While the Kolkata Knight Riders have managed to rope in some big names in cricket like Chris Gayle and Brendon McCullum, Punjab’s Kings XI haven’t been quite so fortunate. But nevertheless it will be foolish to consider them any less formidable than the former; as last year’s semi-finalists, the Kings XI are still a daunting challenge.

Their biggest and priciest buy for this year’s second season has been England’s batsman Ravi Bopara, at $450,000. But the key for the Kings XI still lies in the hands of last year’s players: In Season 1, Australian opener Shaun Marsh worked wonders for the team. If he can keep up that level of performance this year too, the Kings XI will have little left to worry about. In addition, the team can boast of Kumara Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene. This Sri Lankan duo has been indispensable to the Sri Lankan team for years, and through the first season of the IPL has proved indispensable for the Kings XI as well. All of them along with Australian Luke Pomersbach have put together a strong batting line up. The team will however have to do without Ramnaresh Sarwan who did not extend his contract.Perhaps the most crucial player for this Preity Zinta, Ness Wadia owned team will be Yuvraj Singh, who also leads the team. His eye catching performances last year were what took his team so far. This year too it is hoped that Yuvraj, who loves batting in South Africa, will continue pillaring his team the same way.

If there is anything that could render the team weak, it is their bowling attack which somehow does not have the same blaze that the batting line up can boast of: especially since West Indian speedster Jerome Taylor had to be counted out because of an injury, and Sreesanth had to drop out after a stress fracture in his lower back. But the management has included a South African Bowler, Yusuf Abdullah, who could prove very useful to the team, considering that he is based here in South Africa.

Another vital aid inclusion to the team is David Nosworthy who is the head coach of the South African team, The Lions. His in-depth knowledge of the pitches and South African conditions will only help the Kings XI prepare better.
Source – cricket360.com

Shah Rukh Khan, Preity Zinta and Shilpa Shetty will be among those watching all the women attending the Indian Professional League games in South Africa over the next five weeks to find the newest Bollywood starlet.

The Indian Professional League has announced a Bollywood movie role for one lucky South African lass as it prepares to launch the five-week Twenty20 extravaganza here on Saturday with an inaugural double header.

The search for a young South African woman with the potential to take Bollywood by storm was announced here Thursday by IPL chairman and commissioner Lalit Modi and Bollywood superstars Shah Rukh Khan, Shilpa Shetty and Preity Zinta, all having stakes in the IPL teams.

The lucky South African IPL fan with star quality stands to win a role in a Bollywood movie, 50,000 rands in cash, a business class trip to India and other prizes in the 2009 tournament’s Miss Bollywood SA competition.

‘We’re looking for someone who has the star quality to stand out in a crowd, probably without even trying that hard. It’s that special, almost indefinable, quality that makes someone a star more than a beauty queen that we are looking for,’ Modi said.

‘IPL matches with their mix of fun and excitement are an excellent environment to identify the kind of person who is a natural stand-out in a big crowd.’

‘Star searches like this are a really great way to find people who may never even have thought that they have what it takes to really make it big,’ Shah Rukh said.

‘The heart of our idea is to search the crowd at IPL matches for someone who has the attitude and appearance that automatically draws the eye. It will be the kind of person who is not necessarily showing off for the camera, but who can mesmerise even total strangers,’ he said.

A total of 50 winners will be chosen from the crowds at every one of the eight venues around the country that are to host IPL matches. Winners will be shown on the big screen at every match during the second five-minute break.

There will be one finalist per match, identified with the help of TV producers who will have cameras scanning the crowds. IPL matches are being played in Cape Town, East London, Port Elizabeth, Durban, Bloemfontein, Kimberley, Johannesburg and Pretoria.

One finalist from each venue will be chosen, leaving eight winners to be hosted and feted at The Wanderers in Johannesburg at the final of the IPL 2009 tournament on 24 May. The ultimate winner will be announced during the final.

IPL fans worldwide will also be able to cast their votes for the winner via the IPL website.

The IPL is also set to announce an eight-million rand educational project here on Friday.
Source – story.zimbabwestar.com

This is the sixth in a series of team-by-team preview articles for the upcoming 2009 Indian Premier League. They are being released two per day until the end of the week. Also featured: Deccan Chargers, Royal Challengers Bangalore, Kolkata Knight Riders, Kings XI Punjab, Chennai Super Kings

Delhi were an anomaly last year. While the other teams were struggling to hide the weak links among the seven Indians required for the playing XI, Virender Sehwag’s men were afflicted by a series of underperforming internationals. In the end, the team that appeared to be as strong as any had a topsy-turvy campaign that took them to fourth place.

Apart from Farveez Maharoof (15 wickets at 16.6, ER 6.90, SR 14.4) and Glenn McGrath (16 wickets at 29.75, ER 6.61, SR 27.0), the imports proved to be Delhi’s achilles heel.

Mohammad Asif was the epitomy of Delhi’s international woes, loping in lackadaisically and bowling with his arm in a support mechanism. Two years earlier, he was one of the world’s premier pacemen, but during the IPL, he performed woefully (8 wickets at 37.00, ER 9.25, SR 24.0). To cap it all off, he was arrested at Dubai Airport for opium possession after the tournament and was later found to have failed a drugs test during the competition.

With so much money at stake, legal action is always a possibility, and the IPL and Delhi administrators could regard themselves lucky that Sehwag’s men hadn’t carried off the title. In the end, the blanket banning of Pakistani players following the Mumbai terrorist attacks allowed Asif, Delhi and the IPL to part ways relatively gracefully; otherwise, Asif’s expulsion would have focused the limelight entirely on the ugly spectre of doping.

Not that Asif was the only import to blame. Shoaib Malik (52 runs at 13.00, SR 110.6), the Pakistani captain at the time, and Tillakaratne Dilshan (104 runs at 17.33, SR 131.6) both floundered with the bat, and neither contributed much with the ball (two and one wicket respectively). AB de Villiers played intermittently (95 runs at 19.00, SR 96.93) as Dinesh Karthik was favoured with the gloves and other imports were squeezed in ahead of him. This proved to be something of a blunder as Karthik batted unconvincingly (145 runs 24.16, SR 135.5) and kept rather untidily. With Manoj Tiwary also struggling (104 runs at 26.00, SR 122.4), it was the middle-order, filled with accomplished and internationally capped players, which proved to be the soft underbelly.

Delhi’s batting was almost entirely reliant on the top order trio of Sehwag (406 runs at 33.83, SR 184.5), Gautam Gambhir (534 runs at 41.07, SR 140.9) and Shikhar Dhawan (340 runs at 37.77, SR 115.3); Dhawan aggregated almost 2.5 times more runs than Karthik, the team’s fourth highest runscorer. Whenever the trio fired, Delhi invariably mounted a formidable total, but their departure often heralded a collapse. When this happened early in the innings, heavy defeat usually followed.

Delhi desperately scrambled to find a way to fit a productive quartet of imports into their team with little success, whereas other teams usually found that part of the jigsaw to be the least of their problems.

Luckily for Sehwag and coach Greg Shipperd, the resource allocation dilemma couldn’t get any worse this year, and due to changes in form and availability of the imports over the last 12 months, as well the playing venues, they should be able to easily and vastly improve the productivity of their foreign legion.

Arguably the finest limited overs spinner in the world, Daniel Vettori showed that slow men could prosper in T20 during the inaugural World Cup and his current T20 career economy rate hovers around 5.5, a remarkable effort by any measure. Due to international commitments, the Kiwi skipper played only two games in the first season, but he will be present for the entire South African campaign. Vettori also adds depth to the lower order batting and improves the fielding of the team, meaning that Amit Mishra will could watch most of the campaign from the sidelines.

Given how poorly the batting imports, Karthik and Tiwary played last year, it’s hard to see the middle order sinking any lower than they did last season, regardless of any blunders in the team composition strategy. Nevertheless, making the correct selections should be easier this year. De Villiers is clearly more reliable than Karthik with the gloves, and after scoring three centuries in his last six Tests against Australia over the past four months, all in vastly contrasting conditions, it would be impossible to deny him a berth on home soil, nor could he do any worse than last year. However, Karthik should still command a place in the team; he was one of only four players to pass 1000 runs for the Indian first-class season, and Cheteshwar Pujara was the only other player to compile five centuries. Given the aplomb he showed when opening in the Tests in South Africa and England, Karthik should adapt to the conditions much better than the vast majority of Indian batsmen in the tournament. This probably means that Dilshan will miss out, especially given his relatively weak record outside the subcontinent. Tiwary has continued to score heavily on the domestic scene (469 runs at 52.11 in 12 List A matches this season) and should improve on last year’s performances.

Following the inexplicable decision to trade Shikhar Dhawan for Ashish Nehra, the middle order will need to fire. Assuming that Sehwag, Gambhir, de Villiers, Tiwary and Karthik all play, another two places in the top seven remain unfilled. At the moment, it seems as though Delhi will be forced to field a New Zealand-style line-up. The Kiwis often pack their team with “bits and pieces” allrounders or bowlers who can bat, but this is usually due to a paucity of quality batsmen. On the other hand, Delhi’s situation is of their own making. Despite Sehwag’s stunning limited overs form in the past year, and Gambhir’s relentless evolution towards completeness, the pair cannot be taken to be invincible and it won’t be easy for them to surpass their performance in the inaugural season. Unless Vettori bats at No. 7, which could be stretching things too far, the last import’s position will probably be fought out between Maharoof, Paul Collingwood, Andrew McDonald, Owais Shah or David Warner. Given Sehwag’s reluctance to use his loopy spin and the fact that the top five rarely bowl, Shah and Warner will probably find themselves on the outer. While Warner was stunning on his T20 debut for Australia, the fact that he is yet to play first-class cricket is an indication that there must be more than a few chinks in the armour. South Africa and New Zealand promptly found them and shut down his scoring in the following limited overs matches, and the other international quality bowlers will fancy their chances of doing likewise. This means that Mithun Manhas and Rajat Bhatia are poised to contest the final middle order vacancy. Both have performed strongly on the domestic circuit, and while Bhatia can also bowl, neither have proven themselves with the bat in the way that Dhawan has. At the very least, the retention of Dhawan in the squad would have eased the pressure by giving Delhi more room to manoeuvre their batsmen.

The trading of Dhawan for Nehra appears all the more questionable when one looks at Delhi’s surprisingly healthy state of Delhi’s pace stocks. Who was the Daredevils’ most prolific wicket-taker last year?

Vijaykumar Yo Mahesh didn’t appear to gain much attention, but the Tamil Nadu paceman took 16 wickets at 23.12 in 11 matches (ER 8.77, SR 15.8). He ranked eighth in terms of wickets; apart from Sohail Tanvir, all ahead of him played at least two more games. Yo Mahesh has continued his incisive run in the past domestic season, taking 15 wickets at 16.06 in just eight List A matches. Unlike his IPL campaign, he was also relatively economical (4.05). The performances of McGrath and Maharoof have been discussed above, while Pradeep Sangwan, who played seven matches last year under the youth quota system (5 wickets at 43.00, ER 8.95) has had another steady domestic season, taking 15 wickets at 29.80 (ER 5.03) from 11 List A matches. Sangwan is also capable with the bat. Should Sangwan be deemed to be too much of a risk, and with the pitches also expected to offer some turn, Delhi could always play Mishra. In contrast, Nehra has played in just two List A and four first-class matches (7 wickets at 48.85) for the season; coupled with his status as one of the worst and laziest fielders in the world and his complete inability with the bat, Nehra’s selection at Dhawan’s expense seems ludicrous given that comparable or better bowling options are hardly lacking.

Verdict: Delhi have a lot going for them, with two explosive openers, the best spinner in the competition and the greatest seamer of the generation, albeit a retired one. Their middle order is strong, but the last batting and bowling spot could turn out to be something of a liability. In addition, none of their top five are likely to bowl, which means that the remaining six will be difficult to hide if they have a bad day and get savaged. 3rd
Source – blogs.livemint.com

It is a nightmare that rattles the bowlers these days. For fans, they conjure visions of some exciting batsmanship in all forms of the game. The most destructive opening pair in today’s cricket leads Delhi Daredevils’ challenge as a domestic competition travels overseas.

Sehwag and Gambhir have often traversed successfully when the terrain has been most treacherous and the duo has pledged a run feast in the second edition of the Indian Premier League. They have set goals that can be attained only by outshining each other at the crease.
Flattering to deceive

Much was expected in IPL-1 when Daredevils swept four of its first five matches, including three away encounters. And then it slipped. Four defeats in a row, including one at home, was a setback to a side that had come to believe it had the arsenal to win the war. The failure of Mohammad Asif and Shoaib Malik proved a severe handicap.

But Daredevils clawed back into the reckoning and qualified to meet Rajasthan Royals in the semifinals where it was blasted by Shane Watson, who made runs and took wickets too. Daredevils, a favourite to become champion, finished fourth.

An inconsistent middle order, comprising Manoj Tiwary, Dinesh Karthik, Abraham de Villiers and T. Dilshan was a worry in the first IPL, but not this time. They are in fine form now. The presence of Owais Shah, Paul Collingwood and David Warner improves the options. The flexibility factor in the batting line-up is Daredevils’ strength.
Lethal attack

With the crafty Glenn McGrath, who can still bowl the best four overs against any opposition, and the world’s finest left-arm spinner in Daniel Vettori, Daredevils can boast of a lethal attack, what with Ashish Nehra bolstering it, shifting from Mumbai Indians.

Leg-spinner Amit Mishra brings a refreshing variety even as seamers Farveez Maharoof, Pradeep Sangwan, Avishkar Salvi and V. Yomahesh wait in the wings.

Coach T.A. Sekar reminds you of the presence of Umesh Yadav, a young fast bowler from Nagpur, not to forget crisis man Rajat Bhatia. Delhi veteran Mithun Manhas too “can be trusted to excel.”
Compact combination

A compact combination with some explosive talent, Daredevils, for many reasons, would be the team to beat in this edition. There are some acknowledged performers with a reputation to swing the matches with their individual brilliance but as Sehwag observed, Daredevils will rely on its “collective strength.”

Oppositions better watch out. Sehwag and Gambhir are coming!
Source – hindu.com

The opening game of the IPL 2009 will see Sachin Tendulkar’s Mumbai Indians, take on IPL 2008 finalists, the Chennai Super Kings, at Newlands in Cape Town.
The Chennai Super Kings, under the leadership of wicketkeeper/batsman MS Dhoni, are entering this year’s IPL as one of the bookmaker’s favourite.
Big hitting all-rounders Andrew Flintoff and Albie Morkel will be at the forefront of the Super Kings attack this coming Saturday.
They will try to be tamed by the Mumbai Indian’s bowlers, consisting of Zaheer Khan, Lasith ‘Slinga’ Malinga and Harbhajan Singh, who have the knowledge of Shaun Pollock (the Mumbai Indians’ mentor) on their side, when taking on the often tricky Newlands pitch.
All eyes will be on Mumbai’s Sanath Jayasuria, to see if he can entertain the sold-out Newlands crowd, as he tries follow up his record as IPL’s greatest six hitter (31 sixes in IPL 2008).
Other Mumbai batsmen to watch will be the “Maestro” Sachin Tendulkar, “Million-Dollar Kid” JP Duminy (on his home ground), and West Indian Dwayne Bravo.
They’ll try to be unsettled by Chennai’s Makhaya Ntini, Muttiah Muralitharan, and Lakshmipathy Balaji.
Source – bleacherreport.com