Did IPL revived Indian Cricket?

IPL was the big hyped T20 club cricket tournament that recently concluded in India. Beyond the entertainment it provided, did it do any good for Indian cricket?

Though at first sight it looked like an entertainment show only (involving big movie stars), and it hardly benifited Indian cricket. But to be honest, I have seen improved form of lot of our cricketers after playing in IPL which makes me happpy. The beauty of IPL was that lot's of young Indian players got a chance to play with international star's. The pressure level that comes with International cricket was also missing from IPL, and cricketers got a chance to take more risks and succeed. The Indian team selectors also identified a big pool of talented bench strength, who looked ready to perform in international level. Well time will tell how these guy's go ahead and perform in future.

Most of the Indian current players regained their form in a big way which they are continuing in the Bangladesh tour and current Asia Cup in Pakistan. Gambhir, Sehwag looks like they are in best of their form. Dhoni, Yuvraj, Suresh Raina and Rohit Sharma also looks good. So though many may not like the glitters and "Masala" of the IPL, they should be happy to see the revival of form of the players.

It also impacted career of many International players. Shane Watson and Shaun Marsh, two of the starts of the IPL was called to join the Australian national team, and they are doing wonders.
Same applies to Brendon McCullum of New Zealand.

IPL is here to stay for a longer term, and hopefully it will keep benefiting our cricket; in addition to providing entertainment to the nation and money to our cricketers.

Power of Media and Indian Premier League:

Indian Premier League (IPL), the greatest T20 cricket extravaganza recently started in India. It has created a hype never seen before, with the two biggest fantasies of Indian population coming together, Cricket and Bollywood.

But sometimes I wonder, the Indian media had a very big role to play for the kind of hype that has been created. There is a parallel league that runs (which started before IPL) called the Indian Cricket League (ICL). There are equally good players, both domestic and foreign, playing in that league. But there is hardly any media attention to it, and most common Indians do not know about it. Its not being recognized by BCCI (the body governing Indian cricket), and this might be a reason for this step-motherly treatment. But not even the winner of the ICL finals getting published in the premier Indian newspapers was a disappointment.

But the IPL created hype even before it got started, with the newspapers and the television news channels flooding their space with IPL news.

The media power also came into light when they made BCCI kneel down and take back the restrictive clauses put down for the media. Indian media has become quite powerful recently with news reaching peoples within seconds and people responding emotionally to what is been published or shown in TV.

Though this media uprising is a good sign, the power has to be used responsibly. May be I can quote the Spider-Man dialogue “with power comes responsibility”. They should be neutral in performing their responsibility.

I am not sure why ICL news was not seen anywhere, not even on a small newspaper column, and IPL is driving full-page reports (and in some case 2 pages). ICL has the equal right for the news space as do IPL.