IPl is not just the mix of cricket and entertainment. It is also about expanding the limits of human capacity
For most of us, cricket is one of the most favoured forms of entertainment. No wonder, we are today gripped with cricket fever, thanks to the Indian Premier league (IPl). Yes, there are cynics who think that there is little Indian about IPl, given the number of foreign players leading the teams. Then there are hard-nosed business-minded people who think IPl is all about money. Yet, there is another side of the story. And this has to be celebrated. No, it is not about sixes and fours. It is also not about the smiles and gyrations of pretty cheerleaders who hold the audience in awe every time something worthwhile happens in the field. And it is much more than the exploits of Chris Gayle. What is IPl all about, thenIJ
It is about human psychology, unfathomed human potential and capacity. To understand this we need to go back in the time machine — to the early 1950s and 1960s, when cricket was a gentleman’s game. It was about elegance, charm, style, substance and, above all, grace — the white dress that cricketers donned symbolised tranquility and calmness of the game. Those were the days when five-day Test matches were the norm. In the 1970s something drastic happened. A person named Kerry Packer sent all cricketing norms packing with limited over matches involving only the Whites. Cricket changed and the man who changed cricket was not a cricketer. He was a marketer. As one-day cricket started catching the imaginations of the non-Whites, the game became more catholic and soon the World Cup started. Even in those days, the batting side scored around 220-odd runs in its stipulated limited overs and anything more than that was considered a high total.
Then entered New Zealand’s Mike Greatbatch who turned the game on its head. Soon, Jayasuriya and Kaluvitharna of Sri lanka joined the rally. And lo and behold, 250 runs for a team became pedestrian, 275 fighting and 300 and above a good total. But the story did not stop there. There was more to come. Subsequently, even the sides scoring 400-plus were on the tenterhooks, actually loosing many a times. Enter T20 and the game has changed completely. Try calculating and you will find that somewhere around 800 runs are being scored in a day. The likes of Chris Gayle have done for cricket what Roger Bannister did for runners by breaking the four-minute mile barrier.
Classical psychologists suggested that human potential was immense and normally human beings used only 10 per cent of that, with 90 per cent lying unutilised. IPl proves that they were right. Yes, realising that calls for efforts and attitude change. When someone asked Sir Edmund Hillary why he wanted to conquer Mount Everest, he said: “Because it is there.” That should be the spirit and yes, sky is the limit.
The writer is professor, Indian School of Mines, Dhanbad (Jharkhand). He can be reached at ppathak.ism@gmail.com