Play hard, play fair: Fair play award winners from all the IPL seasons

The Indian Premier League (IPL) has completely changed the game of cricket over the years and has brought some new dimensions as well. Every year, we see very close and intense matches between sides and players involved give their all to win the games for their respective teams. However, even with so much intensity in games, the IPL has been successful in maintaining sanity and a lot of credit goes to the franchise, players, and the umpires.

To promote fair play, every year, a team is given the fair play award for their good record in terms of on-field behaviour. The winner is decided based on the points the umpires give to the teams playing the match. After completion of each game, the two on-field umpires, and the third umpire, give scores on the performance of both teams.

A team can be awarded a maximum of ten points per match, out of which four points are given on the basis of how the team has maintained the ‘spirit of the game’ in the opinion of all three umpires. Apart from this, the other three criteria are based on respect towards the opposition players and teams, the laws of cricket, and the umpires.

Each of these three criteria carries two points. If a team gets two points in particular criteria, its performance is considered as ‘good’, whereas getting one or zero points signifies that its performance is ‘average’ or ‘bad’ respectively.

CSK top the list in the IPL

Among the 13 seasons which have been held so far, Chennai Super Kings have won the award for the most times (six). However, all these awards came till the 2015 season, and the team has failed to win fair award play since 2016.

Mumbai Indians and Sunrisers Hyderabad have won the award twice, while Rajasthan Royals and Punjab Kings have been successful in winning the award for one season each. The teams, involved in IPL 2021, who are yet to top the list in terms of the fair-play award, include RCB, DC, and KKR.

IPL fair play award winners list: