June 1st, a day that will be remembered in cricketing history for sure. If the two semi-finals were not a part of the bang-bang theory, the finals made up for it. With all the right ingredients and the perfect amount of salt in the dish, made the final a perfect desert to supplement the most amazing meal in cricket history. 45 days of 59 action filled matches finally culminated to a perfect finish last night. The team that was written off at the commencement was the team that finally lifted the multi-million dollar gold trophy studded with diamonds, rubies and sapphires. The Rajasthan Royals where the only team with a foreign captain cum coach. The cheapest team with the cheapest franchise finally emerged on top.
Shane Warne won the toss and elected to bowl. The Chennai Superkings were off to a blistering start with Parthiv Patel and Suresh Raina doing all the damage in the beginning. Once Raina was out the scoring rate slowed down and Chennai were a little off their way. Yusuf Pathan proved a point and showed that he is no kid to the game by getting 3 quick wickets. Posting a total of 164, Dhoni’s men had a tough job in hand to defend the total successfully. With Gramme Smith injured the top order of Rajasthan looked a little insecure. But the young Swapnil Asnodkar had other plans in store. His unorthodox cricketing shots made sure that Rajasthan got off to a fine start. But all did not go their way. With Manpreet Goni and the extremely oiled up Makhaya Ntini charging in, the Royals lost two wickets in very quick succession. This brought into the crease Rajasthan’s two thriving batsmen. Shane Watson, Rajasthan’s cheapest buy, looked exceptionally solid and Yusuf Pathan, the man of the match, well no ground in the world is big for him. Its Yusuf’s blistering shots and towering six’s that got Rajasthan close to triumph. There was only one way to get Yusuf out, and Raina quickly held on to the run out opportunity hitting the timber with an exceptional throw. With Yusuf gone, Rajasthan were only 20 short of their goal. With an extremely cool captain and the purple cap holder, Rajasthan went for the kill. With 8 runs needed of the last over, the match was down to the wire. For once I was biting my nails off. Thanks to Balaji’s wide ball and Parthiv’s misfield, the Royals needed only 1 run to win of the last ball. With the score tied, the Royals managed to get home safely avoiding a bowl-out situation. This was one of the few matches in the IPL that went down to the very last ball. The match got even cricketing greats like Sachin Tendulkar to get to the edge of their seats.
A good show by both teams to end the inaugural season. Dhoni’s men put on a valiant fight but ended up loosing. Hats off to Shane Warne for making all the right moves at the right times and training such an inexperienced lot into a match winning squad The saying, ‘Fortune favors the brave’ clearly proved that Shane Warne is indeed one of cricket’s favourite sons. Man of the series, Shane Watson, must be renamed as Shane Hotson. He was as hot as a bloody furnace.
Great show Royals. At the end of the day, I put my money on the deserving team and they totally deserved to win.
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