Team India coach Gary Kirsten is barking up the wrong tree when he blames the Indian Premier League for India’s unceremonious exit from the World T20 championship. His logic flies in the face of comments from Ricky Ponting and other Australians that their early exit may have been caused because they did not participate in the IPL this season. In blaming the fatigue factors in Indians on the IPL schedule, Kirsten may not have considered the fact that top players from two of the four teams, plus a couple of prominent West Indians, who are in the T-20 World Cup semi-finals, were active participants in the IPL.
Experts who analysed India’s poor show have already shed light on the tactical weaknesses of the team for which Kirsten has to share the blame with his skipper, M.S Dhoni. Strangely, there is a difference of opinion between the coach and the captain with regard to the IPL with Dhoni categorically saying the IPL was not the cause of the debacle. Analysts have agreed that IPL has enabled players and teams to master the art of Twenty20 cricket. Also, it is readily accepted that IPL has taken away financial insecurities and fear of selection inconsistencies from the minds of players, many of them Indian, and allowed them to focus only on their cricket. The IPL is regarded as a sporting revolution that has transformed cricket.