da betsul：
da supremo： Siddhartha Vaidyanathan11-Mar-2008The second round of IPL auctions are done with and it’s time once again tolook at how the franchises have built their teams for the 44-day tournament.
Misbah-ul-Haq provides the X-factor to the Bangalore Royal Challengers © Getty Images
Tuesday’s show wasn’t as high-profile but was as important for a few franchises. Some, like Hyderabad, had already settled their squads while others like Jaipur had plenty of money left to spend. Others still, like Kolkata and Jaipur, may have ended up with too many overseas signings while Bangalore and Mumbai used the second opportunity to plug the gaps.Like we did after the first auction, we run therule over the eight sides.BangaloreBangalore have a far more balanced look after the second auction. Just when the batting order appeared too conventional for Twenty20, they poached Misbah-ul-Haq, someone who will addthe X-factor. Shreevats Goswami, the Under-19 player acquired on Tuesday, will be the second-choice wicketkeeper. With a bowling attack that’s one of the best in the tournament, Bangalore look a far more flexible unit.Probable XI: 1 Bharat Chipli, 2 J Arunkumar, 3 Rahul Dravid, 4 JacquesKallis/Misbah-ul-Haq 5 Virat Kohli, 6 Cameron White, 7 Mark Boucher (wk), 8Zaheer Khan, 9 Anil Kumble, 10 Nathan Bracken, 11 Dale Steyn/Vinay Kumar.ChennaiIt was a quiet day for Chennai, having bought most of their players in thefirst auction. It’s a squad with a fine balance of local and foreigntalent and plenty of options in both batting and bowling. It’s a side withquality fast bowlers, handy medium-pacers, fine spinners, big hitters, andaccumulators. Mahendra Singh Dhoni, the captain, couldn’t have asked formore.Probable XI 1 Matthew Hayden, 2 Stephen Fleming/ Abhinav Mukund, 3Suresh Raina, 4 Jacob Oram, 5 Mahendra Singh Dhoni (capt & wk), 6 MichaelHussey/S Badrinath, 7 Albie Morkel/Parthiv Patel, 8 Joginder Sharma, 9Napoleon Einstein, 10 Muttiah Muralitharan/ Makhaya Ntini, 11 SudeepTyagi/R Ashwin.DelhiA balanced side with an outstanding fielding unit, it also has enoughlocal talent to give it good shape. The pace department isimpressive but Delhi may still be pondering about spin.Daniel Vettori continues to be the lone specialist spin option, withVirender Sehwag backing up. Overall a side that looks like seriouscontenders.Probable XI 1 Virender Sehwag (capt), 2 Gautam Gambhir, 3 Shikhar Dhawan, 4AB de Villiers/Shoaib Malik/Tillakaratne Dilshan, 5 Rajat Bhatia, 6 ManojTiwary, 7 Dinesh Karthik (wk), 8 Daniel Vettori, 9 Farveez Maharoof/YoMahesh, 10 Mohammad Asif, 11 Glenn McGrath.HyderabadNo need for the second auction here. The franchise spent most of their money the first time and quickly went about signing others from the catchment areas. It’s a power-packed side with a fine mix of local and foreign players. Hyderabad are making the least noise among all the franchises but don’t be surprised if you see them on top of the podium.Probable XI: 1 Adam Gilchrist (wk), 2 DB Ravi Teja, 3 VVS Laxman (capt), 4 Arjun Yadav, 5 Andrew Symonds/Herschelle Gibbs, 6 Venugopal Rao/ Rohit Sharma, 7 Scott Styris/Shahid Afridi/Chamara Silva, 8 Pragyan Ojha, 9 Chaminda Vaas/Nuwan Zoysa, 10 RP Singh, 11 D Kalyankrishna.
The power of Dimitri Mascarenhas will surely boost the Rajasthan Royals © Getty Images
JaipurThey’ve no doubt gained the most from the second auction but are still too reliant on foreign talent. Shane Warne has plenty of options in the squad but he’s allowed only four foreign players – a fact which will restrict the selection of the side. DImitri Mascarenhas, Morne Morkel and Sohail Tanvir are wonderful additions but all might struggle to get picked regularly.Probable XI: 1 Taruwar Kohli, 2 Graeme Smith, 3 Yusuf Pathan,4 Mohammad Kaif, 5 Anup Revendkar, 6 Kamran Akmal (wk), 7 Shane Watson, 8Ravindra Jadeja, 9 Shane Warne (capt) 10 Pankaj Singh, 11 Munaf Patel.KolkataSourav Ganguly is the only high-profile Indian in the batting line-up. With only four foreign players allowed in the playing XI, it leaves them with a brittle middle order. Their only purchases on Tuesday were Iqbal Abdulla and Siddharth Kaul, both bowlers. It means the likes of Laxmi Ratan Shukla and other local players would need to fill the void in the middle.Probable XI 1 Sourav Ganguly (capt), 2 Chris Gayle, 3 Brendon McCullum (wk),4 Ricky Ponting, 5 Laxmi Ratan Shukla, 6 Ajit Agarkar, 7 Murali Kartik, 8Iqbal Abdulla/Saurasish Lahiri, 9 Shoaib Akhtar/Umar Gul, 10 IshantSharma, 11 Siddharth Kaul.MohaliA good second auction but the batting still looks thin on paper.Most of the options are foreign recruits and Yuvraj Singh might struggle to put abalanced XI in place. Ajitesh Argal and Tanmay Srivatsava, though, couldbe fine picks in the long run, with both players touted as futureinternational stars. The bowling line-up has a fine mix – well representedin both pace and spin.Probable XI 1 Kumar Sangakkara (wk), 2 Irfan Pathan, 3 TanmaySrivastava, 4 Yuvraj Singh, 5 Mahela Jayawardene/ Ramnaresh Sarwan/ SimonKatich, 6 James Hopes, 7 Piyush Chawla, 8 Ramesh Powar, 9 Brett Lee, 10Ajitesh Argal, 11 Sreesanth.MumbaiMumbai have a more settled unit now with Manish Pandey and Saurabh Tiwarybeefing up the batting order. The only team without a foreign wicketkeeper[Delhi have AB de Villiers as a back-up option to Dinesh Karthik], Mumbaiwill rely on Pinal Shah from Baroda and Maharashtra’s Yogesh Takawale. Expect fireworks from the top order:Ajinkya Rahane and Robin Uthappa following the two masters, SachinTendulkar and Sanath Jayasuriya.Probable XI: 1 Sachin Tendulkar (capt), 2 Sanath Jayasuriya, 3 Ajinkya Rahane, 4 RobinUthappa, 5 Manish Pandey, 6 Sourabh Tiwary, 7 Shaun Pollock, 8 Pinal Shah(wk), 9 Harbhajan Singh, 10, Lasith Malinga, 11 Dilhara Fernando.