Franchise History

The Deccan Chargers franchise is owned by Deccan Chronicle. The media group acquired the franchise from IPL for $107 million on January 24, 2008. It is announced that from 2009 season onwards the team will change its jersey(from beige-black to sparkling silver-blue), logo and also the team will have much more hype in it.^[2]

[edit]2008 IPL Season

Despite the fact that the team was one of the favourites to win the inauguaral edition of the IPL, the team failed to reach the semi-finals. In addition, Andrew Symonds (Deccan's most expensive player) batted only 3 innings before leaving to play for the Australian national team, and team captain Laxman had his season ended by an injury after 6 games. Only 3 Deccan bowlers, R. P. Singh, Pragyan Ojha and Shahid Afridi, took more than 4 wickets in the competition. In this 14 match period, the team went winless at home and only managed 2 wins overall, one against the Mumbai Indians and one against the Chennai Super Kings. They finished at the bottom of the table.

[edit]Players

The franchise acquired players like Adam Gilchrist-The Great, Andrew Symonds, Shahid Afridi, Scott Styris and Herschelle Gibbs. The main bowlers acquired by the franchise were R.P. Singh, Nuwan Zoysa and Chaminda Vaas. From 2009, the team will be captained by Adam Gilchristwho replaced the captain of the inaugural season, V.V.S. Laxman. In 2008, VVS Laxman was intended to be the Icon Player for the team but he relinquished his Icon Player Status and settled for a signing amount of $375,000, which allowed the team to bid for costly players and still remain under the salary cap.

A huge controversy has risen amidst the Deccan Chargers camp, as their ace player VVS Laxman has reportedly decided not to play for the team again. Laxman, a senior Indian batsman, is upset by the way the owners have overlooked his contributions and sacrifices and named Adam Gilchrist as the captain for the next season, without even informing him before-hand. People realized something was wrong when another star player Shahid Afridi accused VVS Laxman of his below-par performance and inability to lead on the field in the inaugural season. A temporary truce was resorted to, but the flames have reappeared soon. Later they have terminated the contract of Shahid Afridi and after team management have snapped their ties with him.

[edit]2009 Season

[edit]New Administration And Support Staff

After the debacle of 2008, the team management have sacked the entire previous administration(their CEO, Managers), the Captain and the entire Coaching Staff except assistant coach Kanwaljit Singh. They have sacked their CEO J.Kalyankrishnan after one week of the 2008 Season, Coach Robin Singh and later Captain V.V.S.Laxman and replaced them with Tim Wright(later he too resigned after violating Foreigners Act), the former Australian batsman Darren Lehmann and former Australia Wicket-Keeper Adam Gilchrist respectively.

[edit]Trading

In a low key trading of players, the Deccan Chargers management had placed Shahid Afridi and Herschelle Gibbs up for sale, a direct result of their below par performance during the 2008 season, however no Franchise owners were interested in acquiring these two players. Due to this the Deccan Chargers management have ceased all ties with Shahid Afridi, due to a disagreement with former Deccan Chargers captainV.V.S.Laxman. They have also released former India all-rounder Sanjay Bangar.

[edit]New-Signings

Before the second player auction took place the management signed Queensland all-rounder Ryan Harris owing to a strong recommendation from Coach Darren Lehmann.

In the resulting auction the Deccan Chargers franchise acquired two West Indian players, Fidel Edwards for a fee of $150,000, and Dwayne Smith for $100,000

They have also signed up six new domestic players, T.Suman and Abhinav Kumar are two batsmen, bowler S.M.Shoaib from the Hyderabadteam signed after their consistent performances on the domestic circuit, M.S.Bisla, a Wicket-Keeper from Himachal Pradesh and two fast bowlers from Punjab, Jaskarandeep Singh and H.S. Bansal.Some have stated that the Chargers' spinner Pragyan Ojha will be their major asset because of his recent performance in all forms of the game.

[edit]CEO Resignation

Chargers new CEO Tim Wright have resigned, after alleged to have committed serious violations of Foreigners Registration Act and this made to resign as CEO of Deccan Chargers. Later team Vice-President Venkat Reddy said that team will not have CEO for 2009 season.

[edit]Logo and Team Jersey

The New Deccan Chargers Logo created for IPL Season 2009.

The New Deccan Chargers Team Jersey created for IPL Season 2009. Team jersey is being sponsored by Sports brand Puma AG.

[edit]Etymology

The Deccan Chargers are represented by a charging bull, the mascot for the chargers which signifies strength, power and aggression .^[3]

[edit]Current Squad

Deccan Chargers Roster view • talk • edit
Batsmen 05 Chamara Silva 08  Herschelle Gibbs 19  V.V.S.Laxman 26  Arjun Yadav 36  Venugopal Rao 45  Rohit Sharma(Vice-Captain) 59  D.B.Ravi Teja --  T.Suman --  Abhinav Kumar 44 Azhar Bilakhia All Rounders 12  Harmeet Singh 50  Dwayne Smith 56 Scott Styris 63  Andrew Symonds --  Ryan Harris		Wicket Keepers 18  Adam Gilchrist(Captain) 11  Halhadar Das --  M.S.Bisla Bowlers 09  R. P. Singh 20  Fidel Edwards 22  Chaminda Vaas 23  Nuwan Zoysa 27  D.Kalyankrishna 30  Pragyan Ojha --  M Sarveesh Kumar --  Jaskarandeep Singh --  P. Vijay Kumar --  S.M.Shoaib		Support Staff Head Coach:  Darren Lehmann Assistant Coaches:  Kanwaljit Singh Assistant Coaches:  Mike Young Physiotherapist: Dr Sean Slattery Strength and Conditioning Coach: Steve Smith → More rosters