How can Kings XI Punjab reach the IPL-2 Semifinals?

kp1Beat Chennai Super Kings and end up with 16 points to secure a 2nd/3rd place on the point-table.

If in the earlier match, Kolkata Knight Riders beat Rajasthan Royals, and Kings XI Punjab lose this match, Kings XI will still stand at par (14 points) with the losing side of the match between Deccan Chargers and Royal Challengers Bangalore. But in that case, the losing team would know in advance what they need to do to keep their run rate better than Kings XI Punjab.

Bottom-line: Beat Chennai Super Kings and secure the semifinal ticket!

How Chennai Super Kings WILL reach the IPL-2 Semifinals?

csk1The ‘Rajasthan Royals Vs Kolkata Knight Riders’ match would be over by the time Chennai Super Kings get to play against Kings XI Punjab.

If Rajasthan Royals win the match, they will end up with 15 points. Chennai Super Kings, in this situation will have to beat Kings XI Punjab to end the marathon with 17 points, sealing the 2nd place for themselves on the table.

The second situation would be… even if Chennai Super Kings lose the match to Kings XI Punjab, they will have to keep their net run rate better than Rajasthan Royals, as a result matching Rajasthan Royals at 15 points. Chennai Super Kings will have an advantage here as they would know in advance what they need to do to keep their net run rate better than Rajasthan Royals.

Now even in this situation, they will have to assume that the match between Deccan Chargers and Royal Challengers Bangalore is not canceled due to rain. In an unlikely event that “Deccan Chargers Vs. Royal Challengers Bangalore” match is declared as a “No result”, there will be a 4 way tie between DC, RCB, CSK and RR with each having 15 points.

Bottom-line: Beat Kings XI Punjab and celebrate!

How can Rajasthan Royals reach the IPL-2 Semifinals?

rrBeat Kolkata Knight Riders by a good margin and end up with 15 points!

Now pray that Chennai Super Kings beat Kings XI Punjab so that Kings XI Punjab remain at 14 points. This way Rajasthan Royals can get the 4th spot on the table, while Deccan Chargers and Royal Challengers Bangalore will have to battle it out between themselves for the 3rd spot (with one of them ending with 16 points and the other with 14 points).

Given Rajasthan Royals win their match and Kings XI Punjab beat Chennai Super Kings in the following match, Chennai can still make it to the semifinals by kicking out Rajasthan Royals because they would know (even if they lose the match!) by what margin they should manage their run rate so that they could still beat Rajasthan Royals on the net run rate factor.

Bottom-line: Beat Kolkata Knight Riders and keep praying that Chennai Super Kings win their match against Kings XI Punjab!

Who gets to decide which teams will reach the IPL-2 Semifinals?

image1Only 2 days left in the league and 3 of the four Semifinal tickets are yet to be finalized.

With Delhi Daredevils through to the semifinal, the rest of the places in the semifinals are yet to be decided. Last week witnessed some very closely contested matches and it hasn’t been easy to guess who will be in the semifinals.

Fans are already going crazy and the cricket madness will be on its peak when the last 4 matches of the league will be played on May 20 and May 21.

While Kings XI Punjab, Chennai Super Kings, Rajasthan Royals, Deccan Chargers and Royal Challengers Bangalore will be fighting their skins out on the last 2 days to secure a place in the semifinals, Delhi Dare Devils, who are already on the top of the table, will continue to experiment. Kolkata Knight Riders who are already out of the contest will be only playing for some respect… perhaps even to ruin the sport-dreams of Rajasthan Royals for their ticket to the semifinals.

This is a really tricky situation… other than how these 5 teams play, there are 3 other factors that will decide the fate of the teams. First is the performance of the Kolkata Knight Riders team, the second being the Net Run Rate and third being the God of Rain.

A look at how the teams are currently placed:

Team

Mat

Won

Lost

Tied

N/R

Pts

Net RR
Delhi Daredevils 13 9 4 0 0 18 +0.251
Chennai 13 7 5 0 1 15 +0.932
Deccan Chargers 13 7 6 0 0 14 +0.265
Bangalore 13 7 6 0 0 14 -0.253
Kings XI Punjab 13 7 6 0 0 14 -0.423
Rajasthan Royals 13 6 6 0 1 13 -0.360
Mumbai Indians 13 5 7 0 1 11 +0.401
Kolkata 13 2 10 0 1 5 -0.891

.

A quick look at the remaining matches in the league:

Date and time The Fixture
Wed 20  16:00 IST Kolkata Knight Riders vs. Rajasthan Royals
Wed 20  20:00 IST Chennai Super Kings vs. Kings XI Punjab
Thu 21   16:00 IST Delhi Daredevils vs. Mumbai Indians
Thu 21  20:00 IST Royal Challengers Bangalore vs. Deccan Chargers

Keep reading CricTalks to know the fate of each of these 5 teams and their chances of making it to the Semifinals.

Virgin IHL Contest – Answer a simple question and win free goodies! [Day 1]

Update: Contest for the Day 1 is over. Both, those who participated and those who missed it,  can take part in Day 2 contest. Winners for Day 1 will be declared on this blog post by May 21st, 3 P.M. by a separate blog post.

So if you haven’t subscribed to CricTalks yet, please subscribe via email or in a feed reader. You will get notifications about new contest as well.

virgin-indian-hatke-leagueThanks to Virgin Indian Hatke League (IHL), CricTalks readers can participate in a simple contest where you can win free IHL merchandise by answering a simple question.

The question is…

Which is your favorite IPL team? why?

Submit your answers in 24 hours via comment form at the end of this post! There are no right and wrong answers, but be creative so that your answer fetches best rating! Yes winner will be decided by you guys only. Next to each comment you will find rating option. So don’t forget to rate others’ answers.

Contest Guidelines:

  1. This will be 5 days event. A new question will be asked daily.
  2. You can participate daily. But you can answer a question only once!
  3. rtCamp staff (including editors and full-time authors employed by rtBlogs network) and their family members can not participate in this contest. Its open for rest of all.
  4. Contest will end on May 20, at 10 P.M. (IST).
  5. All the winners and other details will be declared on CricTalks with a new post.

So if you haven’t subscribed to CricTalks yet, please subscribe via email or in a feed reader. You will get notifications about new contest as well.

All D Best! 😉

Nazara launches games around IPL clubs – Delhi Daredevils & Deccan Chargers

image1Keeping in view the huge popularity of the IPL-2, even Nazara Technologies is trying to cash on the cricket mania by introducing a range of mobile phone games on the Indian Premier League. Nazara has tied up with the various cellular operators for these mobile games such as Airtel, Spice, Idea, Vodafone, BPL, Tata Indicom and Reliance.

The products:

  • Games
  • Wall papers
  • Color logos
  • Themes
  • Videos
  • Ring tones
  • Caller back ring tones

Games around IPL clubs – Delhi Daredevils, Deccan Chargers:

  • The games will be available at Rs.10 allowing the players to play up to 3 times.
  • Unlimited game downloads will be available at Rs.99.

Nazara is a Mumbai-based mobile entertainment company that focuses on the 100 million+ mobile subscriber base in India. They develop a range of branded and original mobile content that is highly relevant to the culturally diverse consumer base in the country.

Nazara has a subscriber base of 1.2 million and it expects to add another one million subscribers in this fiscal.

(Source: EFYtimes)

The mystery of the fake IPL player continues…

image1Last month ‘Akki’ wrote a very interesting post on the Fake IPL player. Like everyone else, it also got me all curious to find out a little more about this mystery man (or woman… who knows!). I seem to enjoy some of the things written on the blog – not for its sleaze, but been for this absurd yet fascinating piece of cricket writing, that has apparently taken the internet world by storm since it was launched on 18 April.

Some time back even Aakash Chopra, a KKR player, was suspected of being the fake IPL player. He says:

“Let’s face it, we as a society love our reality shows and love gossip… we’ve never had access to gossip on cricket and the blog is catering to that need… It’s just one more media product that’s up for consumption in this space.

Undoubtedly, the blog has brought in a new wave of freshness in the world of Cricket. It has sucked in a huge audience as well with its dressing room gossips and interesting tittle-tattles on the lives in the KKR team.

According to the reports from Pinstorm, a Mumbai-based digital marketing firm:

“The fake IPL player blog had at its peak, on 26 April, 150,000 visitors, who each spent 15 minutes on the site, which adds up to about 37,500 hours spent on the blog in one day. Much of the interest in the fake IPL blog has stemmed from cities such as Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai and Bangalore, even though the blogger apparently belongs to the Kolkata team”.

More than 41,502 people have voted already on the fake IPL player blog to determine whether the anonymous blogger should disclose his identity. Of course, the majority (almost 64% of the voters) feels the mystery blogger should stand by his word and disclose his identity at the end of the popular 20-20 cricket tournament.
I suppose the curiosity factor would keep all of us interested in finding out the true identity and face behind this blog. The people all over seem to be enjoying every bit of it… I guess that’s what really matters.

With all the speculations that have been going around, the mystery still continues… Do let us know if you have any clues!

Link: Fake IPL Player

Virgin Mobile’s Indian Hatke League – the lighter side of IPL!

image2Here’s another creative piece of promotional campaign from Virgin Mobile – the Indian Hatke League (IHL) – an entertaining take on the Indian Premier League Cricket tournament (IPL). At the time when the fever of IPL-2 has absorbed the nation altogether, the Hatke League aims to leverage maximum benefits from the season (that started in South Africa on April 18).

This newly launched website is designed by Culture Mafia. It is more of an IPL-2 spoof, and that’s what makes it so much more fun.

M.A. Madhusudan, CEO, Virgin Mobile India says:

“The Indian Hatke League is all about interacting with the Indian youth and giving them a taste of some stimulating entertainment and sense of being part of a cricketing phenomenon in a HATKE way. For the Hatke champions, Virgin Mobile has some exciting prizes such as a Hyundai i20, Sony PSP and Virgin Mobile phones.”

The Matches

  • There will be over 20 day and night matches in this tournament.
  • The user will have the option to play for any of the eight teams participating in IPL-2.
  • Each team will have 11 players.

The Hatke Teams

  1. Kakke’s XI Punjab
  2. Delhi Dhinchaks
  3. Rajasthan Muchhads
  4. Mumbai Manoos
  5. Royal ChillMaadis Bangalore
  6. Deccan ChilliEaters
  7. Kolkata Tram Riders
  8. Chennai Super Muthus

image1

Some Hatke team players

Characters are modeled and named after famous cricket personalities and icons, like:

  1. Sachim Martodkar
  2. Veeru Suhag
  3. Mike Lassi
  4. Hari Bhajji
  5. Lakshmipatni Maalaji
  6. Handdraw Shallowman
  7. Also Ziddu for his wise cracks
  8. And Inzoo for his guru gyaan!

Play the game

  1. Login at IndianHatkeLeague
  2. Register online for an account under the team of your choice
  3. Play the tournament for FREE!
  4. Play as many times as you want
  5. Submit your best score for each match individually

Practice matches?

The player has an option to practice anytime by choosing the team they want to practice against and improve chances of winning during the tournament.

Win Awesome Prizes!

  • Hyundai’s recently launched hatchback i20
  • Sony’s video game console Play Station
  • Virgin Mobile handsets

Prizes worth Rs 10 Lakh for Match Titles

  • Man of the Series
  • Most obsessed User
  • Top 10 fastest Sixes
  • Sixer of the Series

Other Prizes

  • Earn points for recommending a friend to the website that can be redeemed against Virgin Mobile connections for exciting merchandise
  • Play and get special online retail offers on products purchased from Virgin Mobile India website.
  • Download Indian Hatke League wallpapers, and interactive screen savers for free.

It also has come up with community and fan pages, for the teams, promoters and profiles of 50 key players, on social networking sites such as Orkut, Facebook, Twitter etc., for the Indian Hatke League. So don’t just keep sitting there. Register on the website to be a part of the tournament and win exciting prizes.

Link: IHL

Kolkata Knight Riders’ Online Marketing Freebies

image-1No wonder, Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) team has the highest brand value. They might not be a successful team at IPL this season, but they are definitely the best when it comes to marketing and creating brand awareness.

IPL is turning out to be a pure business. Big reputation does not get you bread and butter… if you do not fit into the business, you better be at home! Catch this – Jayasuriya was asked to sit out of the Mumbai Indian’s playing eleven, the other night by Sachin Tendulkar.

So, said that, it does not really matter if KKR are playing well or not, they have done there homework well. The rule is simple – if you are doing a business you need to have your budgets right.

KKR has set aside a good amount of money for their branding and marketing activities and even when they are not playing well, the strategy has been paying them well.  Interesting would be to see, if KKR have been able to get back their costs, after the IPL gets over. Last season, they were truly ahead of all other IPL teams!!

Check out their official website and more importantly check out the download section in it. It is full of online marketing freebies… I guess good enough to keep the fans engaged and keep the buzz alive. 🙂

image-2

The download section features:

  • Web badges including the code that you may use to put on your web pages
  • Free KKR WordPress themes (Now, that’s something interesting)
  • Wallpapers
  • Mobile games & applications
  • Desktop alerts for KKR matches (can the alerts show KKR winning some matches?) 😛
  • Screensavers

Not sure how much all these online marketing strategies help play better cricket but it definitely helps in keeping the fans engaged.

I have not downloaded any of the freebies yet, so I am not sure how well they are designed. But, I am sure many of you would like to try out a few. If you do… then let us know. Also, interesting to know would be if there is any live blog using KKR’s WordPress theme or not.

Till then, let’s keep praying that KKR manages to break their losing streak. (7th consecutive loss today!)

Link: KKR Download page

What you don’t know about Dirk Nannes!

Last Name: Nannes

First Name: Dirk

DOB: 16 May 1976

Country:  Australia

IPL Team: Delhi Daredevils

Batting style: Right Handed-hand bat

Bowling style: Left arm fast medium

What so special about him that I am writing a whole post about him?? Once you finish reading this you’ll know.

So to begin with what age does a person start playing cricket if he wants to take it as his profession?? may be 14-15 at school or at most 16-18 in his high school but not the case with Nannes. He was a pro skier for Australia and participated in world cup.

But then his interest changed and he decided to take cricket as his next profession. At an age of 27-28 he started playing cricket, played for middlesex (English county) and then IPL.

And yeah he has been doing wonders for the DD’s in the IPL2. However, he was not selected for the Australian 20-20 side, instead he was chosen for Netherlands team in Oct 2008 and will soon be seen in the team color.

Wish him luck and to DD’s too. 🙂