The circus is winding its way through S.Africa playing at different venues, to different audiences; by and large, version 2.0 can be called a success.

As we reach the final league stages and as teams, (all except one) try frantically, to get a SF berth, lo and behold! it is not the matches and the players who are creating all the excitement, but AJ, fakeipl player and match fixing allegations. The gyrations of the cheer leaders is passe; Ms Bedi's plunging neckline is of no interest; dug out interviews, expert analyses, highlights - all very ordinary, boring.

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Thankfully,the matches, unlike IPL 01 are all not bang, bang, wham wham. Bowlers, whose influence was negligible, last year, are more influential and bowlers are winning many matches for their sides.

Matches are more meaningful and less predictable.    

Coming back to all the excitement off the field, the fakeipl player's blog takes the cake for total entertainment - true/untrue - it is blogging or gossip at its best (or worst - depending on how you look at it).

It reveals (or claims to) a lot of inside info, the blogger has come up with some great nick names, good easy flow, a lot of 'news' - quite a lot of it we always suspected was probably happening - and the digs at celebrities, a good time pass. 

There is bound to be some politics in every team, pecking orders are a reality in any set up, no player wants to warm the benches always and in this new scenario where the interaction, forced or otherwise, between phoren and desi cannot be avoided, culture clashes are inevitable, given the fact that even today there are men foolish enough to believe that the color of skin bestows superior status. The clashes - ego or whatever, get exacerbated when any team has as its owner who not only does not know abc of cricket, but seems to get swayed by phoren. SRK is not cut out for this - he cannot play this part.  

What is really baffling though is why Ajay jadeja said what he said - that there is a class conflict, clash in KKR; is he after (bad) publicity? What is his agenda? To me it sounds silly; of course unnecessary, too. 

While one was wondering how KKR was in the news all the time for all the wrong reasons, comes the match fixing allegation against them. May be true, may not be true, but let's hope the truth comes out. 

  Coming back to 'action on the field', Daredevils and CSK appear to be certain of their SF berths, it is going to be a tight race among the remaining five (KKR not in the race), but one would think Mumbai and Deccan to make up the last four, with Bangalore having an outside chance. If the Semifinalists are CSK,Delhi, Mumbai and Deccan, remember you read it here first!

 Let’s look forward to more action on the field!

L.Ravichandran
ravi@chennaionline.com