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I am penning down this article a few hours before the start of the much anticipated final of IPL 3. As one reads through this article, they would get to realise that this article could not have been published at a more inopportune time!!!!.

 
IPL as a product has been a resounding success. The ever burgeoning viewership and the patronage the matches have received in terms of in-stadia attendance bears ample testimony to the fact that IPL has been a product which has been marketed well. Is IPL doing a fair bit to restore an even contest between bat and ball? The answer to that question is certainly an emphatic No.
 
All top flight sportsmen, international cricketers included, derive utmost pride and satisfaction in winning under testing or trying conditions. T20 as a format of the game and IPL being the chief patron of this format have ensured that there is no contest between bat and ball there by robbing the protagonists of any testing or trying conditions. Bowlers in the IPL have been more or less reduced to the role of bowling machines waiting for their turn to get slaughtered. The day may not be far off, when bowlers are replaced with bowling machines as anyway both get to serve the same objective of being mute spectators in a contest designed to provide perverted entertainment in the form of fours and sixes.
 
The T20 format ensures that there is no emphasis on art of innings building as the likelihood of being bowled out under 20 overs is very remote. This scenario provides a license for lot of average players to go for broke from the word go and be successful. This format of the game forces even puritans like Rahul Dravid to try out ungainly heaves over Mid-wicket, certainly an eye sore to watch and not definitely Rahul’s cup of tea!!!!. Even top notch bowlers like Dale Steyn get the stick from average batsmen and this format of the game ensures that the skills needed to succeed as a batsman are highly commoditised!!!!.
 
I have chronicled enough about the pitfalls in the T20 format of the game in terms of lack of contest between bat and ball. How could IPL take the cue in restoring the balance in T20 so that this format does not get to canibalise Test Cricket and 50-50 onedayers? Given the financial muscle of IPL and the clout it enjoys among ICC bigwigs, a few game changing moves could be introduced by IPL, if it succeeds it would be eventually embraced by ICC and become de-facto ones in any T20 format.
In the next version of IPL, the following changes could be looked at. Do away with the first 6 overs of batting power play; this would give some cushion to bowlers in the form of a spread out field. Allow 2 bouncers per over so that fast bowlers could prey on weakness of some of the batsmen against short pitched stuff. This would also ensure that batsmen cannot instinctively get on to the front foot at will and cart the bowlers out of the park.
Do away with the free hit rule as already there is enough in this format stacked against the hapless bowlers!!!!. Increase the length of the boundary there by making the fours and sixes hard earned. During IPL 3, the boundaries in some of the venues were so short that even mis-hits found its way to the boundary or beyond the boundary!!!. The last recommendation, possibly the key one is to restrict the batting side to 5 wickets per outing instead of the current 10 wickets per outing. Each side would field 11 players but utmost 6 players can get to bat in the 20 overs. The batting side would have flexibility to choose the 6 players who would get to bat. This would ensure that the tactical acumen plays a key role and it would also ensure that the art of innings building gains some semblance of significance.
 
IPL can certainly look at implementing the above recommendations for the betterment of the game. Do they have the hunger and determination to do it possibly at the expense of a few billion dollars!!!!?