Feature
RCB take on Sunrisers Hyderabad in IPL opener
Hyderabad: Hampered by injuries to some of their biggest stars, Royal Challengers Bangalore will have their task cut out when they take on defending champions Sunrisers Hyderabad in the IPL lung-opener today evening.
Captain Virat Kohli and star batsman AB de Villiers will be unavailable for today’s match due to injuries. While Kohli is ruled out because of a shoulder injury, de Villiers is nursing a back problem.
They have also lost star batsman KL Rahul for the whole tournament owing to injury. In addition, RCB’s young batsman Sarfaraz Khan will most likely be unavailable for the entire season after hurting himself on the field during a practice match in Bengaluru.
As Kohli is likely to miss the first few matches in the tournament, the team has named Shane Watson as its captain in the interim.
RCB can still bank on Gayle and Watson who are both capable of destroying any opposition on their day. Kedar Jadhav, a rising Indian star, can rise to the occasion and fill the gap caused by Rahul’s absence.
Australian Twenty20 star Travis Head, Indian players Sachin Baby and Mandeep Singh, who have previous experience of playing in the IPL, are also valuable assets in the batting order.
RCB boasts of some deadly bowlers in English paceman Tymal Mills, an expensive buy at the IPL 2017 auction, and Yuzvendra Chahal. Chahal’s six-wicket haul had helped India clinch last year’s series against England.
West Indies’ Twenty20 specialist leg-spinner Samuel Badree, Kiwi pacer Adam Milne and left-arm seamer Aniket Choudhary add to the bowling strength of the Bangalore outfit.
Indian players like Sreenath Aravind, Stuart Binny and all-rounder Pawan Negi are also expected to help the team’s cause.
Sunrisers Hyderabad, on the other hand, are determined to repeat last year’s magic to grab the title. Hyderabad has one of the most formidable batsmen in IPL in its skipper David Warner, who led from the front last season.
Warner opens batting in the company of Shikhar Dhawan, who is keen to make a mark after losing his berth in the Indian national side.
Dhawan was impressive in the recent Deodhar Trophy and would look to carry the good form into the IPL.
Seasoned campaigner Yuvraj Singh also adds to the batting strength of SRH, but the much-talked about middle-order needs to raise the bar, especially in the event of Warner and Dhawan falling short of expectations.
Moises Henriques, Kane Williamson, Naman Ojha, Deepak Hooda, and Vijay Shankar are no pushovers and make for a solid line-up.
The SRH bowling is one of the best in IPL. Though the team would be deprived of the services of Mustafizzur Rahman for tomorrow’s match, the seasoned Ashish Nehra, Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Barinder Sran are quality bowlers, who can turn the match at any given time.
The team has acquired Rashid Khan, a unique leg-spinner from Afghanistan, this year to add to its bowling strength.
All-rounders like Yuvraj Singh, Henriques, Ben Cutting, Mohammad Nabi and Chris Jordan would also be crucial to the team’s fortunes.
The teams (from):
Royal Challengers Bangalore: Shane Watson (C), Sreenath Aravind, Avesh Khan, Samuel Badree, Stuart Binny, Yuzvendra Chahal, Aniket Choudhary, Praveen Dubey, Chris Gayle, Travis Head, Iqbal Abdulla, Kedar Jadhav, Mandeep Singh, Tymal Mills, Adam Milne, Pawan Negi, Harshal Patel, Sachin Baby, Tabraiz Shamsi, and Billy Stanlake.
Sunrisers Hyderabad: David Warner (C), Tanmay Agarwal, Ricky Bhui, Bipul Sharma, Ben Cutting, Shikhar Dhawan, Eklavya Dwivedi, Moises Henriques, Deepak Hooda, Chris Jordan, Siddharth Kaul, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Ben Laughlin, Abhimanyu Mithun, Mohammad Nabi, Mohammed Siraj, Mustafizur Rahman, Ashish Nehra, Naman Ojha (wk), Rashid Khan, Vijay Shankar, Barinder Sran, Pravin Tambe, Kane Williamson and Yuvraj Singh.
The State Scores Extra High on Gaming-Friendly Industry Index
Meghalaya scored 92.85 out of 100 possible points in a Gaming Industry Index and proved to be India’s most gaming-friendly state following its recent profound legislation changes over the field allowing land-based and online gaming, including games of chance, under a licensing regime.
The index by the UK India Business Council (UKIBC) uses a scale of 0 to 100 to measure the level of legalisation on gambling and betting achieved by a state based on the scores over a set of seven different games – lottery, horse racing, betting on sports, poker, rummy, casino and fantasy sports
Starting from February last year, Meghalaya became the third state in India’s northeast to legalise gambling and betting after Sikkim and Nagaland. After consultations with the UKIBC, the state proceeded with the adoption of the Meghalaya Regulation of Gaming Act, 2021 and the nullification of the Meghalaya Prevention of Gambling Act, 1970. Subsequently in December, the Meghalaya Regulation of Gaming Rules, 2021 were notified and came into force.
All for the Tourists
The move to legalise and license various forms of offline and online betting and gambling in Meghalaya is aimed at boosting tourism and creating jobs, and altogether raising taxation revenues for the northeastern state. At the same time, the opportunities to bet and gamble legally will be reserved only for tourists and visitors.
“We came out with a Gaming Act and subsequently framed the Regulation of Gaming Rules, 2021. The government will accordingly issue licenses to operate games of skill and chance, both online and offline,” said James P. K. Sangma, Meghalaya State Law and Taxation Minister speaking in the capital city of Shillong. “But the legalized gambling and gaming will only be for tourists and not residents of Meghalaya,” he continued.
To be allowed to play, tourists and people visiting the state for work or business purposes will have to prove their non-resident status by presenting appropriate documents, in a process similar to a bank KYC (Know Your Customer) procedure.
Meghalaya Reaches Out to a Vast Market
With 140 millions of people in India estimated to bet regularly on sports, and a total of 370 million desi bettors around prominent sporting events, as per data from one of the latest reports by Esse N Videri, Meghalaya is set to reach out and take a piece of a vast market.
Estimates on the financial value of India’s sports betting market, combined across all types of offline channels and online sports and cricket predictions and betting platforms, speak about amounts between $130 and $150 billion (roughly between ₹9.7 and ₹11.5 lakh crore).
Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Delhi are shown to deliver the highest number of bettors and Meghalaya can count on substantial tourists flow from their betting circles. The sports betting communities of Karnataka, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana are also not to be underestimated.
Among the sports, cricket is most popular, registering 68 percent of the total bet count analyzed by Esse N Videri. Football takes second position with 11 percent of the bets, followed by betting on FIFA at 7 percent and on eCricket at 5 percent. The last position in the Top 5 of popular sports for betting in India is taken by tennis with 3 percent of the bet count.
Local Citizens will Still have Their Teer Betting
Meghalaya residents will still be permitted to participate in teer betting over arrow-shooting results. Teer is a traditional method of gambling, somewhat similar to a lottery draw, and held under the rules of the Meghalaya Regulation of the Game of Arrow Shooting and the Sale of Teer Tickets Act, 2018.
Teer includes bettors wagering on the number of arrows that reach the target which is placed about 50 meters away from a team of 20 archers positioned in a semicircle.
The archers shoot volleys of arrows at the target for ten minutes, and players place their bets choosing a number between 0 and 99 trying to guess the last two digits of the number of arrows that successfully pierce the target.
If, for example, the number of hits is 256, anyone who has bet on 56 wins an amount eight times bigger than their wager.
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