Team Profiles
Mumbai Profile
Team Mumbai will be led by Master Blaster Sachin Tendulkar in the Twenty20 Championship. Sachin also happens to be the Icon Player of the team.
Lalchand Rajput, the former Manager of the Indian Cricket Team will coach this star-studded side. The rights for the Mumbai franchise were purchased by the Mukesh Ambani-owned Reliance Industries Limited through its subsidiary Reliance Retail Ltd. It was purchased for a whopping $111.9 million during the auction on January 24, 2008. This consequently made the Mumbai the most expensive franchise in Championship. The team logo is the Sudharshan Chakra and team colour is blue.
Through the player auction, Mumbai fruitfully bid for 7 players. This includes two of the heroes of Indian Twenty20 World Cup side in Harbhajan Singh and Robin Uthappa. Sanath Jayasuriya was also another high-quality catch, alongside South African veteran Shaun Pollock. Flamboyant Sri Lankan speedster Lasith Malinga was also added to the team. Outside of the player auction, the franchise has also signed up Ajinkya Rahane and Abhishek Nayar (both from Mumbai), Yogesh Takawale (wicketkeeper-batsman from Maharashtra) and Pinal Shah (wicketkeeper-batsman from Baroda). Delhi's Ashish Nehra and Western Australia's striking wicketkeeper-batsman Luke Ronchi are two priceless assets added to the Mumbai outfit. Saurabh Tiwary and Manish Pandey, the stars of the ICC Under-19 World Cup winning team were the chance picks drafted in through the second auction.
There will be high expectations from the Mumbai setup as it is also the home-team of Sachin Tendulkar who will play the role of skipper. Being the costliest franchise, the Mumbai team will look to prove their worth and mettle.
Chennai Profile
Team Chennai will be led by Indian cricket star Mahendra Singh Dhoni,the highest paid player in the championship. The outfit will be coached by Kepler Wessels. However, the team has no Icon Player. Chennai are one of the three franchises with no icon player. The lack of an icon player benefited the team during the bidding as they managed to bid profitably on two of the six A-listed players - Dhoni and Muttiah Muralidharan. In addition the list of players already attained, the team will pick the lingering members from the three catchment areas - Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Railways - that have been assigned to it. The team has decided to have twenty three players on its roster.
The name was picked to pay tribute to the rulers of the golden era of Tamil culture, the team logo has a lion to reflect the King of the Jungle. In addition, the word "Super" is informally used in the state of Tamil Nadu to reflect all things exhilarating and thrilling and is a word on the lips of almost everyone there. The name is also from Coromandel Super King cement, a brand of cement promoted by the India Cements group, of which N. Srinivasan (Treasurer, BCCI) is the Vice-Chairman and Managing Director. The crown in the logo is also borrowed from the cement brand. Incidentally the Chennai team playing in the ICL (the rebel league) is named as "Chennai Superstars". The franchise is owned by India Cements, who paid a spectacular $91 million to get hold of the rights of the franchise for the next decade.
Former India Test player Kris Srikkanth is the brand ambassador for the franchise, and another former Indian opener VB Chandrasekhar will be the chief selector. The brand ambassadors for the team will be South Indian actor, Vijay and actress, Nayantara. The MA Chidambaram stadium (often referred to as Chepauk, the place where the stadium is located) will be the home ground of the team. The theme song of Chennai, penned by Vairamuthu, is composed by Mani Sharma and directed by Rajeev Menon. Being MS Dhoni's team, the Chennai will have a huge fan following and they will be keen to not let down their fans
Delhi Profile
Team Delhi is owned by the GMR Group. The group is in to energy and infrastructure sectors and is based in Hyderabad. Grandhi Mallikarjun Rao is the Chairman and Managing director of GMR group. The team will be under the captaincy of Virender 'Triple Centurion' Sehwag. He is also designated as the Icon Player for the franchise. During the franchise auction for the Indian Premier League teams, GMR Group acquired the rights for the Delhi franchise for $84 million.
Along with Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Tillakratne Dilshan, Manoj Tiwary and Shikhar Dhawan will be the specialist batsmen in the team. Veteran New Zealander Daniel Vettori was a prize catch along with wicketkeeper-batsman AB de Villiers of South Africa. Dinesh Karthik is the other keeper option.
Pakistani all-rounder Shoaib Malik is also a part of the team. The pace bowling department of the outfit looks strong as it houses legend Glenn McGrath and Pakistani speedster Mohammad Asif. The others who constitute the team are Sri Lankan all-rounder Farveez Maharoof, Ranji Trophy players - Rajat Bhatia and Mithun Manhas and under-22 all-rounder Mayank Tehlan. Yo Mahesh, Pradeep Sangwan and Australian Brett Geeves are also a part of the outfit.
Bollywood superstar Akshay Kumar has been signed as the brand ambassador. The team looks a formidable opposition with the likes of Sehwag and McGrath, and will look to make most of the challenge and give it their maximum.
Mohali Profile
Team Mohali is the one of the sports franchises in the Twenty20 Championship. They are based in Mohali. The team will be captained by Yuvraj Singh. He is also the Icon Player of the franchise. The team will be coached by Australian Tom Moody. The CEO will be Neil Maxwell who has been a part of the Australian domestic circuit. The owners of the franchise include Bollywood actress Preity Zinta, Ness Wadia - Joint Managing Director of Bombay Dyeing, Karan Paul of the Apeejay Surendra Group and Mohit Burman of Dabur.
The group paid a total of $76 million to acquire the franchise. In addition to Yuvraj, the team also contains the promising Indian all-rounder Irfan Pathan, Aussie speedster Brett Lee and the Sri Lankan duo of Mahela Jayawardena and Kumar Sangakkara in its ranks. Indian speedsters S Sreesanth, spinner Piyush Chawla, and VRV Singh also constitute the team. The team will be looking to put up a good show and give some tough competition to all their rivals.
Kolkata Profile
Team Kolkata will be captained by former captain Sourav Ganguly who is also the Icon Player for the team. John Buchanan will coach the team. The name of the team was revealed on March 10, 2008 with an official team unveiling ceremony on March 11, 2008. The official theme of the team is "Korbo, Lorbo, Jitbo Re" (We will do it, Fight for it, Win it) and has been created by Bollywood's Vishal-Shekhar duo. Since Black stands for the valor of Indian goddess Maa Kali and gold stands for the spirit of winning, the official colors are black and gold. The jersey was created by Bollywood fashion designer Manish Malhotra. The franchise was bought on January 24, 2008 by Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan's Red Chillies Entertainment in a joint venture with actress Juhi Chawla and her husband, Jai Mehta.
The emblem of the team consists of a scorching golden Viking helmet against a black background with the name of the team Kolkata written in gold. The tag line of the team is 'All the King's Men.' The team also has a mascot named Hoog Lee, who is a lazy Royal Bengal Tiger and loves to eat burgers. The name of the team was chosen after a lot of research. The name Knight Riders has been chosen keeping in mind the appeal to kids and youth. The squad consists of Windies all-rounder Chris Gayle and Kiwi wicketkeeper batsman Brendon McCullum. Also, the most successful captain in world cricket Ricky Ponting follows suit with a bowling attack including India's latest pace sensation Ishant Sharma and Pakistani Umar Gul. Others include Ajit Agarkar, Murali Karthik and David Hussey. The team looks a very balanced one and will be looking forward to battle it out with any team that comes between them and victory.
The Pink City will be embodied by Team Jaipur. The team will be led as well as coached by Aussie spin legend Shane Warne. The team has no icon player. It is the only IPL team to have a foreign captain and playing coach. The team's mascot is a lion named Moochu Singh. The team anthem is 'Halla Bol', and has been sung by Ila Arun. The Jaipur franchise is owned by Emerging Media Group. The group acquired the franchise for $67 million. Jaipur was the least active franchise during the player auction. The team does not have a designated icon player, which saved a lot of cap space for the franchise.
However, the franchise was startlingly low-key during the auction, and in the end got reprimanded by the organizing committee for failing to meet the minimum bidding criteria of $3.3 million. The highest bid by Jaipur was for the Indian middle order batsman Mohammad Kaif, who came off the board at $675,000. The Royals are only one of its kind in the Twenty20 tournament as they are the only side to have an English cricketer in their squad, Hampshire's all rounder Dimitri Mascarenhas. Despite being the most low-profile team in the auction, they will look to capitalize on their strengths and emerge victorious.
Bangalore Profile
Team Bangalore is owned by liquor tycoon Dr. Vijay Mallya, the chairman of UB Group. Charu Sharma will fulfill the role of the team's CEO and Rahul Dravid, the captain is also its Icon Player. Martin Crowe, the former New Zealand captain, has also been signed as a member of the team management. Venkatesh Prasad, the former Indian fast bowler and the current bowling coach of India has been affirmed as the coach for the team.
The Bangalore team was won by Dr. Vijay Mallya, who paid US$111.6 million for it. This was the second highest bid for a team, next only to Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries' bid of $111.9 million for the Mumbai team. The team has quite a few big names associated with them as they have signed Indian film stars Deepika Padukone, Katrina Kaif, Upendra and Ramya as the brand ambassadors.
Dr.Vijay Mallya wished to correlate one of his top-selling liquor brands, either "No. 1 McDowell's" or "Royal Challenge" with the team.. The jersey colours of the team are red and golden yellow, and the insignia consists of the RC crest with 'Bangalore' in standard format. The players in the team, except for Rahul Dravid who was the Icon Player, were chosen in an auction carried out by BCCI on 20 February 2008. South Africa's Jacques Kallis at $900,000 became the priciest player to be selected to play for the Royal Challengers. This meant that Rahul Dravid, being the Icon Player would be paid $1,035,000 (15% more than the highest bid player in the team). Other players incorporated are the Indian Test cricket captain Anil Kumble along with his team-mates Praveen Kumar and Zaheer Khan. West Indian Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Aussies Nathan Bracken and Cameron White, South Africa's Mark Boucher (wicketkeeper) and Dale Steyn all form a part of the team.
It is widely known that the franchise owner Dr. Vijay Mallya plays to win and he would wish the team to do the same. Since the line-up includes stars like Anil Kumble and Rahul Dravid, expectations will be running high.
Hyderabad Profile
VVS Laxman has been appointed captain of Team Hyderabad and the outfit will be coached by Robin Singh who presently is also the fielding coach of the Indian cricket team. There is no Icon Player for the team. The Hyderabad franchise is owned by Deccan Chronicle. The media group obtained the franchise for $107 million on January 24, 2008. Group M shortly picked a 20% stake. The Chargers were amongst the most aggressive bidders during the first player auction. The franchise added a lot of fiery power in batting by attaining some notorious big hitters like Adam Gilchrist, Andrew Symonds, Shahid Afridi, Scott Styris and Herschelle Gibbs. In totaling to all these players, the franchise also includes the Indian test player VVS Laxman, who is a Hyderabad local. They are also utilizing the services of well-known pacers RP Singh, Nuwan Zoysa and Chaminda Vaas. It's been declared by the franchise that Laxman will captain the side during the tournament.
VVS Laxman was supposed to be the Icon Player for the Hyderabad, but this meant that the players mentioned above could not be bought as Icon Players earn 15% more than the highest earner in the team. However, VVS Laxman renounced his Icon Player Status, and instead of earning $1 million like other Icon players he earns $375,000, which allowed the team to buy the big names and still remain under the salary cap. The team appears strong on all fronts and will hopefully provide riveting action throughout the tournament.
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