This has been a strange year. In March, when the IPL was postponed indefinitely, little did we think that Indian cricket would be able to successfully host a tournament of this magnitude, given the new circumstances.
The BCCI decided to take the entire IPL season out of the country for the second time. The United Arab Emirates was the destination of choice for a variety of reasons, but there were questions about whether the tournament could go off without a hitch, let alone how successful it has been.
A few days before flying to the UAE to comment, I spoke to a doctor and the conversation made me think twice. I bought a respirator, a piece of equipment surgeons use in operating rooms, before deciding to take the plunge. Now I’m glad I went. This success of a world-class sports event away from home during a raging pandemic has been one of the greatest logistical achievements of Indian cricket.
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As for cricket itself, there were also some surprises. Let’s start with the launches. We were all a bit skeptical when we heard that all the games would be played in just three locations, with Dubai and Abi Dhabi hosting most of them. But how good it turned out to be. Both venues produced pitches that were nearly perfect for T20 cricket.
Both fields have a large square and a very hard base, and that ensured that the fields did not deteriorate as much as we all thought. After all, in India, each venue hosts only eight games over the course of 60 days and that’s enough for the fields to show signs of fatigue towards the end of the tournament. It should also be noted that the IPL takes place after a long cricket season in India and that exacerbates the problem of pitch fatigue. There was no such problem with the UAE, because there had been no cricket in either venue for a long time before the IPL. The fact that the pitches offered a consistent bounce without alarming wear and tear can be seen as a good sign for the future. We could well need all three venues for the next IPL or the T20 World Cup.
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Aakash Chopra chooses his team of the tournament
Sharjah, of course, had two different appearances during the course of the tournament. A venue that started out as the one with the flattest pitches and shortest limits, churning out racing festivals, became a field of change that posted some of the lowest scores of the season. What faced Sharjah was the square, which is not as tough as the other two venues, and the track didn’t have the same amount of grass to begin with either. A point to remember for future planning.
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The other thing that surprised everyone was the mastery of rhythm and the return of conventional fast bowling. Of course, the fields had a role to play in this revival, but it was a treat to see some old-school fast bowling.
The first over of a T20 game is often treated as an opportunity to launch an over from the weakest link, but that was not the case in this edition of the IPL. Rather, it was seen as an opportunity to seize a wicket or two by pitching the fuller ball, making it move off the surface, or shortly digging to surprise the batter. We saw a lot of wickets falling in the first over of the innings in this IPL: 2020 ranked fifth among all IPL seasons in that tally, third if you discount the two seasons in the top four in which there were around 30 first overs more (because there were more games those seasons). And most of these wickets were taken by the faster bowlers. Barring Sharjah, the big grounds also encouraged fast bowlers to be a bit more liberal with gorillas.
Another surprising element of this season, not so positive the weather, was the quality of fielding and catching. While we saw some stellar efforts throughout the season, we also saw a lot of sloppy stuff. The larger outfields not only exposed the slow movements, but also tested the quality of the pitches. And it should be noted that a few players came to this tournament with extra pounds on their waists. On smaller Indian lots, like Sharjah, you can hide excess baggage, but on larger lots, every gram mattered.
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