It is fair to say that match fixing cloud that was looming large over this IPL is truly over for now. IPL has found its flow now.First leg in UAE was just something that this years ipl needed.
KKR have won two of last three IPLs
Long term credibility is not for now. The match fixing allegations and the poisonous vein that clearly runs from the top of the Indian game to the bottom, is something that needs removing very quickly. The unfortunate ascension of N Srinivasan, recently suspended chief of the BCCI, to the power seat at the ICC, suggests that cricket may well have to get worse before it gets better in this regard.Appointment of Sunil Gavaskar was great move from BCCi.
The zest with which the IPL was embraced throughout, however, is clear indicator that this tournament is going nowhere. There is too much commercial interest and enthusiasm from genuine cricket fans for it to just disappear.
IPL 2014 in numbers
- Robin Uthappa scored 660 runs to take the orange cap by 94 runs from CSK’s Dwayne Smith. This was the first time that the winner of the orange cap, representative of the tournament’s top run scorer, has been on the side that has won the trophy.
- Glenn Maxwell hit 36 sixes in 2014, the most at the tournament. This is a record amongst mere mortals. Chris Gayle is not a mere mortal and hit 59 maximums in 2012. Then 51 in 2013 having hit 44 in 2011.
- Gayle added 12 sixes to his tally in 2014 taking him to 192 from 68 games. That’s 2.8 sixes per game on average. Maxwell has 40 from 21, or 1.9 per game.
- Maxwell does, however, now have the best strike rate in IPL history, 178.91, ahead of Virender Sehwag, 157.33 and Gayle, 154.56.
- Mohit Sharma claimed the purple cap, representative of the tournament’s top wicket taker, with 23 scalps. Dwayne Bravo still holds the record for most wickets in a season with 32, in 2013.
- Despite the influence of spin, as highlighted again by Narine, only one spinner has ever won the purple cap, Pragyan Ojha in 2010.
- To further highlight the influence of a good spinner, of bowlers with over 30 IPL wickets to their name, Narine has comfortably the best economy rate at 5.77. In fact, he’s the only bowler with an economy rate below 6.53.