The IPL has contributed to the career growth of many players, both in India and around the world. Players who score goals and hit sixes on the field often threw parties after matches. The atmosphere of glamour off the field and the cohesion between players and franchise owners make the IPL special.
Recently, two veterans of the Indian team, Keshav Pujara and Irfan Pathan, shared interesting stories from the early seasons of the IPL and the night parties.
Keshav Pujara, who won the title with Chennai Super Kings (CSK) in 2021, appeared very composed on the field. Besides sports, Pujara was always punctual in his personal life. He recounted that his father had taught him to wake up early since childhood. However, the atmosphere in the IPL was completely different.
According to Pujara, the post-match parties would start around midnight or two in the morning. Being a punctual person, he would arrive first, but the other players would show up closer to three in the morning. Pujara would stay back a bit to sleep in his room, and in the morning, as usual, he would come to the dining hall for breakfast at 7:30 AM.
When Pujara first saw the other players at breakfast early in the morning, he thought they, like him, were used to waking up early. But later he learned the truth: the players weren't sleeping; they came to breakfast right after the night party, unrested, and planned to go to bed after eating.
During this conversation, Pujara also admitted that meeting Shahrukh Khan when he played for Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) was an important moment for him. On the other hand, Irfan Pathan told a funny story from IPL 2009. At that time, he played for Kings XI Punjab (now Punjab Kings). The team was losing matches consecutively, and the atmosphere was tense.
At that moment, the team co-owner and Bollywood actress Preeti Jinta offered the players a unique condition to boost morale. Preeti told the team that if they won the next match, she herself would prepare potato porridge for everyone.
This amusing promise worked: the team won the next match, and Preeti Jinta personally prepared the porridge and treated the entire team. Pathan highly appreciated Preeti Jinta, noting that she never lost her composure despite the string of defeats and always maintained the players' morale.
