Former Pakistan captain and bowling coach of Kolkata Knight Riders, Wasim Akram today slammed those criticising the Indian Premier League, saying that they were &quot;jealous&quot; of the cash-rich Twenty20 event&#39;s success and should be &quot;ignored&quot;. &quot;It is sad to see people protesting against IPL. These are jealous people and should be ignored. Let&#39;s focus on the business end of the championship,&quot; Akram said. The veteran of 104 Tests insisted that the Twenty20 tournament was a &quot;great advertisement for pure entertainment&quot;.u00a0 <img alt="Wasim Akram, L Balaji, Brett Lee" src="/imagedata/2012/may/akram.jpg" style="width: 500px; height: 590px; " /> Wasim Akram (right) with Brett Lee (centre). Pic/AFP Akram said that success makes many enemies and IPL was one glaring example of that. &quot;Only successful people have critics. In our culture, there is a tendency to run down a prosperous venture. Make no mistake, IPL is all about success. Every year it is making a positive statement and attracting the best in the world. We have had packed stadiums in almost every game. That&#39;s just great,&quot; the cricketer wrote in his column for &#39;espnstar.com&#39;.u00a0 The fifth edition of IPL has been marred with controversies with a television channel alleging that fixing of matches was rampant in the tournament. KKR co-owner Shah Rukh Khan was involved in a brawl with the Mumbai Cricket Association officials at the Wankhede stadium leading to his ban for five years from the venue.u00a0The chorus against IPL got louder when Royal Challengers Bangalore&#39;s Australian recruit Luke Pomersbach was charged of molesting an American national at the team hotel here. If all these were not enough, Pune Warrior&#39;s cricketers Rahul Sharma and Wayne Parnell were detained by the police after a raid at a rave party.u00a0 However, Akram insisted that the controversies surrounding the IPL have in no way &quot;dampened the spirit of the game&quot;. &quot;Any big event always brings along its share of concerns. Controversies may have surfaced but they haven&#39;t damped the spirit of cricket. Close matches have underlined the beauty of T20 cricket,&quot; he wrote.u00a0

Former Pakistan skipper and KKR bowling consultant Wasim Akram wants cricketers to ignore the people criticising IPL because they are just jealous.

Ignore IPL critics and focus on play-offs: Akram

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Ignore IPL critics and focus on play-offs: Akram

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