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A match I looked forward to, for some reasons (at this stage I have not decided how many points I am going to list):

1. To see if Lakshmi Rai was in the crowd (don’t know if she got a complimentary pass from Dhoni or Dhoni stumped her out and brought in Sivamani to beat around the bush)

2. To see if the Cauvery Water dispute between Tamil Nadu and Karnataka could be settled with this IPL match played on neutral ground between the two “South Indian Ashes” rivals – (Cricinfo analogy).

3. To see if Bangalore Royal Challengers continue their new “high”

4. To see if the Chennai team had more Chennaites than the first match

5. To see if Dhoni once again did the foolish act of leaving out Albie Morkel and Muthaiah Muralidharan

I found out:

1. Lakshmi Rai was not found in the crowd probably is “out” of Dhoni’s life at present. Sivamani did beat the drums but there was no Bush or bush around.

2. I found a solution which may lead to Cauvery dispute resolutions. Here it is. Lalit Modi, with his tremendous organization skills – on which he is all set to start a lecture series to FIFA organizers – can send out agreements to TN and Karnataka Governments to agree to settle the dispute through IPL matches. The water dispute can be settled by splitting the water on twenty-twenty basis – each Government using twenty tmc of water alternatively till the last drop is sucked. Whoever wins a real IPL game shall have the first twenty tmc of water. Modi can charge a good fee for BCCI for these special matches and sell advertisement spots along the path of the river and donate some portion of the money collected to the Universities in Somalia providing graduation degree in Piratechnics.

3. Royal Challengers came off their high (after all they tasted the winning spirit two days back, you can expect the high to remain for two days, even if it is RC)

4. Chennai Super Kings had two Chennai members in the team (Balaji came into the team in addition to Badrinath)

5. Dhoni announced he belongs to “once beaten always shy” group and promptly included Albie Morkel and Muralidharan into the the team

Coming to the match itself, Mathew Hayden, who is fondly referred as “Namakkal Anjaneyar” due to his hefty physique by the real Chennai team members of CSK (hope Symonds doesn’t notice this), tore apart the bowling of Praveen Kumar, Dale Steyn and Kallis to score a blistering 65 off just 35 balls. He would have reached his hundred but for the strategical advertisement break innovated by “I will teach FIFA” Lalit Modi.

Hayden scored his runs so fast and demoralized the RC bowlers that it really didn’t matter who else scored how much in the CSK team. However, for the record, Dhoni and Flintoff came in to rub salt on RC’s spirits hitting two more sixes and fours between them.

Batting second and staring at a big score to chase at a run rate of nearly nine runs per over, RC panicked from the word go.   They sent in Praveen Kumar as the pinch hitter who was already very tired after bowling four expensive overs when CSK batted.

He must have decided that he will not touch the ball again with a barge pole, leave alone the bat; nothing else explains he getting out bowled in the very over of the RC innings.

It is puzzling how Kevin Pietersen thought Praveen Kumar will be a good pinch hitter. In 23 ODIs played so far, Praveen’s highest score is 15 off 21 balls scored with 1 four. Hardly anything to be considered a pinch hitter. According to me he is not even a small pinch of a hitter.

Of the rest of RC batsmen, including the Rs.6 crore plus price-tagged Pietersen, none scored anything of note, unable to match the guile of Muralidharan, except for briefly spirited Jacques Kallis and “I am proving a point or two to you Mr. Mallya” Rahul Dravid.

So the first encounter between the “South Indian Ashes” rivals concluded in favor of my favorite team Chennai with Murali winning the Man of the Match and humbly opining Mathew Hayden deserved the MoM more than him.  Almost Rahmanish!

If I was the adjudicator for the MoM award, I would have given it to Haydharan as both deserved the award.

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