IPL Mouthpieces Cornered

By Gulu Ezekiel

All those paid IPL mouthpieces, both overt and covert, will have a lot to answer for now that defending champions India have been knocked out of the World T-20.
Having been bombarded with propaganda for the last few weeks that India is the best placed team in the tournament as all its players took part in the IPL, one wonders what that bunch will come up with now.
It should be pretty obvious to any impartial observer that the Indian players are carrying and covering injuries as they are playing far too much cricket.
The players had been complaining of burnout pre-IPL as well. But since the first season last year and last month’s edition, the load has increased enormously.
You will never hear a professional cricketer to voice his opinion of overload during the IPL as they are paid well to not only pay but also to keep their mouths shut.
Hardly had the tour of New Zealand finished, when it was time for the IPL this year. And right after that came the World championships.
The sordid saga of Virender Sehwag has already been discussed ad nauseum and Zaheer Khan also said he was lucky to escape with a minor injury after injuring his shoulder in the IPL.
MS Dhoni has been nursing bruised hands for some time now and this showed in England where both his keeping and batting were sub-par.
Since the priority has now switched from international cricket to corporate cricket, we can expect more such injuries and further debacles from the national side.
After all, all the money in the world cannot buy you a successful team as the BCCI has finally discovered.
Coming back to the World Cup, South Africa now appear to be the favourites. If they do lift the cup at Lord’s next week it will be their first major title at the world level since the Wills International Cup tournament at Dhaka in 1998.