The Gamechangers

By Fake IPL Player

Indian Bollywood League, Indias premier T20 cricket tournament, is all set for its second edition. With the hard cash that it spins around, the league is as much about cricket as it is about the starts involved-both on the field and off it, Kings of Bollywood, glamorous starlets, cricketing demi-gods, business tycoons-everyone has something to gain and a whole lot to lose during this 35-day extravaganza.But upsetting the apple-cart for many of them is FIP, the Fake IBL Player, spreading gossip and tainting reputations with the scandalous revelations on his blog. Now super-sleuth Parminder Mahipal Singh, a.k.a. Detective PMS, has been roped in to go undercover and find the treacherous rat.With big bucks, bigger personality and fragile egos batting for supremacy, can politics conspiracy and deception be far behind? Will PMS be able to stop the Fake IBL Player from spreading his poison? And what exactly does happen behind the scenes in crickets richest league?

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Release date: Mar 3, 2010
• ISBN: 9789350293508

Fake IPL Player

An anonymous blog called Fake IPL Player took the world by storm with its scandalous behind-the-scenes revelations and tongue-in-check humour, during the 2009 season of the Indian Premier League, a Many believed the blogger to be a member of the Kolkata Knight Riders. His identity, however, is still not known.

Book preview

PART I

Day Minus One

LET THE GAMES BEGIN

I am the perennial no-hoper your Mom warned you about. The only time I showed any promise was when I played for my school. They thought I might make it to the Test side one day. Well, they were wrong. I made it to the Ranjis, but never beyond. And now, I find myself a part of the Indian Bollywood League. IBL. Entertainment Ka Baap.

You might think I am full of shit to call myself a no-hoper when I am playing IBL, the richest cricket tournament ever. All I can say is that despite all the money that’s being thrown around at IBL, not much is being spent shopping for brains. I went to the team trials only to support a friend who was trying his luck. While I was there, I decided to pad up and hit a few. I had the worst hit of my life and sprayed the ball all over. But I pretended I was playing them deliberately. And guess what, the Phoren Babas observing me in between swigs of beer offered me a contract. ‘Plays at strange angles, different, refreshing, exciting’ is how they described my game. And then there was the interview with Bhookha Naan and Boy George, which I bullshitted my way through.

So, here I am. Part of the most happening team in IBL. A team full of superstars. A team that walks, talks, sings and dances like a Bollywood movie. A team that’s, at the moment, prancing around like a headless chicken because our captain hasn’t been announced yet. Lord Almighty, our captain the previous season, isn’t exactly shitting bricks, but he does look restless. Coach Bhookha Naan is too much in charge of things for Lordie’s liking. I am sure things are going to heat up on that front. We all know that Lordie and Australian coaches are allergic to each other. Australian coaches make Lordie sweat and dehydrate. And just a mention of Lordie’s name causes severe constipation in Australian coaches, best demonstrated by the static expression Hawaii Chappal wore during the years he was coaching the Indian national team.

My guess is that Bhookha Naan will try and strip Lordie. I mean, strip him of captaincy. And then kick him out of the side. All he has to do is convince our owner, Vinnie Dildo. That shouldn’t be too difficult. Megalomaniac that he is, Dildo doesn’t care too much for Lordie’s attitude. And I haven’t found him too bright either. Good actor, big star, but not too smart. You know what’s worse than being dumb? Not knowing it. That, in a nutshell, is the situation with Dildo.

One good thing about the IBL money is that I have bought myself this thing called a MacBook Pro. I am still trying to figure it out, though. It doesn’t have a left/right click and the icons fly past you like a film. But it looks great. On me, it looks like the weapon I was born for.

I am not expecting to play any of the games, but it’s my duty to entertain. So, throughout IBL, I’ll be bringing you the ‘aankhon dekha haal’, the stuff they never report, the stuff that gets edited out. The stuff you always suspected but couldn’t confirm about the world of cricket. And cricketers.

The best kept secrets of cricket will soon be history.

Let the games begin!

Day Zero

A NIGHT IN MUMBAI

He stood in his trademark gold-rimmed glasses and black suit with gold-embroidered collars, overlooking a sea of microphones, flashbulbs and TV cameras, with the poise of a man born to be a public figure.

‘The next 35 days will be the most exciting in cricketing history and, on the thirty-fifth day, after the IBL final at Lord’s, we’ll have something special to announce. I can’t disclose it right now, but I can promise you that it will change the landscape of world cricket forever,’ said Lalu Parekh, the diminutive, 48-year-old CEO of Indian Bollywood League, India’s premier T20 cricket tournament, as he addressed the media after the curtain raiser event for IBL 2009.

‘IBL is now probably the most important cricket tournament in the world. Everybody wants more of IBL every year. But nothing is more important than international cricket. We are working with ICC to ensure that both IBL and international cricket can coexist peacefully,’ continued Lalu with well-rehearsed smoothness.

The ability to effortlessly contradict oneself within a few seconds and to speak a lot without actually saying much are traits usually found in career politicians and cricket commentators. Lalu Parekh was neither. But he was many men rolled into one—marketeer, moneyman, fixer, politician, devious tactician and strategist. And this year, he was pulling off his biggest heist ever as he took IBL straight into the den of the International Cricket Council, England.

Having answered the last question, Lalu smiled and turned to shake hands with the CEO of ICC, who had stood beside him all this while without once uttering a word. The exaggerated handshake, hug and beaming smiles on display for the cameras couldn’t hide the lack of trust between these two overlords of world cricket.

Lalu stepped down from the stage and briskly walked across the lush lawns of the Juhu Marriott in Mumbai. As he reached the far end of the lawns, he turned around to take one final look at the mega set created to his specifications.

Both ends of the stage had semicircular stairs going right up to the top, rather like the affiuent Indian homes shown in most saas-bahu serials on TV, minus the handrails wrapped in gold-coloured sheets. The existence of these stairs remained a bit of a mystery, though, as no one actually walked up or down them during the event. The backdrop of the stage had a graphic of a huge golden bat, its handle studded with diamonds, stroking a glowing fluorescent green globe. The character holding the bat was a masked man wearing a cape like the hero of Baazigar, the Bollywood superhit of the 1990s. A modern-day superhero hitting the world for a six with a gold-and-diamond-studded bat was exactly the image that Lalu wanted to portray to the world. What he hadn’t accounted for, however, was that every time lights fell on the stage, the glare from all the gold and diamond sent the audience scurrying for cover. The stylish snapped on their shades, the more athletic ducked under tables, the elderly complained of palpitations, and ambulances had to be kept on stand-by.

But the rest of the event went exactly as Lalu had planned. As he walked out to the lobby of the five-star hotel, he could still hear people discussing the 15 Bollywood numbers, the king-sized cheque handed out to charity, the lifetime achievement awards given to a Bollywood star and a cricketer, the nine speeches, the laser show, the unfunny jokes of the host and the perfectly timed wardrobe malfunction of the hostess of the event. Marketeers had slapped brand logos on every inch of the show, which was telecast to more than a billion television viewers worldwide, although the hostess’s blouse that suffered the malfunction went, surprisingly, unbranded. Every aspect of the event was carefully orchestrated and it seemed like the perfect curtain raiser for an exciting 35-day rollercoaster.

Just a couple of kilometres away, the after-party had begun, at 11 Echoes, Juhu. Sigwald Raees Kahn, half-German, half-Afghan, king of Bollywood and owner of the IBL team Calcutta Cavalry, was talking to a few journos at the gate of the club. Blessed with his Afghan mother’s looks, he looked dapper in his black suit, black tie, black shirt and gelled hair. Though he was well away from the blinding set at the Marriott, Kahn had his dark glasses on. A little more attitude and he could have played Will Smith’s character in Men in Black. But then, as Kahn always said, ‘Why be a beggar in Hollywood when you are the shahenshah of Bollywood?’

Kahn stubbed out his Marlboro Light just before the cameras were switched on. ‘Look, my job with the Calcutta Cavalry is very simple. I am the twelfth man of the team. I am the water boy. My job is to serve drinks, dance for them, motivate them, massage their tired muscles, keep them happy. I may be the owner, but I am also a humble servant of the team.’ Saying which, Kahn flicked back his gelled hair and flashed the dimpled smile that made girls the world over go ‘ooh’ and ‘aah’.

‘Do you think Calcutta Cavalry will do better this time?’ asked a journalist.

‘The good news is that last year we were at the bottom of the table. So, whatever we do this time, it can’t get any worse, can it?’ Kahn replied, lopsided smile intact. ‘And don’t forget that, despite being last, we were the only team to make a profit last year. That’s why our slogan for this season is, Haar ke bhi jeetne vale ko shahnshah kehte hain. We are not scared of losing because we know that eventually we will win. Inshallah.’

‘So you think you can actually win?’ the same journalist asked again.

Kahn glared at the man. The smile was gone and there was just a hint of a quiver at the lips. There was a second’s silence as everyone waited for Kahn to react.

‘My name is Kahn. I am a Pathan. I am a born winner. And I know that we will win IBL this time. Remember, you don’t win the silver. You lose the gold,’ Kahn finally announced and declared the impromptu press meet over. He saw Lalu Parekh disembark from his Mercedes and stalked off to meet him. A handshake and a hug, and they entered the club reserved for the entire night for the cricketers to party with Bollywood stars. They were supposed to make the most of the few hours they had before catching their flights to England in the wee hours of the morning.

Lalu put an arm around Kahn’s shoulder and said, ‘Boss, your captain’s not settled and Clive Richards will fly back midway. What’s going on?’

Clive Richards was Calcutta Cavalry’s most valuable player. An explosive right-handed opening batsman from the West Indies who, on a good day, could demolish any bowling attack in the world. And his medium pace bowling, with brilliant variations, made him one of the most difficult bowlers to play.

As per ICC’s Future Tours Progamme (FTP), West Indies were scheduled to play New Zealand in a test series in two weeks while South Africa and Sri Lanka were scheduled to play a series in less than four weeks. All the players from these four countries were expected to leave the tournament midway to play for their countries. For playing 15 days of test cricket in empty stadiums, each player would earn the princely amount of $10,000, foregoing anything between $1,00,000 and $5,00,000 that they could have earned during the same time, playing high octane games at IBL. ICC and the respective cricket boards, in all their wisdom, assumed that the players would be ecstatic about being forced to make such a choice.

‘Boss, I can solve the captaincy thing. About Clive Richards, you’ll have to do something. What’s the point of spending so much money when you can’t even have your best players?’ Kahn said.

‘Kya, yaar. You are paying Clive a million dollars. You can always tell him to stay back. The West Indies board hasn’t paid him for two years, do you know that? For the kind of money you are paying him, he should be ready to dance naked for you if you ask him to,’ said Lalu, laughing.

As the two men entered the club, a wave of silence seemed to sweep the floor and all eyes turned to them. Lalu gently pulled Kahn to one corner and whispered, ‘No player wants to leave IBL. I have news that the entire South African team is close to revolt. And the Sri Lankans and New Zealanders are also staying on. If ICC tries to ban them, I’ll simply say that nothing can be done midway through the tournament. You guys can throw in your weight after that. By the time IBL ends, we’ll get this FTP shit scrapped, I am telling you. Convince Clive to stand his ground.’

11 Echoes wasn’t the most glamorous of places to party at, but it was perfect for a night such as this. The ground floor had a full-fledged bar and a reasonably big dance floor and there was a small garden outside with a mini bar of its own. On the first floor, there was a smaller covered, air-conditioned area that opened out into a huge balcony overlooking the Juhu beach and the Arabian Sea.

It was a cloudy evening. Rain was in the air and the sea breeze was cool. It was quite nippy by Mumbai standards. The place was littered with players, cricket administrators, film stars, starlets on the make, models, businessmen, select journalists and some hangers-on.

A first-time visitor to such parties would instantly sense the familiarity between the film stars and the cricketers. It was almost a Yin-Yang thing. One set looking to be in the company of glory, the other set seeking glamour. For a struggling film actress, being seen with a top cricketer ensured that she was in the news all the time, and for a cricketer, film stars acted as an all-access pass to a whole new world. For instance, 28-year-old Abhimanyu Singh, the most talented batsman in India since God, long-time vice-captain of India and heir apparent to the throne before being been rudely brushed aside at the appointed hour for a rank outsider—during his nine years with the Indian team, Abhimanyu had launched two dozen acting careers by letting fringe actresses hook up with him. In exchange, he was able to live almost a rock star life. Though he had puffed eyes, a double chin and a paunch to show for his excesses, he still had a cover drive to die for. Mostly grumpy and with a perennially pissed-off expression on his face, both on and off the field, Abhimanyu was usually at his charming best with the ladies.

On this night, Abhimanyu was engaged in his favourite off-field pastime. He was backslapping actors, cracking jokes with actresses, shaking a leg on the dance floor and had received as many as 25 ‘best of luck’ kisses. If these kisses had the desired impact, he might well end up handing over the IBL trophy to Abhimanyu’s team, Haryana Hurricanes, Lalu thought with a wry smile.

But not everyone was as skilled a socializer as Abhimanyu. There were many players who stood huddled in groups of four or five, looking around and sharing a word or two with each other before continuing to gawk. These guys were known as ‘fringe players’—those who hovered around the Indian cricket team and had a few games under their belts, but hadn’t quite established themselves in the big league. Not completely at ease at parties like this, they tended to seek comfort in numbers. But just a season or two with the Indian team could completely transform their fortunes. They’d be chased by top models and hunted down by film actresses. They’d go to a night club and suddenly realize that their short height, squeaky voice, mole on the cheek, missing tooth, stuttering speech, broken English didn’t stack up against them any longer. This could be quite addictive; it was certainly what many former cricketers missed most about the sport.

With the party in full swing, the attention suddenly shifted to the lawns of the club, where a makeshift ramp was bathed in multicoloured lights and confetti. Soon models started walking the ramp to foot-tapping music, wearing tights, shorts, leotards and stylish body suits from one of the world’s top sports apparel brands. There were loud claps and whistles when a top Bollywood actress stepped on to the ramp wearing gym attire that amply displayed the effects of her exercise regimen.

No sooner had she finished her two-and-a-half laps than there were feminine shrieks of delight, the kind reserved for the Frank Sinatras, Beatles and Michael Jacksons of the world. Rocky, the captain of the Indian team, had just appeared on the ramp, clad in a pair of tennis shorts and an abs-hugging, anti-perspiration T-shirt. Every eye in the club followed the charismatic Indian captain as he walked down the ramp to cries of ‘Yeeaah’ and the rhythmic chant of ‘Rocky! Rocky! Rocky!’

Rocky had carved a little corner for himself in the hearts of Indian cricket followers almost from the moment he first put on the Team India jersey. Not good-looking in the conventional sense, back then he went by his real name, Rakesh Sharma, and was well-known for his long hair, superfit body and a devil-may-care attitude. A Kanpur boy, he had burst onto the scene four years ago as a flamboyant, hard-hitting batsman whose only purpose in life was to despatch every ball outside the ground, and it was this that earned him the sobriquet Rocky. While his bravado on the pitch had grabbed everyone’s attention, his self-assuredness had made him stand out in the crowd of young aspiring players trying to cement their place in the Indian side. Within no time, he was collecting ‘Man of the Match’ awards and giving press interviews like a pro. And that was when the world noticed the spark behind his stoic, unflappable demeanour. He was irreverent without being disrespectful, spoke his mind without being abrasive and exhibited a non-PR trained sense of humour which the world found refreshing. In a rare flash of brilliance, the selectors made him captain of the Indian team. What followed was a golden 18-month period in Indian cricket history during which they won the World Cup and beat the all-conquering Australian team at home and away. As captain, Rocky displayed an affable personality and instinctive leadership. Off the ground, he polished his English, cut his hair and stopped colouring it and started wearing trendier clothes. And suddenly, he was the new sex symbol of India.

Walking down the ramp under the limelight, Rocky casually scanned the audience. One face in the crowd jumped out at him. She wasn’t excitedly screaming like most of the others but was standing quietly near the door, watching him with detached interest. She seemed … different, yet familiar. By the time Rocky walked back to the other end of the ramp, turned around and glanced in her direction, she was gone. But the memory of her face stayed with him for the rest of the night. Why did she look so familiar, he asked himself over and over again.

On the surface, the party was just another cricket-Bollywood party. But if one dug a little deeper, it was much more than that.

About half an hour after the Rocky show, you would have seen Gautam Sarkar, alone in the enclosed area on the first floor, with a glass of Diet Coke on the table. A legendary figure in Indian cricket, Gautam had led the national team for seven years before his form, fitness and agility compelled the selectors to first ease him out of captaincy and then nudge him out of the side. But he continued to be popular with the masses, especially in his hometown, Calcutta. He had been captain of Calcutta Cavalry the previous year when they finished last. This year, much to everyone’s surprise, Calcutta Cavalry hadn’t officially announced their captain yet.

Gautam was looking straight ahead, through the tinted glass walls of the room and across the large balcony to its far corner, where a roundtable conference was on between the owner of Calcutta Cavalry, Sigwald Raees Kahn, and his two lieutenants—CEO Sanjoy Roy Choudhry and coach Jeff Buccaneer—to whom he had entrusted the responsibility of bringing home the IBL trophy. From his vantage point inside the enclosure, Gautam could observe their body language closely while remaining hidden from their sight. He knew that there was only one thing the top management of Calcutta Cavalry could be discussing.

Kahn was leaning forward, elbows on the table, eyes shut, thoughtfully rubbing the bridge of his nose with both his forefingers, his cigarette resting on the edge of the ashtray on the table. He was listening keenly to Jeff Buccaneer. Buccaneer’s credentials as a cricketer were a well-guarded secret and not much was known about his achievements with bat or ball. However, his prowess with the laptop had elevated him to the status of the best cricketer never to have been seen playing cricket. During his stint as coach to the Australian team in the 1990s, he was credited with inventing a machine that allowed people to tread the thin line between gamesmanship and outright cheating and was said to have been seriously close to a Nobel Prize for this invention. All his secret strategies, notes, complex algorithms and differential calculus results were neatly stored in his prized possession—his laptop—from which his flashes of brilliance seemed to radiate in every direction.

‘It’s a new game, mate. Needs fresh ideas. You’ve got to junk the old school, change the rules of the game, shock the opposition with your strategies. But Gautam doesn’t understand shit about it. You can continue with Gautam if you like, but be prepared for the same result as last time, mate,’ said Buccaneer.

‘So what’s your plan? Who’s your captain?’ asked Kahn without opening his eyes.

‘Brian McMillan. He’s the man. He’s an Aussie, a leader. Drinks beer, connects with his mates, aggressive approach to the game. He understands my thoughts. He is my man to execute my ideas. I want him as captain,’ Buccaneer replied.

Kahn opened his eyes, looked at Sanjoy Roy Choudhry and asked pointedly, ‘What about the public backlash we talked about?’

Sanjoy Roy Choudhry turned slowly with the air of a genius disturbed mid-thought. Only those who had worked with him for a reasonable period of time knew that there was nothing to him beyond that look and that he had built his career on the foundation of a vacant eye, gelled hair, an Oxford accent and management jargon. This particular high-paying job that required him to do nothing but lick Kahn’s balls twice a day, metaphorically speaking, was right up his alley.

Sanjoy scratched his cheek, cleared his throat and said, ‘The key to a successful brand is to have a winning brand. You give me a winning team and I’ll give you a successful brand. Period.’

Kahn took a long drag of his cigarette as he stared blankly at Sanjoy, trying to understand what he had said other than ‘Period’. Eventually, he thought that Sanjoy must have a very clear plan in his head to have articulated such an answer and let it pass. He turned his attention to Buccaneer and asked, ‘Do you think he’ll give his best if he’s not the captain?’

Buccaneer shook his head. ‘Mate, if he’s not the captain, he’s not in the team either. Can’t bat, can’t bowl, can’t field. How do you expect me to win IBL with just 10 players on the field?’

‘What?’ Kahn screamed. He took a moment to calm himself down and then spoke tersely without raising his voice. ‘Look, Calcutta will burn if he’s dropped from the side. Don’t forget, the reason I bought this team is because it’s got millions of crazy idiots supporting it. They bought all the T-shirts and merchandise and made a losing team profitable last year. These lunatics are perfectly capable of putting a burning rod up my ass if I rub them the wrong way. Ask Greg Chappell. He’ll tell you what Calcutta can do. Sorry, I can’t let that happen. I’ve got a career to protect here.’

‘Okay, mate. Then let’s be cool with continuing as a losing team,’ said Buccaneer.

In true corporate style, Sanjoy mediated the situation. ‘Let’s take one thing at a time. First, let’s handle the captaincy issue. Once that’s taken care of, we’ll know exactly how to smoothly ease him out of the playing XI as well.’

Kahn nodded. Adjusting his hair, he asked, ‘And how do you propose to handle the captaincy issue?’

Sanjoy smiled. This was one question he was prepared for.

Sanjoy’s smile made Kahn heave a slight sigh of relief. Clearly there was at least one thing Sanjoy had thought through and would handle without demanding intervention from him.

‘Tonight, on the flight to London, you will talk to him. Man to man. Ask him to step down. If he steps down on his own, there will be no riots in Calcutta.’ Sanjoy smiled again.

Despite his irritation, Kahn asked politely, ‘And what makes you believe that his highness will step down?’

‘Because you will ask him to, your highness,’ was Sanjoy’s reply. Sanjoy knew that nothing worked as well with stars as an ego massage. With a reassuring nod and blink of the eyes, the matter was decided.

From his position inside the enclosed area, Gautam had carefully followed the body language of the trio and watched them hatch their plan. During his 15-year career in cricket, Gautam had waged many a political battle, most of them far more complex than this one. He knew exactly which bouncer was coming his way and even better, how to tackle it. He left his glass of unfinished Diet Coke on the table and quickly walked out, down the stairs, out of the gate and into his waiting car.

The fun had just begun.

Night Zero/Day One

LONDON, HERE WE COME

The first to arrive at Mumbai’s Sahar Airport, just past midnight, were the Bangalore Bangers. Their captain, Rocky, had earlier declined a ride on their owner’s private jet, opting to travel with the rest of his mates. The flamboyant owner of Bangalore Bangers, Raj Singhania, was once again baffled by Rocky’s choice and attitude. In his long global business career, Singhania had come across all kinds of people, but his IBL team skipper puzzled him no end.

Singhania had a very simple technique for getting strong, important men by their unmentionables. He opened doors to a fantasy land—a king-sized life with wine, women, money, casinos, luxury travel, horse racing, fashion shows, models, actresses, F1-racing, the works. One taste of Singhania’s sinful extravagance enslaved them for life. The trick had worked, almost without exception, for decades. Powerful world leaders, businessmen, stock market gurus, film stars, financial musclemen, self-styled spiritual gurus—they were all in Singhania’s bottomless pockets. But Rocky hadn’t taken Singhania’s bait so far. On the contrary, he showed an attitude Singhania was unable to understand at all. Last year, when they lost the final, Rocky hadn’t offered the usual excuses, apologies, promises of better results next time. He had simply said, ‘This is sport. Sometimes you lose too,’ before walking off. If his own son had displayed such behaviour, Singhania would have slashed his pocket money to $1,00,000 and taken back his Micro Light. To him, Rocky was the burden he could neither carry nor drop.

Rocky watched his boys, the Bangalore Bangers, as they strolled around the airport terminal. They looked like a happy bunch and could easily be mistaken for a group of college boys browsing the duty-free shops, sharing laughs, doing the stuff boys their age usually do. Rocky couldn’t hide the smile on his face when he saw them turn as one to gape at a group of air hostesses walking by and then look at each other with sheepish smiles. Such juvenile indiscretions aside, he was confident that he had a good team with him. They were talented and probably too young to know fear.

Rocky had always believed that IBL was a great platform for showcasing young talent. ‘It’s like Indian Idol, where you can perform and get noticed immediately. It’s almost like an overdrive gear for your career,’ Rocky had said of IBL in a TV interview just a few days ago. But tonight, sitting in the VIP lounge, he was having doubts about the effect of IBL on these young minds.

He had already seen the chasm between IBL and international cricket when he had selected a couple of players for the Indian team based on their IBL performance the previous season—neither of them had come up to scratch. IBL, though highly competitive, was simply not the the same as top-class international cricket. Rocky looked back at his own life and thought of all the years he had struggled before making it to the Indian team. He had played domestic cricket for five years, travelled by train and bus to small towns to play local cricket. He had played in the worst conditions possible, worked for days, weeks and months on his technique and waited patiently for the national team to call him up.

As he watched his young wards pick out bottles of cologne at the duty-free stores, he feared that they might become rich and famous superstars without having done the hard work. Nothing was worse than fruit without labour, he thought. It killed ambition, destroyed perspective and character. A few months ago, at the Hindu Times Leadership Summit, he had shared the stage with Wipro chairman Azim Premji, who had said, ‘When you retire, you don’t remember which deal you won or how much money you made for the company. All you remember is how many leaders you nurtured and created.’ Rocky looked at some of the talented young players at his disposal, many of them still in their teens, and felt a sense of fatherly responsibility towards them. He made a mental note to try and shepherd them in the right direction through IBL.

After the Bangalore Bangers had checked in, the Haryana Hurricanes started streaming in. A buzz went around the airport terminal as Abhimanyu Singh’s famous flame-red Ferrari slowly found its way into the drop-off area. As always, he parked his baby in the middle of the road and opened its spaceship-like door. He struggled a little, though, as he stepped out of the swanky car. His recently acquired flab had made him a man of sizeable proportions and the sports car was turning out to be too small for his bulk.

All hell broke loose as Abhimanyu stood next to his car—photographers went berserk, mobile phones went click-click-click, girls started screaming ‘Abhi, I love you!’ and ‘Marry me, Abhi!’ from behind the police barricade. Like royalty, Abhimanyu left the car door open, took charge of the bags trolley pre-arranged for him and walked into the terminal with his usual swagger and the ‘what-the-fuck’ expression that he had been wearing since he lost the captaincy race. Soon his mates surrounded him with high–fives, handshakes and raucous chatter. The predominantly north Indian team was in high spirits.

But suddenly, there was a distinct change in the air. There was distaste on people’s faces as they turned towards the entrance to the terminal. Abhimanyu turned around too and muttered, ‘O teri penh di!’

Prasanth had arrived.

Prasanth was quite a talented fast bowler. Unfortunately, that was where the good news ended. He behaved like a Rottweiler on the field and a yappy poodle off it, making everybody— cricketers and cricket lovers—treat him with a certain measure of disgust. Prasanth, however, had one skill that was unmatched—there was not a skin in the world he could not get under, nor a man whose patience he could not test.

No Adonis to begin with, he had edited and reedited his appearance over the years with less than aesthetic results. He had large teeth, two large holes for a nose and eyes that nearly popped out of his head. A narrow strip of skin separated his eyebrows from his thick, curly hair, which was a constant source of consternation for him. Long, medium, short, he had tried it all. And for IBL, he had gone for the kill—severely straight hair with green and blue highlights.

Prasanth posed a strange problem for Abhimanyu. Haryana Hurricanes was already reeling with injuries and unavailability of their fast bowlers, so much so that they had had to do a last-minute transfer of a fast bowler from Calcutta Cavalry. Prasanth, along with his supreme repellent powers, also possessed a mean swing. On days when he got it right, he could run through the best of batting line-ups. Abhimanyu had gambled and kept Prasanth in the team for that one day when he would get it right, risking public embarrassment, internal dissent and mental instability. Would he pay too high a price for it? He hoped not.

An hour or so after Haryana Hurricanes, Calcutta Cavalry took off from the drenched runway of Mumbai’s international airport and faced turbulence as their flight struggled to stay on course to Heathrow. Their soon-to-be-dethroned captain Gautam Sarkar was relishing his glass of champagne with his feet up, comfortably seated in the last row of the first-class cabin. The last to board the flight, he had walked straight past owner Sigwald Raees Kahn, coach Jeff Buccaneer and CEO Sanjoy Roy Choudhry without so much as a glance at them and taken the seat farthest from them. Experience told him that something would happen on the flight and he didn’t want to make it too easy for them; they would have to walk a little distance in order to get to him. Soon enough, the flight was under control and the seat belt sign was switched off. From the corner of his eye, he caught sight of Sanjoy Roy Choudhry walking towards him. Sanjoy stopped near Gautam’s seat, squatted down and rested his six-foot frame on his toes.

‘Gautam, Boss wants to talk to you. Some important stuff needs to be discussed,’ Sanjoy said softly.

Gautam looked directly at him and replied, ‘It’s been a long day, Sanjoy. I am not in the mood right now. Tell him we can talk tomorrow in London.’

‘Dada, it’s kind of urgent. Come, na,’ Sanjoy pleaded nervously.

‘Na re. Ekhon na. Porey. Tell him I’ll be much fresher to talk about anything tomorrow. Now is not a good time,’ Gautam said, enjoying Sanjoy’s anxiety.

‘Please, dada. Please,’ Sanjoy said with a smile and a wink, almost begging.

‘Nope,’ Gautam replied sternly and turned his attention to his magazine, signalling the end of the meeting.

Sanjoy waited a few seconds, then stood up and walked away. Gautam watched as Sanjoy walked up to Kahn and conveyed the message. He