Described by many as the worst team on paper, Delhi Daredevils seems to have an advantage over Rajasthan Royals with a great fielding side and more pinchhitters.

Delhi Daredevils

The Delhi Daredevils is a mixed bag team of youth and experience. They have the flashy Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir, who were bagged for $833,750 and $725,000, respectively. Both are good Twenty20 players.

The Delhi Daredevils can also boast of South African AB De Villiers who is in great nick right now, New Zealand Captain Daniel Vettori, and Sri Lankan Tilakratne Dilshan. Daniel Vettori seems to be having a great time in the warm climes of Delhi, considering the toungue in cheek ad spots he has been figuring in on TV in Delhi.

The Delhi team also has youngsters like Rajat Bhatia, Shikhar Dhawan, Mithun Manhas and Mayank Tehlan, Pradeep Sangwan, and Yo Mahesh. All have done exceptionally well in the domestic season recently.

The batting line-up looks well balanced with hitters like Virender Sehwag (Twenty 20 strike rate of 133.6), Gautam Gambhir (Twenty20 strike rate of 129.71), and Del Villiers (Twenty20 strike rate: 103.7), and consistent players like Shoaib Malik Twenty 20 strike rate of 123.01), and Dilshan (Twenty 20 strike rate of 102.94). The line-up is backed up by Dinesh Kartik, Rajat Bhatia, Manhas and Tehlan.

Batsman Rajat Bhatia was instrumental in securing Delhi’s Ranji Trophy win after 16 years.

The bowling line-up looks good with Glen McGrath, Australian ex-strike bowler, who was man-of-the-series in the last World Cup, spinner Daniel Vettori, Mohammad Asif, and Maharoof. Left-arm pacer Pradeep Sangwan was the star of the Under-19 World Cup that India won.

Best Feature: The Daredevils have a superb fielding outfit, with brilliant fielders like Villiers and Dilshan, supported by six very athletic youngsters.

Key Players: Virender Sehwag, Glenn McGrath, and AB De Villiers

Disadvantage: A shaky bowling attack with Asif and Maharoof battling with injuries while Vettori is off to join the New Zeland team’s tour to England.

Rajasthan Royals

The Rajasthan Royals biggest ace-in-the-pack is captain-coach Shane Warne. Considered the finest leg-spinner in the world, Warne is the only non-Indian captain in the DLF IPL tournament. The other big draw is Shane Warne’s archrival Graeme Smith, captain of the South Africa team.

Graeme Smith has a fantastic record with the bat. He has played 115 ODIs and has a strike rate of 82.62. In International Twenty20s, Smith has played 10 matches and has a strike rate of 132.71.

The Rajasthan Royals also have pinchhitter Dmitri Mascarenhas, who has an ODI  strike rate of 116.67 and an International Twenty20 strike rate of 105.41. He is famous for hitting five consecutive sixes off the final five balls of an innings against India in 2007. Mascarenhas is pretty much the Rajasthan Royals trump card.

The Rajasthan Royals also have Mohammad Kaif, Kamran Akmal (Twenty 20 strike rate of 116.92), Sohail Tanvir and Younus Khan (Twenty 20 strike rate of 118.92).

The other players in the squad are Yusuf Pathan, Niraj Patel, Siddharth Trivedi, Ravindra Jadeja, Swapnil Asnodkar, Taruwar Kohli, Jaydev Shah, Sumeet Khatri, Parag More, Mahesh Rawat, Pankaj Singh and Dinesh Salunkhe.

Key Player: Dmitri Mascarenhas

Disadvantage : Graeme Smith will miss the first two matches in the IPL tournament and will be replaced by former Australian batsman Darren Lehman. Smith will be back on April 24, 2008.

“I read about the survey and it has thrown up some interesting figures and I am quite surprised by them. I would be very disappointed if they start putting IPL over country as I think playing for your country is the most important thing,” McGrath said in Delhi today.

The survey in discussion was the one organised by the Australian Cricketers’ Association (ACA), which showed that 47 per cent of the centrally contracted and the 49 per cent of the state players were ready to end their national career for playing in the cash rich Indian Twenty20 tournaments, the Indian Premier League(IPL) and the Indian Cricket League (ICL).

McGrath also hoped that the International Cricket Council (ICC) would make a window in the cricket calendar to accommodate the IPL, so that the players participating in the tournament would not have to dump their international duties. “I hope the ICC works out something to prevent such a situation and nothing of this sort happens.”

McGrath said, “IPL has certainly given 35-plus players a chance to continue playing cricket and it’s a good thing for players like Shane (Warne) and me.” McGrath also expected that the new tournament would also renew his old rivalry with the Indian batting maestro Sachin Tendulkar, who would lead the Mumbai Indians IPL franchisee.

The IPL tournament which kickstarts on April 18 will also see the likes of Andrew Symonds as a member in the Hyderabad team. “We know how passionate the Indians are about cricket and cricketers. I think the crowd here will be excited to see him because is one of the best one-day players at the moment and the Indians know their cricket quite well,” McGrath said.

Virender Sehwag (Captain)
Daniel Vettori
Mohammad Asif
Shoaib Malik
Dinesh Karthik
AB de Villiers
Farveez Maharoof
Tillakaratne Dilshan
Gautam Gambhir
Manoj Tiwary
Glenn McGrath
Rajat Bhatia
Shikhar Dhawan
Mithun Manhas
Mayank Tehlan
Pradeep Sangwan
Brett Geeves

GMR Sports, owner of the Delhi Daredevils team has announced the sponsors for its IPL team. Hero Honda will be the main sponsor for the upcoming Twenty:20 tournament, while Adidas has signed up as the team’s Official Kit Supplier. Vijay Mallya’s has a pie in the Delhi Daredevils team too – Kingfisher is the associate sponsor for the Delhi IPL team. Greg Shipperd, coach of Victoria state in Australia will be the coach, and his assistant David Sacker is the assistant-cum-trainer of the Delhi Daredevils.

Virender Sehwag, captain and icon player of the Delhi Daredevils is confident that he has a match-winning team on his hands.

The Delhi daredevils faced some disappointments too. Ashish Nehra, whom the team wanted, was taken by Mumbai Indians – Sehwag said that he was too expensive for Delhi Daredevils. Ishant Sharma, bowling hero of India’s CB Series tour down under, was snatched up by Shah Rukh Khan’s Kolkata Knightriders. Not a major setback, feels Virender Sehwag.

This is what Sehwag told the media while introducing the Delhi daredevils lineup: “Our team combination is good, it is a balanced side. We have very good batsmen, brilliant bowlers and excellent all-rounders.” Sehwag added that the Daredevils are a young side, and therefore he thinks that they are the best fielding side in the IPL tournament.

The daredevils team has eight international players — Glenn McGrath, Daniel Vettori, Farvez Maharoof, Tillekaratne Dilshan and Brett Geeves, Shoaib Malik, AB de Villiers, Mohammad Asif.

Eight international players, yes. But remember that only 4 international players will be allowed to play in a match. The team practise sessions however would be interesting with a bunch of local lads and myriad accents and an Australian coach. That goes for most of the IPL teams, I guess!

Delhi Daredevils will play their first IPL match against Rajasthan Royals at the Ferozeshah Kotla on April 19, 2008.

Our original daredevils post

Though Australia won a controversy-marred Test series 2-1, India defeated Aussies 2-0 in tri-series Commonwealth Bank trophy.

Sachin Tendulkar said the Aussies never withdrew their players to the deep boundaries during previous tours, but this time it happened, reflecting signs of nervousness in the Aussie camp.

Sachin Tendulkar also said the absence of Shane Warne ((Jaipur IPL) and Glenn McGrath (Delhi IPL) might have hurt the Australian team.

Sachin Tendulkar also urged his young Indian colleagues not to be carried away by the recent success, in a reference to youngsters like pacer Ishant Sharma (Kolkata IPL).