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London: After months of watching a billion-dollar build-up with a mixture of admiration and nervousness, the British media gave the thumbs-up to the Indian Premier League (IPL), saying it heralded the future of global cricket. "Cricket, as we know it, did not end on a steamy evening in Bangalore. What happened, on this eagerly awaited first night of the IPL, was the seamless transfer of a 21st-century form of the game to its most natural habitat," wrote the correspondent of The Times. Hype The Telegraph noted: "Grace Road, Canterbury and Chelmsford - hosting county matches yesterday -- seemed a million miles away. "It was the difference between a local karaoke night and a Madonna concert."
The Guardian reported that the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB), which has strongly discouraged England cricketers from playing in the IPL in 2008 and 2009, now planned to set up a Twenty20 league of its own - but based on the existing 18 county teams rather than any new city-based ones. "But for all the well-meaning - if belated - intentions, it was hard yesterday evening to imagine an international event in England matching the IPL for sheer unadulterated hype. "The opening ceremony in itself was worth the entrance fee, the laser show and firework display providing a devastating counterpoint to the feeble efforts at Lord's at the start of the 1999 World Cup," the paper said. And with Brendon McCullum of the Kolkata Knight Riders launching into a record-breaking murderous 158, "not even the most outlandish pre-tournament hype could have written this script".
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