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Former Australian Batsman Michael Bevan has been appointed as the new coach of Kings XI Punjab while his fellow countryman and former fast bowler Geoff Lawson has been appointed as the head coach of Kochi IPL team. Bevan replaces another Australian Tom Moody as the coach of the Kings XI team. Punjab finished at the bottom of the league last year and would hope a change of fortunes with the new coach. Kochi would hope that Lawson can provide them the required expertise and help them a mark in their first year itself at the Indian Premier League. Both the coaches are expected to be physically presented in the auction to be held in Bangalore on Saturday and Sunday.

The IPL’s governing council has finally revealed the league’s format for next season. The 2011 season – as well as the two years after – will have 74 matches, down 20 games on what was previously thought but still up 14 matches on this year’s campaign.

The 10 IPL franchises, including newcomers Kochi and Pune, will be divided into two groups of five; each team will play each other home and away in its group. Then, and this is where it gets confusing, each team will play 4 of the 5 teams in the other group once, either home or away. Each team will also play the remaining team in the other group twice, home and away. Despite there being two different groups, all 10 teams will be ranked together in one league. 

This all means that every team will play 14 league games – the same amount as the first three seasons. A random draw will decide the composition of the groups as well as who plays whom across the groups once and twice.

Once the group stages reach their conclusion, the top four teams from the league will qualify for the play-offs. The teams that finish first and second in the league table will play the first play-off, which in effect is a semi-final. The teams that finish third and fourth will play what is effectively a quarter-final. Next, the loser of the first game will play the winner of the second game in a game that will decide who will join the winner of the first game in the final.

After all that is the now customary Champions League qualify match and, of course, the final.

If you don’t understand, and I don’t blame you if you don’t, here is a simpler run-down of the play-offs:

Game 1: Team 1 vs Team 2

Game 2: Team 3 vs Team 4

Game 3: Winner Game 2 vs Loser Game 1

Final: Winner Game 1 vs Winner Game 3

CLT20 qualifiers: Finalists and Loser Game 3

The play-offs come in an interesting format though they should be praised as it gives a clear incentive for teams to finish in the top two places in the league table. In past seasons, when a team has been virtually guaranteed a semi-final slot from early on, it would leave a few ‘dead’ games towards the end of the league stage. However, with this play-off system, teams will be desperate to finish in the top two places as they will be given two bites of the cherry for a slot in the final.

Overall, though, it is a confusing format, and you wonder how easy it will be for fans to follow. To be fair, it was always going to be difficult to find the balance between how many games money-hounding franchise owners and stakeholders want and how many matches would be too much for the fans to consume. In the end, the governing council has come up with a bloated and disjointed format. We will have to wait until April to see how it pans out.

The IPL governing council has also solved the issue of player retention.

Each of the eight franchises who participated in the 2010 season will be able to retain up to four players but only a maximum of three Indians. The retained players must have been part of the franchise’s registered squads for the 2010 season. The rest of the players will go into the auction scheduled for the second week of November.

IPL IV will start on April 7 – just five days after the final of the Cricket World Cup.

Champions League T20 2010 would start on 10th of September in South Africa and would run till 26th September 2010. There are three IPL teams, two teams from Australia, two teams from South Africa and one team each from Sri Lanka, New Zealand and West Indies. Domestic teams from England could not participate this time due to dates clashing with their domestic competition.

Here is the complete Airtel Champions League T20 schedule:

Group A: Chennai Super Kings, Warriors, Victorian Bushrangers, Wayamba Elevens and Central Stags

Group B: Mumbai Indians, Highveld Lions, South Australian Redbacks, Royal Challengers Bangalore and West Indies Domestic T20 Winner.

Top two teams from each group will qualify for Semi Final Matches. Share
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Date GMT Match Details Venue
Sep 10, 2010 15:30 Mumbai Indians vs Highveld Lions , 1st T20 Match The Wanderers Stadium, Johannesburg
Sep 11, 2010 11:30 Warriors vs Wayamba , 2nd T20 Match St Georges Park, Port Elizabeth
Sep 11, 2010 15:30 Central Stags vs Chennai Super Kings , 3rd T20 Match Kingsmead, Durban
Sep 12, 2010 11:30 Highveld Lions vs South Australian Redbacks , 4th T20 Match SuperSport Park, Centurion
Sep 12, 2010 15:30 Bangalore Royal Challengers vs Guyana , 5th T20 Match SuperSport Park, Centurion
Sep 13, 2010 15:30 Victoria vs Warriors , 6th T20 Match St Georges Park, Port Elizabeth
Sep 14, 2010 15:30 Mumbai Indians vs South Australian Redbacks , 7th T20 Match Kingsmead, Durban
Sep 15, 2010 11:30 Central Stags vs Wayamba , 8th T20 Match SuperSport Park, Centurion
Sep 15, 2010 15:30 Chennai Super Kings vs Wayamba , 9th T20 Match SuperSport Park, Centurion
Sep 16, 2010 15:30 Mumbai Indians vs Guyana , 10th T20 Match Kingsmead, Durban
Sep 17, 2010 15:30 Bangalore Royal Challengers vs South Australian Redbacks , 11th T20 Match Kingsmead, Durban
Sep 18, 2010 11:30 Central Stags vs Warriors , 12th T20 Match St Georges Park, Port Elizabeth
Sep 18, 2010 15:30 Chennai Super Kings vs Victoria , 13th T20 Match St Georges Park, Port Elizabeth
Sep 19, 2010 11:30 Highveld Lions vs Guyana , 14th T20 Match The Wanderers Stadium, Johannesburg
Sep 19, 2010 15:30 Mumbai Indians vs Bangalore Royal Challengers , 15th T20 Match Kingsmead, Durban
Sep 20, 2010 15:30 Victoria vs Wayamba , 16th T20 Match SuperSport Park, Centurion
Sep 21, 2010 11:30 South Australian Redbacks vs Guyana , 17th T20 Match The Wanderers Stadium, Johannesburg
Sep 21, 2010 15:30 Highveld Lions vs Bangalore Royal Challengers , 18th T20 Match The Wanderers Stadium, Johannesburg
Sep 22, 2010 11:30 Central Stags vs Wayamba , 19th T20 Match St Georges Park, Port Elizabeth
Sep 22, 2010 15:30 Chennai Super Kings vs Warriors , 20th T20 Match St Georges Park, Port Elizabeth
Sep 24, 2010 15:30 TBC vs TBC , 1st Semi Final T20 Match Kingsmead, Durban
Sep 25, 2010 15:30 TBC vs TBC , 2nd Semi Final T20 Match SuperSport Park, Centurion
Sep 26, 2010 15:30 TBC vs TBC , Final T20 Match The Wanderers Stadium, Johannesburg

The third season of the Indian Premier League started on an unexpected note once again as the team which was last on the points table in IPL 2 Kolkata Knight Riders defeated the winners of IPL 2 and defending champions Deccan Chargers in the opening match of IPL 3. Deccan Chargers captain Adam Gilchrist won the toss and put Kolkata Knight Riders to bat. KKR lost two wickets to Chaminda Vaas in the first over itself without any runs on the board and it seemed to be continuing their dismal form since IPL 2. Two more quick wickets fell and they were struggling as they were only at 41 after losing 4 wickets. But then Angelo Matthews (65 runs off 46 balls) and Owais Shah (58 runs off 46 balls) put up a brilliant partnership till the end of the KKR innings as they reached 161/4 in their allotted 20 overs. DC captain Adam Gilchrist (54 runs off 35 balls) put up a brilliant fight but other wickets fell at regular intervals and Deccan Chargers could only make 150/7 at the end of 20 overs.

Deccan Chargers vs Kolkata Knight Riders, 1st match

Kolkata Knight Riders Innings

Batsman Kolkata Knight Riders(161/4 in 20 ovs) Runs Balls 4′s 6′s SR
M Tiwary c R Sharma & b C Vaas 0 1 0 0 0
B Hodge c H Gibbs & b J Singh 13 9 1 1 144.44
S Ganguly(c) c V Laxman & b C Vaas 0 3 0 0 0
C Pujara c P Ojha & b R Singh 10 16 2 0 62.5
O Shah Not out 58 46 3 3 126.09
A Mathews Not out 65 46 5 4 141.3
W Saha(wk) dnB 0 0 0 0 0.00
L Shukla dnb 0 0 0 0 0.00
M Kartik dnb 0 0 0 0 0.00
C Langeveldt dnb 0 0 0 0 0.00
I Sharma dnb 0 0 0 0 0.00

Extras b – 0, lb – 8, w – 6, nb – 1, Total – 15

Total:(161 for 4 in 20 overs) 161 Run Rate: 8.05

Fall Of Wickets
1/0 (Manoj Tiwary, 0.1 ov.), 2/0 (Sourav Ganguly, 0.4 ov.), 3/31 (Cheteshwar Pujara, 4.4 ov.), 4/31 (Brad Hodge, 5.1 ov.)

Bowler 0 M R W Nb Wd ER
Chaminda Vaas 3 1 22 2 0 0 7.33
RP Singh 4 0 35 1 0 3 8.75
Jaskaran Singh 4 0 35 1 0 1 8.75
Pragyan Ojha 4 0 19 0 0 0 4.75
Andrew Symonds 4 0 26 0 0 2 6.5
T Suman 1 0 16 0 1 0 16

Deccan Chargers Innings
Batsman Deccan Chargers(150/7 in 20 ovs) Runs Balls 4′s 6′s SR
A Gilchrist(c) c M Tiwary & b B Hodge 54 35 3 3 154.29
VVS Laxman c & b M Kartik 22 14 2 1 157.14
H Gibbs c A Mathews & b C Langeveldt 19 24 2 0 79.17
A Symonds c S Ganguly & b I Sharma 5 9 0 0 55.56
R Sharma c B Hodge & b A Mathews 13 12 2 0 108.33
A Singh c & b L Shukla 14 14 1 0 100
T Suman Not out 7 9 1 0 77.78
C Vaas b C Langeveldt 0 1 0 0 0
J Singh Not out 4 4 0 0 100
RP Singh dnb 0 0 0 0 0.00
P Ojha dnb 0 0 0 0 0.00

Extras b – 4, lb – 1, w – 5, nb – 2, Total – 12

Total:(150 for 7 in 20 overs) 150 Run Rate: 7.5

Fall Of Wickets
1/61 (VVS Laxman, 5.5 ov.), 2/99 (Adam Gilchrist, 11.1 ov.), 3/102 (Herschelle Gibbs, 12.2 ov.), 4/116 (Andrew Symonds, 14.1 ov.), 5/128 (Rohit Sharma, 16.2 ov.), 6/141 (Anirudh Singh, 17.6 ov.), 7/142 (Chaminda Vaas, 18.3 ov.)

Bowler 0 M R W Nb Wd ER
Charl Langeveldt 4 0 26 2 0 3 6.5
Ishant Sharma 4 0 31 1 1 1 7.75
Laxmi Shukla 3 0 30 1 0 0 10
Murali Kartik 3 0 17 1 0 0 5.67
Angelo Mathews 4 0 27 1 1 1 6.75
Brad Hodge 2 0 14 1 0 0 7