What a game! What a game!!

I think that I have finally acquired a good understanding of the "There is a game on tonight!" mentality here in the United States...courtesy of the Indian Premier League's (IPL) inaugural season which wrapped up today. The last two overs of the second innings of the final match today were simply phenomenal in the kind of in-your-face nerve-racking tension that built up during the course of the match!

Since I moved to Boston back in '94, I have not been following the usual formats of Cricket (that can last several days) as I picked up on other physical activities here in the United States. I have come to embrace this format of Cricket as each match lasts only 3 hours and is played in the evenings (local time). My weekend rock climbing up in NH has been put off because I have been sitting at home watching these IPL matches late weekend mornings (EST) for the past 5 weeks.

Anyway, both the losing team, the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) whom I came to thoroughly support, and the winning team, the Rajasthan Royals (RR), put up a consistently well-played inning each. The win was a very close one for RR. But full credit definitely goes to RR's lower order batsmen, Shane Warne (also the RR skipper) and Sohail Tanveer, for not giving into pressure and wrapping the final over up with dignity. Unlike Soccer or American Football, in Cricket, the coach really has no say once a game begins. The Captain of each team gets to make all tactical decisions. So it has been an absolute pleasure watching Warne (the only non-Indian skipper in the league) guide his team through each match and then eventually take the final! Now I have decided to make an effort to get out there and find some Cricket lovers so I can get to watch the next season of the IPL with some great new friends!