We’re nearly halfway through the tournament, and the league table is looking very very interesting. So the three most expensive teams in the league are taking the bottom 3 spots. The cheapest team, the Rajasthan Royals, bought at a partly $67 million (compared to the $112 million Mumbai team) is at the top of the table. Wait… its more interesting. The Jaipur team didn’t even spend the $5 million player budget and got fined for it. Everyone made fun of the team for being kanjoos then. Who’s laughing now?Looking back, it seems clear now that some teams have done thier homework really really well. In our earlier review of the Kings XI Punjab, we’d pointed out the Preity Zinta & Co. had thought out a team strategy and picked out a good team, and that has worked out really well for them so far. The Hyderabad Deccan Chargers, on the other hand, seemed to have just bought players randomly with nothing weaving together the strategy, and that can partially be blamed for their totally incoherent performance.
"Each team is evolving an
identity. And the Royal
Challengers are schizophrenic"
The Bangalore Royal Challengers are also suffering from the same schizophrenia. Each team is evolving an identity. The Kings XI have a smashing pace attack, the SuperKings have a lefty-dominated-hard hitting batting line up and the Delhi Daredevils are the well rounded, but silently aggressive side. The Rajasthan Royals are the sum-is-greater-than-the-parts team with a fantastic, cohesive team performances.
The Royal Challengers don’t know who they are. They have no sense of identity. The team is full of confusion. Today’s match against the Kings XI was a testament to that. 2 run-outs where both batsmen were at the same side, 5 - that’s right five - ducks in the batting today. Whew! What are they going to do now?!?
If there is one thing that the intense IPL format has brought forward, it is that team strategy matters. You can have all the heroes in the team, but unless you’re working together as a team, even Lalit Modi won’t be able to help you. The bottom 3 teams are in real trouble. They have to do some soul searching now to find out what’s keeping them apart, and plan to overcome these repulsive forces to perform as a single unit. They’ve got to be quick too, otherwise they’re going to see their hope fading real quickly.
