Kumble served their apprenticeship in the first-class game and were all the better for it.

Sunil Narine is the new West Indian hopeful and, boy, do they need someone to pin their hopes on?! The thing is, he has played only six first-class matches in his career, and he's already 24. How will he cope with bowling ten, fifteen overs on the trot, testing out the batsmen, varying line, pace, height and spin to get them out? It's no longer just about enticing slogs to deep mid-wicket. Like Anil Kumble, he has a good high action and his performances in T20 have shown that even the best batters have problems picking his deliveries; in four overs, they simply don't have time. In Test cricket, however, they do. Will he hold his nerve when the likes of Cook or Trott simply thrust a pad or forward defensive to every ball? Will he shrug when one gets cut for four and focus on finding that weakness, or just keep tossing them up in the hope of getting a catch? Kumble was a supreme wicket-taker but he could be expensive. However, in the five-day game it doesn't matter so long as you get the guys out, usually armed with patience and guile.

Actually, the way the weather is shaping up, Narine may not get to deliver a ball against England this week but what he needs to do is get some experience of proper cricket. To sign up for at least half a season in the County Championship and serve an apprenticeship en route to becoming the genuine article. Somehow I don't think he will do that, so I fervently hope he will be a natural in all forms of cricket like Murali and now Saeed Ajmal. For now, Sunil Narine is my Man of the Moment but will he deserve such an honour again?!

KKR beat CSK to the IPL

After the interminable group stages, IPL 2012 livened up for an entertaining climax in Chennai between the home side and Kolkata Knight Riders. Even an avowed T20-sceptic like me couldn't help be gripped by the final ten overs of the match, with the outcome swaying like a pendulum every few balls.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, MS Dhoni opted to bat first and it looked the right decision. Whilst the pitch had seen plenty of runs early on, Chennai Super Kings looked in command from the start. Birthday boy Mike Hussey and a resurgent Murali Vijay flayed poor Brett Lee but it was the Indian opener who fell first, mistiming a slog to a diving Shakib. In came Suresh Raina to up the scoring rate still further. Hussey was tiring visibly and was relieved to see the runs coming in boundaries, because it was too energy-sapping running singles, let alone twos. Having been happy to watch Raina's innings from the other end, the Aussie eventually missed a straight one from Jacques Kallis, on 54. Dhoni struck two fours from his nine balls and his partner perished to a last ball swish to deep mid-wicket having made 73 from 38 deliveries. Good bowlers like Kallis, Lee, Pathan, Shakib and Sunil Narine had each bowled some good balls but had also been thumped around the ground.

Facing a target of 191 under the lights, surely CSK had it in the bag. When KKR skipper Gautam Gambhir missed Ben Hilfenhaus' slower ball in the first over, the yellow-clad fans must have been supremely confident. However, 'keeper Manvinder Bisla, preferred in place of Brendan McCullum, had other ideas. Supported by the peerless Kallis, he played the innings of his career. They shared a partnership of 136 and, more importantly, kept themselves ahead of the asking rate, before Bisla mistimed a slow short ball from Albie Morkel.

Kallis then assumed control, striking some impressive boundaries. At the other end, Shukla and Pathan fell cheaply, but Kallis was clearly wilting in the heat. A quick run left him suffering from cramp and unsurprisingly he didn't last very long after that, slicing a full toss to cover for an excellent 69. His departure left KKR needing 16 from seven balls and the home fans were preparing for victory. Nevertheless, Shakib and Tiwary are useful men to bat at six and seven.

Excitement rose to fever pitch the next ball when Vijay caught Shakib only to be recalled for the most marginal of 'high' no-balls. They had run two and then from the extra delivery, Shakib scooped to the fine leg boundary. Fortune had swung back in KKR's favour, and they needed just nine from the last over, bowled by Dwayne Bravo, who had taken vital wickets for CSK, but at a price.

With their lengthy consultations about field placings, Dhoni and Bravo seemed intent on boring the batsmen into submission. Don't know why they bothered because Bravo's third and fourth balls were gifts for Tiwary who smacked each for leg-side boundaries, sealing the victory and the first IPL trophy for KKR. Now it was the fans in purple doing the cheering, and deservedly so.

I don't think many could begrudge Gambhir the title. He always looks so grim and deserved the chance to smile for once! Similarly few - apart maybe from Chris Gayle - could complain about the Player of the Tournament award to Sunil Narine. Morne Morkel may have taken more wickets, but the young undemonstrative Trinidadian showed that his Champions League economic performances were no flash in the pan. He was good value for his huge IPL auction fee and how I would like to see him ply his trade in first-class cricket. With his high, Kumble-like delivery arm, there's no reason why he couldn't become a valuable member of the West Indies Test side. Sammy needs him at least as much as Gayle right now.

It wasn't a great IPL for Tendulkar, Dravid or Ganguly, whose time has surely come to retire for good. However, the evergreen Hussey and Kallis proved that class is permanent, and Dale Steyn's pace and guile are more than a match for any opponent in any format. Malinga became less effective as the competition wore on. Maybe it's not just the twenty-four balls he has to bowl every few days; I guess it's hot work fielding out there in India, too. The IPL organisers must be relieved that the tournament has been a success in the full grounds, with KKR breaking their duck, too.