Cash, Kings and Kohli: Shane Warne on the IPL's $2.5 billion juggernaut

He's one of cricket's most celebrated and pioneering stars, but buried among Shane Warne's myriad of honors with Australia lies a largely unheralded Indian Premier League title.
It is an accolade pinned onto the end of his playing days, won at a time when such competitions were met in some quarters with disdain, cast off as exhibitions and little more than a final payday.
Yet, leading the Rajasthan Royals to an IPL title in 2008 is, perhaps, among Warne's most underrated achievements. And as the event's 12th edition prepares for takeoff, there have been few more significant figures in the tournament's history.
Inextricably linked to Test cricket -- the game's traditional pinnacle -- by virtue both of his rule over the format and the era in which he dominated the sport before the Twenty20 juggernaut had reached full flight, it is easy to forget Warne's importance to the IPL in its early days.
He played a key role in easing initial skepticism over a competition that has since revolutionized cricket.
His Rajasthan Royals team had been widely discounted as a threat. As Warne recalls, speaking to CNN: "The only consistent thing in 2008 was that everyone wrote us off and said the Royals would come last."




He was both captain and coach. Of the eight brand new franchises, the Royals were the least glamorous, without a star Indian name, and had cost the least ($67 million) when the outfits were initially to put up for auction.
Yet, he led his Jaipur-based side to glory in the inaugural competition. In a league founded on gluttonous wealth, it was -- in relative terms -- a victory for the little guy. The story ignited a flame, a fire that burns brighter than ever 11 years later.


An 'underdog story'

"I think [we] helped give the IPL credibility because the underdog came good," Warne says.
"To then go and win it in the style we did, that put the IPL on the map. Any underdog story like that -- you look at Leicester City, what they did. It's a pretty amazing story.
"I was very lucky to play in an era of Australian cricket where we were super-successful. We beat every team home and away, won World Cups, Ashes series, so we had some huge results.
"To be part of all of that with the Aussies and do those things was great but the IPL, it was completely different," he explains.