A Couple of Positives

Okay, I know the IPL is so last week. Will post this anyway.

Common knowledge (or is it assupmtion?) holds that this year's edition of IPL was more crass, garish and commercial than ever. It didn't help that the quality of cricket was seen to be a curate's egg - for example, terrific rebound catches on the boundary happened with the same regularity as schoolboy-esque fielding errors. And yet, a couple of subtle developments (yes, IPL and 'subtle') appear to point to an improved future.

First, the retention of Jeremy Coney and the addition of Dominic Cork to commentary team. Their laid-back, dry tones were the perfect antidote to the hysterical drivel spewed out from the likes of Shastri and Morrison. Could this be the first signs of restoring some balance to the art of covering games?

Also, we must applaud SET MAX for bringing in Anjum Chopra as an analyst. I wrote a post last year observing how the role of women in covering cricket was being unfairly stereotyped, but including the erudite and knowledgable Chopra (it helps that she plays the game, I suppose) on their panel is a move in the right direction for a channel which gave Mandira Bedi a career outside the Hindi soap world. Better late than never.

Maybe it's too much to hope for, but these developments seem to indicate that the broadcasters are slowly coming to terms with the fact that their overall package is loaded with a little too much frivolity. Slowly but surely, could we be moving back to some relatively restrained coverage in a few years' time?