5th week of IPL, this week Punjab became second team to quality for the semi-final along with Rajasthan Royals, who had qualified previous week itself. One of the favorite to win the league, Chennai Superkings struggled throughout the week. First they were humbled by Bangalore in a low scoring game and lost a close match to Rajasthan.
Player of the week:
The major influencer of the week was not a cricketer, but in fact it was rain-god. Knight Riders were the most affected by the same. Their do-or-die encounter against Delhi was washed out and their previous game against Chennai was decided by D/L method. Coming to cummulative performance the orange stayed with Gautam Gambhir throughout the week, but the purple cap moved from RP Singh to Sreesanth and came to Sohail Tanveer yesterday.
Match of the week:
It is definitely has to be nail biting encounter bewteen Mumbai Indians and King XI Punjab. Chasing 190 to win, Mumbai Indians very cruising one stage. But they lost 3 quick wickets in a span 6 balls and match went down to the wire and came down to 2 runs to score in last ball. The Jonty Rhodes style run out by Yuvraj sealed 1-run win for Punjab ending six consecutive matches winning streak of Mumbai Indians.
Rajasthan continued to lead:
Like previous weeks Rajasthan maintained their lead in the points table. They don’t seem to have any mercy for the opposition. Whenever the opposition has a sniff of victory, anyone of the Royals players ‘pulls rabbit out of the hat’ taking game away from the opposition. In the match against Kolkata, in between brilliant spell of Ganguly, Yusuf Pathan of Rajasthan struck two consequetive sixes to change whole equation. Similarly, in yesterday’s match Chennai were fancying themselves to win. But Sohail Tanveer with creative field placing made captain Dhoni try a risky shot in turn taking his wicket at a crucial juncture.
Rahul Dravid responds to his critics:
Royal Challengers stunned Chennai Superkings in a low scoring encounter. The match was wake-up call for Chennai and opened up the points table. After the win Ramiz Raja complimented Rahul Dravid for his excellent captaincy. To which Dravid replied “well, I’ve done the same thing that I did in the previous games. Nothing special. You are complimenting me only because we won”. He went on to say, “I think luck plays a big part in these games. In every game, you do the same things. Sometimes you win and sometimes you don’t. Today luck was with us so we won”. Also in the post match press conference Dravid accepted frankly that he is already 35 and not young enough to adapt to the format unlike Sehwags and Gambhirs.
Controversies:
The major controversaries surronded Shah Rukh Khan this week. First there were speculation in the media about a rift with team captain Ganguly. SRK seem to have requested Ganguly to get entertainment tax waiver from West-Bengal CM, on account of him close to the CM. In addition to this Anti Corruption And Security Unit of the ICC told SRK to stay away from the team and its players during the match. To this SRK responded
“I have paid my players to win. Will I pay them now to lose? This is illogical”.
The actor decided to keep himself away from the team in a crucial match and instead decided to send a motivational SMS to all his team members. Unfortunately, the SMS didn’t had any effect as the match was abandoned due to rain.
The captain of Rajasthan Royal - Shane Warne was issued a warning by a NGO for allegedly smoking in a IPL match.
The two British(Afro) cheergirls of Kings XI Punjab team were asked by their management to leave. The victims charged the management for racial abuse as they may have thrown out because of their skin colour.
What’s on card for next week:
The last two semi-final spots have to be decided between Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai. Delhi kept their hopes alive after beating Mumbai yesterday on account of matching winning knock by Dinesh Karthik. After this result, Mumbai and Chennai have to win their remaining in order to qualify for semis. So, the matches Mumbai v/s Bangalore and Chennai v/s Deccan which were initially speculated to be dead-rubber a few days back have become important because of must win situation.
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