Look beyond the stars

Expensive investments don't always turn out right in cricket, as the IPL has demonstrated. Two of the biggest buys - Flintoff and Pietersen - did little to justify their heavy price tags and there are lessons to be learnt for all franchises to invest in lesser-known names like Sudeep Tyagi and Shadab Jakati, writes Dileep Premachandran in the Guardian.

All of this merely reinforces the lessons learnt from last season, when the best batsman (Shaun Marsh), best bowler (Pakistan's Sohail Tanvir) and best allrounder (Shane Watson) were all bargain-basement buys. At the auction in Goa, Lalit Modi had boasted that his brainchild was recession-proof. It could well be, but in hard times, you don't throw the banknotes around. Just ask Shah Rukh Khan, who skulked off back to India after his Knight Riders sank quicker than a crap movie in opening week.