Bollywood stars bank on IPL success

MUMBAI (AFP) — The involvement of some of Bollywood's biggest stars in the Indian Premier League (IPL) means the world's best one-day cricketers are not the only draw when the competition starts this weekend.

Leading figures in India's Hindi-language film industry are closely involved in the eight teams who will battle it out for Twenty20 supremacy in South Africa from Saturday.

Top actor-producer Shahrukh Khan part-owns Kolkata Knight Riders, actress Preity Zinta has a stake in King's XI Punjab and fellow star Shilpa Shetty has taken a share in defending champions Rajasthan Royals.

Action hero Akshay Kumar is brand ambassador for Delhi Daredevils, movie hearthrob Hrithik Roshan is flying the flag for the Mumbai Indians, while screen siren Katrina Kaif is supporting the Bangalore Royal Challengers.

Top performers and music directors have also got in on the act, producing music videos for many of the teams that owe much to Bollywood's song and dance routine tradition.

In their oversized filmstar sunglasses and designer clothes, Shetty, Zinta and Kaif added much-needed glamour to the gathering of corporate suits at the auction for new players in the resort state of Goa earlier this year.

For the actors, many of whom who have been making the rounds at promotional events before the start of IPL's second season, merging cricket and film makes perfect sense given the fanatical following that both have on the subcontinent.

"Cricket is not a sport in our country, it's a religion," said Shetty in February after she and her partner, British Asian businessman Raj Kundra, bought a 16-million-dollar stake in the Rajasthan Royals.

"I am very passionate about cricket and who better to invest in than the current reigning IPL champions. It completes the success story for the IPL team by merging with Bollywood."

Shahrukh Khan, who stumped up 75 million dollars with his business partners for the Knight Riders franchise, said he got involved to help promote sport as a profitiable career option for young people.

"For me, it will be great to change the lives of youngsters who need to go out and channel their youthful aggression for good purposes rather than putting it to destructive use," he said.

But with the IPL as much a commercial as a sporting exercise, the glitzy, fast-paced tournament tempts stars and corporate firms alike with the promise of big bucks.

"They (Bollywood stars) have got involved because people today are not just actors. They want to be entrepreneurs. They want to explore all business avenues and not just the film industry," film critic Taran Adarsh told AFP.

"The fact that they're coming together for the second time means that the first time was lucrative for them."

Indian cricket's governing body made nearly 1.75 billion dollars from the sale of television rights, 108 million dollars from promotion and about 700 million from franchises, according to cricinfo.com.

About 240 million dollars in sponsorship are riding on the event this year alone, India's Economic Times newspaper said last month.

For Kundra, using Shetty's "tremendous" following in Britain, Australia and South Africa is another way of making Rajasthan Royals a global sporting brand.

"Bollywood joining cricket is about cricket's undersold potential," he said.

Ironically, the only loser could be Indian cinema itself: multiplex owners -- already hit by a producers' strike over box office takings -- fear empty theatres through April and May as millions tune in to the IPL instead.

ICC should make window for IPL: Warne

Cape Town: International Cricket Council lacks 'common sense', otherwise it would have created a separate window for the Indian Premier League, said spin legend Shane Warne.

A vociferous advocate of a separate window for the Twenty20 event, Warne said no international matches should have been scheduled for the month of April to allow all players compete in the cash-rich league.

"If the ICC had any common sense, they would create a window for the IPL," Warne, who led the Rajasthan Royals to a fairytale victory in the inaugural edition of the league was quoted as saying by The Star.

Rhodes calls for fielding captains

Jonty Rhodes, one of the greatest fielders, has partially backed John Buchanan's multi-captain theory by calling for a fielding captain in Twenty20s. Rhodes feels the nominated player can play the role of a "facilitator" for the team captain, who would have many other responsibilities and could not be expected to carry out every fielding change.

Rhodes, the fielding coach of Mumbai Indians in the IPL, said Hansie Cronje, the former South Africa captain, had given him the task of monitoring the field to make sure all the players were attentive. Rhodes felt it was a move that helped South Africa become one of the best fielding units.

"Cronje gave me the responsibility to find ways to improve our fielding...You can have a guy who is responsible for that, if you want to call him the fielding captain that's fine," Rhodes told Cricinfo from Durban, where he is supervising the Mumbai squad with his former team-mate Shaun Pollock, the team's mentor.

Buchanan's theory of multiple-strategists for the Kolkata Knight Riders created a huge furore. As part of his plan to succeed in Twenty20s, Buchanan favoured more "decision-makers" in the side, including one who could look after the fielders. Rhodes said the man in charge of the fielding needs to make sure fielders are into their positions quickly so the bowlers could get through the overs soon.

"Also if there is an instance where the player could dive but doesn't then, without adding pressure on him, you need the guy [fielding captain] to tell him what could've been the result if only he had attempted the dive," Rhodes said. "That's not the captain's role (to advise the fielders). He has many other things on his head. The fielding captain is like a facilitator."

Rhodes, who was a consultant with the South African team, said during his interaction last month with the Mumbai players he stressed on throwing techniques and foot movement, two aspects that make a good fielder.

Asked to nominate the best fielders in the game today, Rhodes picked countrymen JP Duminy and AB de Villiers, Australian Andrew Symonds, and England's Paul Collingwood.

"JP Duminy fields well in the inner ring in the first six overs. And when the fielding restrictions are over because he is very quick to the ball and even if he may not have the biggest arm in the world, he has a good throw, his body position is good, catches a lot of balls in the outfield so he is very good. Andrew Symonds is a very good all-round fielder, too He is very strong in the inner ring, who leans very well and throws very well from the boundary. AB de Villiers has really good feet movement as a wicketkeeper and Paul Collingwood is very good at backward point or at cover."

Rhodes felt their strength was that they are completely focused. In his own words it means "intensity", which, he says, is the key to success in Twenty20 cricket. "You have to maintain a high intensity. There are only 120 balls, you have to be focused every single ball, expecting every single ball to come to you whether you are fielding at third man, fine leg, or backward point, the way the guys play shots these days you have to expect the ball to come wherever you fielding," Rhodes said. "That is the key to good fielding - if you are expecting it you can put up a good performance."

Rhodes said that while the basic skills of fielding remain the same in all forms of the game, it is the intensity that differs. "Even in the 50-overs game I was expecting the ball to come to me and was quite disappointed if it didn't come. Pressure is a constant in the 20-over game with matches going right down to the wire so you can't afford to really make a mistake with bat, ball or in the field. Fielding is the same, just that you are doing it at a lot quicker pace."

IPL 2009 Shedule

IPL
Season II - Schedule in South Africa

April 18: RAJASTHAN ROYALS v ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE at Cape Town; MUMBAI INDIANS v CHENNAI SUPER KINGS at Cape Town

April 19: KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS v DECCAN CHARGERS at Cape Town; DELHI DAREDEVILS v KINGS XI PUNJAB at Cape Town.

April 20: ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE V CHENNAI SUPER KINGS at Port Elizabeth.

April 21: RAJASTHAN ROYALS v MUMBAI INDIANS at Durban; KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS v KINGS XI PUNJAB at Durban

April 22: DELHI DAREDEVILS v CHENNAI SUPER KINGS at Durban; ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE v DECCAN CHARGERS at Cape Town

April 23: KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS v RAJASTHAN ROYALS at Port Elizabeth

April 24: KINGS XI PUNJAB v ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE at Johannesburg

April 25: KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS v CHENNAI SUPER KINGS at Cape Town; DECCAN CHARGERS v MUMBAI INDIANS at Durban.

April 26: RAJASTHAN ROYALS v KINGS XI PUNJAB at Cape Town; ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE v DELHI DAREDEVILS Port Elizabeth

April 27: KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS v MUMBAI INDIANS at Cape Town; CHENNAI SUPER KINGS v DECCAN CHARGERS at Durban.

April 28: DELHI DAREDEVILS v RAJASTHAN ROYALS at Pretoria

April 29: MUMBAI INDIANS v KINGS XI PUNJAB at Durban; KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS v ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE at Durban

April 30: DELHI DAREDEVILS v DECCAN CHARGERS at Pretoria; RAJASTHAN ROYALS v CHENNAI SUPER KINGS at Pretoria.

May 1: ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE v KINGS XI PUNJAB at East London; MUMBAI INDIANS v KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS at Durban

May 2: RAJASTHAN ROYALS v DECCAN CHARGERS at Johannesburg; CHENNAI SUPER KINGS v DELHI DAREDEVILS at Port Elizabeth

May 3: MUMBAI INDIANS v ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE at Durban; KINGS XI PUNJAB v KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS at East London

May 4: DECCAN CHARGERS v CHENNAI SUPER KINGS at Port Elizabeth

May 5: DELHI DAREDEVILS v KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS at Durban; KINGS XI PUNJAB v RAJASTHAN ROYALS at Durban

May 6: MUMBAI INDIANS v DECCAN CHARGERS at Pretoria

May 7: KINGS XI PUNJAB v CHENNAI SUPER KINGS at Pretoria; ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE v RAJASTHAN ROYALS at Pretoria

May 8: DELHI DAREDEVILS v MUMBAI INDIANS at East London

May 9: DECCAN CHARGERS v KINGS XI PUNJAB at Bloemfontein; CHENNAI SUPER KINGS v RAJASTHAN ROYALS at Port Elizabeth

May 10: KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS v DELHI DAREDEVILS at East London; ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE v MUMBAI INDIANS at Johannesburg

May 11: DECCAN CHARGERS v RAJASTHAN ROYALS at Bloemfontein

May 12: ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE v KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS at Pretoria; KINGS XI PUNJAB v MUMBAI INDIANS at Pretoria.

May 13: DECCAN CHARGERS v DELHI DAREDEVILS at Durban

May 14: MUMBAI INDIANS v RAJASTHAN ROYALS at Durban; CHENNAI SUPER KINGS v ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE at Durban.

May 15: KINGS XI PUNJAB v DELHI DAREDEVILS at Kimberley

May 16: CHENNAI SUPER KINGS v MUMBAI INDIANS at Johannesburg; DECCAN CHARGERS v KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS at Port Elizabeth

May 17: RAJASTHAN ROYALS v DELHI DAREDEVILS at Kimberley; KINGS XI PUNJAB v DECCAN CHARGERS at Johannesburg

May 18: CHENNAI SUPER KINGS v KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS at Pretoria

May 19: DELHI DAREDEVILS v ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE at Johannesburg

May 20: CHENNAI SUPER KINGS v KINGS XI PUNJAB at Durban; RAJASTHAN ROYALS v KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS at Durban

May 21: DECCAN CHARGERS v ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE at Pretoria; MUMBAI INDIANS v DELHI DAREDEVILS at Pretoria

May 22: Semi Final 1 at Pretoria

May 23: Semi Final 2 at Johannesburg

May 24: Final at Johannesburg.