The Surfer

And then it happened. Just as patrons rose to acclaim Sutcliffe, a figure appeared from the tunnel and started walking towards the middle. The crowd, about to cheer and applaud, was suddenly rendered silent. Sutcliffe went to his stricken team-mate and put an arm around his shoulders.

"We've got 10 times last year's audience in the UK," Ravi Shastri purred on commentary, and a high-water mark of 400,000 viewers does sound impressive. This must be put into perspective. In the same time-slot Grandpa In My Pocket (target age: 4-6 years) is pulling in 518,000 viewers on CBeebies, a margin of victory that makes you wonder if Grandpa In My Pocket should think about getting in a DJ, fringing itself with podium dancers and going out to "crack" America

“Surprise him, Navjot,” an inner voice told me, “surprise him like Murali foxes batsmen with his doosra.” I pondered for a while and then saw the (100 watt) light. “Learn some Marathi, good fella, that will astonish him,” I told myself. So, pronto I rung up Raj Thackeray. “Maharaj, you have to help me with this one. If not, I will be like a drowning man who left his straw behind in the dressing room,” I pleaded.

The IPL reminds me of Hans Christian Andersen's tale 'The Emperor's New Clothes' where two conmen trick the emperor and his subjects into believing that the dress which they have made for him will not be visible to those who are either not fit for their jobs or are fools...In the story it is a child who speaks the truth. Here, at the risk of being called a dunce, I echo what the child said: “The emperor is not wearing anything at all.“

Could the IPL's slow-over rate actually just be a Prada bag in disguise? To be given to some really lucky woman (or rather the woman who thinks she is lucky to get one)?

Developing that bowling talent is a tough task. Even India have faltered because they do not have a consistent squad of pace bowlers who can really intimidate the opposition. Bangladesh face similar difficulties. Between the flat wickets and the heat and humidity of the conditions, not many young players are going to want to run up and bowl at 140kph for any period of time. One way forward would be to develop wickets that offer more encouragement for seam bowlers.

There's been some fine cricket, too. Sure, Shane Warne was guilty of hyperbole and revisionism when he called Pathan's 37-ball century the best he'd ever seen, but it was still a thrilling display of power and timing. In the same match, Ambati Rayudu, once touted as India's next big thing, and Sourabh Tiwary took on Warne with the fearlessness that comes easily to the young. A day later, Manoj Tiwary, the wasted years in Delhi behind him, delighted his home crowd in Kolkata with a superb innings against Dale Steyn and Anil Kumble.

While I do appreciate the dilemma consistently faced because Albie Morkel’s bowling has become something not far off a liability in run-concession terms, I might personally not have been so swift to remove the Titans player entirely from the plans, given his proven ability to give the ball an old-fashioned “bliksem”, if you like, at the end of an innings.

Only recently Shane Warne described Yusuf Pathan’s scorching IPL hundred as the best innings he had ever seen. Now, either the megabucks the Rajasthan Royals are paying the great leggie are getting to his head or he has completely erased two decades of international cricket from his memory.