IPL 2008 Winners
The first season of DLF Indian Premier League Cricket started on 18th April 2008, with the first match being played between Kolkata Knight Riders and Royal Challengers (Bangalore). The tournament continued over the next 43 days and came to an end on 1st June 2008. The final match took place between Rajasthan Royals and Chennai Super Kings, with the former winning the game and being declared as champions of the series.
Rajasthan Royals, IPL 2008 winners, comprised of Shane Warne, Aditya Angle, Anup Revandkar, Darren Lehmann, Dimitri Mascarenhas, Dinesh Salunke, Graeme Smith, Jaydev Shah, Justin Langer, Kamran Akmal, Mahesh Rawat, Mohammad Kaif, Morne Morkel, Munaf Patel, Niraj Patel, Pankaj Singh, Parag More, Ravindra Jadeja, Shane Watson, Siddharth Trivedi, Sohail Tanvir, Sumit Khatri, Swapnil Asnodkar Taruwar Kohli, Younus Khan, Yusuf Pathan, with Shane Warne being the coach as well as captain.
Rajasthan Royals is owned by Emerging Media group, with the other investors being Lachlan Murdoch, Sir Aditya S Chellaram and Suresh Chellaram. It is chaired by Manoj Badale and was auctioned off for $67 million, which made it the least expensive of the right franchises. The team represents the state of Rajasthan in the DLF IPL T20 Cricket and is the only IPL team to have a foreign captain and coach. Even with no ‘icon player’ amidst its players, Rajasthan Royals managed to become the winners of Indian Premier League Cricket 2008.
In the final match of 2008 Indian Premier League Cricket, Yusuf Pathan was declared as the ‘Man of the Match’. The title of ‘Player of the Tournament’ went to Shane Watson, while Sohail Tanvir got the ‘Purple Cap’ for being the ‘Top Wicket-taking Bowler’. The other honors that were given out on the final day were - ‘Orange Cap’ to Shaun Marsh for ‘Leading Run-scorer in the Tournament’, ‘Best Under-19 Player Award’ to Shreevats Goswami and ‘Special Award for Fair Play’ to Chennai Super Kings (captained by Mahendra Singh Dhoni).
