Six weeks after the first ball was sent down by Zaheer Khan at Bangalore in the inaugural Indian Premier League, there are a few smiling faces on the domestic circuit, players who otherwise would have turned out for the state teams, performed beyond their expectations, failed to capture selectors' eye and eventually vanished into obscurity.
The IPL circus has scripted a new success story for these small town wonders and paved the way to greater glory. These players were never heard off outside their clubs or state teams and their performances were hardly noticed despite the Ranji League allowing them to play more matches than the earlier system where good players on poor teams hardly got a match or two to showcase their talents.
Of course, there is also another lot of Indian players who were out of favour with Messrs Dilip Vengsarker and company and are staking a claim to be recalled to the test or one-day teams.
Chaps like Suresh Raina, Mohammed Kaif, Laxmipathy Balaji, Ashish Nehra, Yusuf Pathan, Munaf Patel and many more like them got a welcome lease to their cricketing life besides raking in some bucks at the IPL.
However, we are not focussing on these fringe players who made the grade and were usurped by others who performed better in a direct shoot-out of sorts.
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