New franchise Kochi perhaps showed their IPL inexperience during the bidding process by picking an unbalanced squad of players: nine of the 17 players they bought were bowlers.

There are two left-arm spinners - Ravindra Jadeja and Steve O'Keefe, two off-spinners – Muttiah Muralitharan and Rames Powar, one leg-spinner - Steven Smith - and four medium-pacers - Sreesanth, RP Singh, Thissara Perera and R Vinay Kumar.

They only captured one Indian batsman and that was VVS Laxman, who is more of a test match specialist.

Their other purchases were all foreigners - Mahela Jayawardene ($1.5m), Brendon McCullum, Brad Hodge, Owais Shah and Michael Klinger.

Because of the rule allowing only for overseas players per match, they will be forced to field relatively unknown Indians in every match.

Strengths

Jayawardene is a shrewd captain and a marvellous batsman. Like Tendulkar, he achieved great consistency in last year's IPL with the most beautiful, orthodox strokeplay.

Brad Hodge has retired from first-class cricket, but remains one of Australia's best Twenty20 specialists, and Brendon McCullum has the ability to take attacks apart.

In the bowling department, RP Singh was the highest wicket-taker over the first three seasons of the IPL, and Muralitharan has declined only slightly from his dizzying peak.

Another possible Kochi strength is the versatility of their bevy of all-rounders, which includes the big-hitting Thisara Perera, John Hastings, Steven Smith and Ravindra Jadeja.

Weaknesses

Kochi arguably have too many overseas players, which will compromise the selection process, and they also have too many bowlers, which leaves them lacking depth if key batsmen lose form or get injured.

Kochi really needed more Indian batsmen, but they were outbid for both Gautum Gambhir and Yousuf Pathan.

The seam bowling could also be a problem. RP Singh has been effective in the first three years of the IPL, but the performances of Sreesanth and Vinay Kumar have been erratic in Indian’s domestic cricket

Key men: Mahela Jayawardene, Muttiah Muralitharan, Owais Shah

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