New Delhi: The ninth edition of the Indian Premier League has finally reached its summit – the final will be played between Royal Challengers Bangalore and Sunrisers Hyderabad at M. Chinnaswamy Stadium tomorrow.
Unlike any other season, the cricketing extravaganza will be remembered for two things.
First, it began with one of the year’s biggest controversies. The dire situation of water crisis in Maharashtra sparked a raging debate over the suitability of playing IPL games in the state.
After a PIL was filed in the Bombay High Court challenging the use of large volume of water for maintaining pitches despite the grave water crisis, twelve matches were moved out of the drought-hit state.
BCCI secretary Anurag Thakur even hinted that IPL's Governing Council may deliberate moving the 2017 edition abroad.
IPL was twice played outside India, both in assembly election years. In 2009, it was moved for the entire duration to South Africa and in 2014 was shifted to the United Arab Emirates for the first 15 days.
Second will be the dominance of Virat Kohli throughout the tournament. His swashbuckling performances with bat left people run out of adjectives.
With four centuries in a single season, including one in a 15-over game, Kohli not only guided Royal Challengers Bangalore to the final but also ensured that there is no one who can overshadow him.
Virat, who is enjoying one of the best times of his cricketing career, has been one of the most talked about players in the world because of his extravagant batting form. The RCB run-machine has already smashed 919 runs in 15 matches, including four tons and six half-centuries.
It will be appropriate to say that Royal Challengers Bangalore, who started with a below-average performance in the league, managed to survive in the championship and enter the finals only because of Virat Kohli.
The season witnessed a number of surprising performances, both at the team and individual levels.
While defending champions Mumbai Indians and Mahendra Singh Dhoni-led Rising Pune Supergiants failed to enter the play-offs, debutants Gujarat Lions came as a surprise package and entered the play-offs as table-toppers.
Despite brilliant start in the league, Gautam Gambhir-led Kolkata Knight Riders (8 wins in 14 matches) failed to enter the eliminators.
On the other hand, Sunrisers Hyderabad, led by Australian T20 specialist David Warner, defeated table-toppers Gujarat Lions in the qualifier match to enter the final of the tournament. Warner played a captain’s inning and smashed 93 runs off just 58 balls, thereby, singlehandedly guiding the team to victory.
Kings XI Punjab again failed to perform and suffered ten losses in fourteen matches. Despite replacing David Miller with Murali Vijay as the captain, the team stood at the last spot on the points table.
Talking about bowling performances, young bowlers like Bhuvneshwar Kumar (23 wickets in 16 matches), Yuzvendra Chahal (20 wickets in 12 matches) and Dhawal Kulkarni (18 wickets in 14 matches) shined with the ball and performed better than regular bowlers like Zaheer Khan and Ashish Nehra.
It will now be interesting to see who among Bangalore and Hyderabad claims the title, as both the teams are eyeing their maiden IPL crown.
