Dhoni and Raina steal Sachin’s moment

Lalit Modi now has one more reason to forget this year’s IPL. The Chennai Super Kings defeated the Mumbai Indians in the final. Chennai is N Srinivasan’s team.

Modi and Srinivasan dislike each other. Last night, in his bed at the Four Seasons hotel, or wherever he set his head on a pillow, Modi must have been traumatized by images of a cackling, taunting Srinivasan. Modi seems god-fearing. He wears beads on his wrist and sometimes wears a ‘tika’ on his forehead. For a peaceful sleep he would have needed the security of all his religious accessories.

The Chennai Super Kings deserve our praise, nonetheless. It is beyond doubt that Mahendra Singh Dhoni has both class and cojones. He started Chennai’s acceleration with a characteristic mix of muscle and irreverence. Player of the match Suresh Raina at last has a big title to show for his ample talent. Dropped twice by Mumbai, Raina scored a fifty, took a wicket and an impossible running catch of JP Duminy.

Now that congratulations are out of the way, the question must be asked: was Mumbai’s Abhishek Nayar thinking he was playing single-wicket cricket? He and Sachin Tendulkar, who against all expectations played the final, had added 66 for the second wicket. True, they had consumed eleven overs. But they were in the process of taking it up a notch. In the tenth over, Nayar had struck two consecutive sixes off left-arm spinner Shadab Jakati. But throughout his innings, he had been taking off for singles without looking at the non-striker. He looked like a novice and had escaped being run out a few times. Just as he seemed to have found his confidence with the two sixes, he perished. He was run out by a Dhoni throw from up close. Tendulkar, at the non-striker’s end, banged his bat into the turf. Tendulkar does not usually show his temper but in this tournament, he vented his feelings a few times. Sunday’s outburst was understandable. He had played the final despite tearing the webbing of his right hand three days ago. He and Nayar were going along alright. Then the stand ended due to a rudimentary mistake by his partner.

The other mystifying aspect of Mumbai’s defeat was the batting order. Nayar and Harbhajan Singh were promoted while the potentially match-winning Kieron Pollard was almost an afterthought at No. 8.

Chennai made a steady start after winning the toss. Saving wickets seemed their intention, not batting acrobatics. Matthew Hayden found a few runs at least, even though Harbhajan had him in a tangle at the start. Murali Vijay returned to the form he showed earlier in the tournament but which deserted him in the semifinals. His cover drive off Lasith Malinga in the fifth over was a sublime note. The stroke was so well-timed that just a punch of the bat was needed to send the ball surging to the fence.

Both, however, lost their wickets to poorly executed shots. The run rate fell. Raina and Dhoni raised the tempo, putting on 72 in just 35 deliveries. This is where the momentum shifted Chennai’s way. If Vijay’s cover drive was classical, Dhoni’s six off Kieron Pollard in the 13th over was outrageous. Dhoni stepped out, Pollard pitched wide. Dhoni swatted it over mid-wicket. With one hand.

The advantage shifted back to Mumbai, however, after Dhoni’s dismissal. Raina was still around but the rate lowered. Malinga was heading towards a dream final over till he conceded five wides and a boundary to S Anirudha. (To think Sachin’s first India captain was Anirudha’s father, K Srikkanth).

As the top-scorer of the tournament, Sachin wore an orange cap over his blue uniform while fielding. He looked like a bottle of Gatorade (Blue Bolt flavour). Unfortunately for Mumbai Indians supporters, he did not have the same energizing effect on his colleagues.

The final night of IPL 2010 began with an extravagant but random closing ceremony. AR Rahman, Bipasha Basu and Shahid Kapoor were among the performers. There was a Rio carnival like procession. For no apparent reason, there was also a huge statue of a batsman, that too dressed in white. White is not allowed in cricket’s version of Studio 54. But you took a lenient view of things because this evening was Lalit Modi’s final binge before vacating his throne. Modi even spun the coin for the final’s toss (the coin was probably Mauritius or Cayman Islands currency).

IPL3Lalit ModiMS DhoniSachin TendulkarSuresh Raina