IPL and controversies
have gone hand in hand from its inception
IPL controversy 1
Starting with the media rights on the coverage of the IPL. All the TV channels threatened to boycott the coverage of the IPL protesting against exclusive use rights given to Sony Network. Moreover Lalti Modi initially refused to discuss the issue with them. There were some other contentious conditions life newspapers covering the IPL were supposed to upload all the photographs taken by them on the IPL website within 24 Hours failing which they will not be allowed to cover next matches. Also there was a cap on the number of photos that can be used by the newspapers and news agencies on their website.
IPL controversy 2
After all these issues were sorted out came the issue of the eligibility of Shoiab Akhtar for IPL. PCB has banned Shoiab Akhtar for 5 years to represent Pakistan but as a professional player he was elligible to play for Kolkata Knight Riders. BCCI didn't want to create any problem so asked him to get a permission from PCB failing which he was not allowed to play for KolKata Knight Riders. Only a week back PCB has stayed the order by a month and new enquiry will take place after that. Due to this he is now available to Knight Riders for selection but totally match unfit. Looks like Shah Rukh Khan must have put his weight to get this done.
IPL controversy 3
The biggest contravarsey of the IPL so far has been Harbhajan-Sreeshanth slap-gate issue.
After slapping Harbhajan Singh with a ban of 11 IPL matches, there is every chance that he might get a severe ban from BCCI. It has been difficult for BCCI to handle Harbhajan Singh from the beginning of his international career as there have been numerous complaints against him from all quarters. Recently he was involved in a Monkey-gate scam where he got timely support from his team members especially Sachin Tendulkar. People wonder why Sachin supports Harbhajan so much. He even preferred Harbhajan Singh over seasoned campaigner like Pollock for captaincy of Mumbai Indians. The irony is that under the captaincy of Pollock only Mumbai Indians have shown some resilience and spirit to win matches. Coming back to the behavior of Harbhajan Singh on-field and outside the field has been nothing but shocking and embarrassing for the home board and the national team that has always supported him in all the situations. I feel the recent slap-gate case against Harbhajan Singh should be handled very carefully as this incident has made a mockery of BCCI in Australia with Australian media bringing to frontline the incidents that happened in the recent Indian tour of Australia and the way they were dictated by the cricket-power house, BCCI. It is high time that BCCI takes a tough stand and sends out a strong statement that this kind of behavior will not be tolerated any more. A ban for a year will be more than welcomed by all quarters of cricket loving people.
IPL controversy 4
There have been couple of instances of light towers malfunctioning. The first one at Eden Gardens helped the home team to re-group and win the thriller against the unlucky Deccan Chargers. Second time also it involved Deccan Chargers but it didn't have any impact on the result of the match.
IPL controversy 5
Even after the Kingfisher fair play award that has been clubbed with the tournament that rewards the team for playing cricket according the rules of the game, Yes rules of the game that are violated a lot these days like arguing with the umpires, sledging the opposition, the players continue to sledge opposition with Umar Gul and Sree Shanth leading the way. In the last match between Deccan Chargers and Kolkata Knight Riders, Umar Gul had a lot to say to Rohit Sharma. Sreeshanth also crossed the limit against Kaif. Adding to it there have been couple of instances of players arguing with Umpires over their decision and forcing them to refer it to third umpire. Ganguly, the captain of Kolkata Knight Riders and Shewag, captain of Delhi Daredevils have been culprit of doing it.
IPL controversy 6
In the match between Delhi Daredevils and Deccan Chargers, the match was stopped at a very crucial point in the 19th Over when Shewag complained to the umpires that the crowd is throwing stones at him. In the press conference instead of looking happy over the victory, he looked very upset because of this incident. The reason may be that for the second time in a row Shewag failed to fire. He made a golden duck last night and at that point in the 19th over of the second innings it looked like Deccan Chargers might pull off a victory.
IPL controversy 7
In the press conference, Deccan Chargers captain Adam Gilchrist questioned the tactics of V Shewag of substituting Mohammad Asif immediately after he had bowled 2 overs and replacing him with one of the best fielders in the team, Shoaib Malik. He came onto bowl his last 2 overs and umpires didn't stop Shewag from using him. There was already another substitute on the field for Delhi. AB de Villiers for their opener Gautam Gambhir who had injured his knee while batting. De Villers is also among the best fielders in the cricket today. What could have irked Adam Gilchrist was that as many as 4 catches were taken by these subs and all of them of set batsmen.
IPL controversy 8
Now there are rumours going around that Shah Rukh Khan wants to sell off his Kolkata Knight Riders. He is irked with the kind of ego that Ganguly is showing. Ganguly wants to be the king of Knight Riders while Shah Rukh Khan feels that he along with the coach should be making most of the decisions like what happens in Football.
IPL controversy 9
Home crowd is definitely supposed to support the home team and in doing that the crowd at most of the places has forgotten that most of the players playing against their home team belong to India as well. This has happened mostly in Kolkota and Mumbai. They have been abusing the opposition a lot and that should not be accepted at any cost. Organizers should come forward and take responsibility to address this issue. In the post match ceremony Yuvraj did a very good job of telling the people to respect the players from the opposition team. The Punjab Kings XI skipper sent a strong message to the Mumbai crowd which had been abusive to his players throughout the match.
IPL controversy 10
Last but not the least, there has been a controversy surrounding the presence of cheer-leaders on the ground. The owner of the Bangalore Royal Challengers, Vijay Mallya, started the trend of keeping the cheer-leaders with the team and others followed. While Vijay Mallya hired the services of the popular cheer leader group from Washington, RedSkin, Deccan Chargers hired cheer leaders from Australia. Some outsourced it to Indian Cheer leader and others to UK. There was a lot of hue and cry about the dressing of these cheer leaders. They were finally made to wear so called decent looking clothes by the moral brigade of Mumbai.
After all this was done came another news of racial abuse directed towards the dark skinned cheer leaders. Two London-based dark-skinned cheer girls, who were hired by the Kings XI Punjab team, through event management company Wizcraft International Entertainment, have alleged that they were asked to sit out just before the April 19 match of the IPL played in Mohali because they were not white.
