Batting is not about a brand of cricket, it's about winning games

With IPL at the halfway stage, the strategic timeout throws up an opportunity to look back at what's happened.

- Amrit Mathur

With IPL at the halfway stage, the strategic timeout throws up an opportunity to look back at what's happened. To an extent, it's the usual story—a rerun of the past with bat dominating ball, bowlers looking for cover and teams considering anything less than 200 to be sub-par. The impact player makes cricket a 12 versus 12 contest; the extra batter is an added weapon, a handy option in case the regulars fire blanks.

Quite often, the IPL is reduced to a celebration of power hitting, what a coach would describe as 'last round' batting. IPL earlier had specialist finishers in Pollard, Russell, ABD, Raina, MSD. Now, the coaches and mentors have made a 360-degree switch and the new mantra, patented and exported from Hyderabad, is to maximize the Powerplay.

That's why 60 in the first six is ok, 75 good and 90 is great. The openers are enforcers; they come from the dugout carrying deadly weapons with intent to destroy. IPL is front-foot cricket where total attack is mandatory and every dot ball is a mini disaster.

But this steroid-based IPL doesn't always succeed. This season saw spectacular collapses, most triggered by insane, unintelligent batting. Intent is fine, and one understands players having a positive mindset, but batting that disrespects the match situation is bad cricket.