Moving season for the IPL

This year's event has highlighted flaws in the system, and raises the question: has a tipping point been reached?

Since its inception, the IPL has never been sold or bought in half-measures. Its approach has always been full-throttle, top-volume. Appropriately, then, an assessment of season four must avoid waffling around the half-empty or half-full. Is 2011 to be remembered for the fireworks on the final night at the Yellow Sea of Chepauk? Or the acreage of empty stands at the Wankhede three nights in a row, representative of the general spectator turnout of six weeks? The dazzle of Chris Gayle? Or the Shane Warne-Sanjay Dixit skirmish? Or even more, the dramatic drop in TV ratings from last season? Or should it be the clues sent out to the world by the BCCI and Indian players over next month's tour of the West Indies?

Regardless of what its own "stakeholders" choose as the flavour of their season - sagacity or smugness - 2011 will be regarded as the IPL's "Moving Season". If "moving day" in cricket and golf are about momentum swings and the emergence of contenders, IPL's Moving Season will dictate the future course of the event.

Chennai v Bangalore, IPL 2011, Final, Chennai

A match-up that's worth the wait?

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It's taken 73 games, but we're finally here. Seventy-three. Chew on that number for a moment. The IPL has had 50% more games than World Cup 2011, which was faulted for being too long. It's had 16 games more than the first three World Cups combined. The IPL has tested viewer appetite and player endurance to the limit, in the process turning the less-is-more norm on its head. The audience has spoken: there is only so much cricket India can take. The players have started breaking under the strain: several overseas signings flew home early, the India squad going to West Indies is severely depleted. Seventy-three is a big number.

The verdict, though, can wait until No. 74 is out of the way. An exciting knockout phase is capable of glossing over all the faults of a bloated tournament, and IPL 2011 has been fortunate on that front - Bangalore's hammering of Mumbai in the virtual semi-final notwithstanding. The impact of a good, well-contested final can be even more far-reaching. The success of the most recent World Cup, and the equally resounding failure of the one that preceded it, are quite closely linked to the manner in which the final moments of the respective events panned out. For three years running, the IPL final has been a closely fought game. Can 2011 continue the trend?