Hello All,
On successful completion of the IPL second season, Deccan Chargers the team which played charitable cricket by all standards, made a mockery with team compositions in the inaugral season of the IPL emerged as the number one team in the second season. The team on paper was the strongest in the league by far far margins. Players like Gilchrist, Andrew Symonds, Gibbs, Shahid Afridi, Rohit Sharma, R. P. Singh, Chaminda Vaas, ohh… if two of these players click in a match, it’s going to be a nightmare for any opposition. Every single person in this list could be a match winner and take the team home on the winning note. But inspite of all this, something went wrong in the last season. Nothing worked in favor of the Deccan Chargers and as a result, they ended right at the bottom of the table with 2 victories.
Starting this season with 4 wins, the Chargers gave a strong statement to the other teams in the tournament. They had good spirits going right from the beginning of the tournament, and then came a rough patch of 3 consecutive loses. With a see-saw battle finally the team just scraped through to the semi-final depending on the runrate they gained in the initial stages of the tournament. In the semi-final it was the Adam Gilchrist show all the way. The team did a good job in restricting the Delhi Daredevils to a nominal total which is still defendable in a semi-final. But, with a knock like that of Adam Gilchrist all that the opposition could do is enjoy the aura of the shots. The final of the tournament was the best display of team work by the Deccan Chargers, with major contributions from the big guns Gibbs (53*), Symonds (33, 2 or 3 wickets) and invaluable contributions from Pragyan Ohja (3 Wickets) and Harmeet Singh (very economical spell with crucial wickets of Dravid and Boucher).
The point of discussion in this blog is what many people throughout India might be asking (Except in Hyderabad of course). Is this team owned by Deccan Chronical named as Deccan Chargers by mistake? Should it be named International Chargers? I wouldn’t blame anyone who puts up their hand and says, “why is this team winning only when the big guns fire?”. At the beginning of the tournament I was under the same impression. Gilchrist, Gibbs, Symonds, Dwayne Smith, one of them had to fire with the bat for the team to win the match. Infact I would have unquestionably accepted Banglore Royal Challengers as the true champions had they made it to the top spot in the ultimate stage of the tournament. I am not saying this for the sake of saying it, but considering the contributions made by the youngsters in the Banglore team and the way the team has been built as the tournament progressed made me think Banglore is a far more formidable attack than the Deccan Chargers.
Guys, I am from Hyderabad and as every Hyderabadi is supposed to, I have to support the team Deccan Chargers. You might be wondering why I said all this. Well, this has been the discussion between my friends and I for the last couple of weeks and to be frank with you all, everything that I echoed above is what I felt about the team Deccan Chargers. I was looking at the team today and was trying to analyze how the team went through different stages of the tournament. I take back my words about the contributions made by the youngsters in the Hyderabad team. They have done a phenomenal job throughout the tournament. None them might have demonstrated the caliber to power play like what Manish Pandey, Vinay Kumar or Virat Kohli did for Banglore but everyone of them contributed to the success of the team.
The contributions made by Ohja in crucial situations of the match, Rohit Sharma’s display of the extra cool attitude both with ball and bat in tense situations and the knocks by TS Suman all contributed to the team’s success. There are still gaps in the team that can be filled in by more promising players in the future seasons of the tournament. The place which has been swaped between Ravi Teja and Azhar Bilakhia is still a question mark as both of them failed to impress and prove a point about their inclusion. Venugopal Rao has been a disappointment with the bat too in this season but his contributions with the ball justified his inclusion in the team. Probably these two slots in the batting order made me feel that the Deccan Chargers were less composed outfit than the Royal Challengers Banglore. May be there is a vacuum for a good medium pace alrounder in one of those slots from the City of Pearls.
But all said and done, three players from the Deccan Chargers team made it into the Indian Squad for the T20 World Cup to be conducted next month. This is not a minor achievement. This is a phenomenal achievement which no other team was able to achieve. The Citi Under 23 Success of the Tournament was won by Rohit Sharma, The Purple Cap (bowler of the tournament) was collected by R. P. Singh. And The Golden Player of the Tournament award was collected by Adam Gilchrist, who led this young team to the top spot in this tournament. All this proves that the team has been a revelation this season with exceptional conglomeration of experienced international players and youthful exuberance of future India. There is definite scope for improvement as I mentioned earlier in the post, but lets not take the credit away from these boys and for the moment let us cherish the victory which none of these guys will ever forget in their lives.
Go Deccan Chargers!!! Hip Hip Hurray!!! Hip Hip Hurray!!! Hip Hip Hurray!!!
Deccan Chargers IPL 2009 Winning Moments
Victorious Deccan Chargers IPL 2009
Photographs taken from ibnlive.com.
Thanks,
Krishna Chaitanya Emani
This is Chaitanya CRUISING your way. 