Searching for an emblematic image of Indian Premier League cricket thus far? Some brief moment that succinctly frames the experience, such as we have had it? Well, it's early days, of course. But, for now, look no farther, perhaps, than what was technically the last ball of Deccan Chargers' innings against Delhi Daredevils the other afternoon - a six, hit off a beamer so high that it eventually qualified as a no-ball. Somehow those brief seconds of strenuous madness seemed to sum it up.

Twenty20 in a nutcase. Sorry - nutshell.

Hang on, though. What about, from the same match, the over in which Virender Sehwag crashed 30 runs off the bowling of Andrew Symonds? Four! Six! Four again! Six again! Four yet again! Six yet again! Send out for more of those posters with the numbers on. These ones are getting tatty from too much waving.

In the wake of this savaging, the bulky Australia all-rounder with the dreadlocks and the no-nonsense attitude to streakers (he recently stopped one on his right shoulder, you may recall) could not have looked more crestfallen if you had run over his feet in a truck. Such an open display of unhappiness, though, was, you would have to say, unusual. Up to now, everyone in the IPL seems pretty cheerful about life.

Even at moments of duress, when he is getting caned to the boundary by a man in a cast-off baseball outfit, a small smile seems to play about the lips of (for instance) Glenn McGrath. Given the size of the cheque he will be taking home at the end of the month, this probably ought not to surprise us. They say money can't buy happiness, and they may be right. But it still might be worth asking around in the Delhi Daredevils' dressing-room, just in case we're all wrong about this.

Symonds, though, did not, at that point, look like a man who was enjoying his superbly remunerated work. The camera stayed on him in his brooding humiliation and, by all appearances, he had gone to a place from where no amount of money or loudly broadcast Bollywood pop or cheerleaders with tinsel pom-poms could bring him back. We should take heart, I think. There was something true about the moment. At any rate, it was good to know that sport and its unrivalled ability to bring a person to his knees live on even here, in the brightly coloured, made-to-measure artificiality of the IPL.

One development we are especially keen on is the use of nicknames, rather than surnames, on the backs of the players' shirts. You see this often enough on replica tops at football matches, but rarely in international cricket, and it certainly adds to the event's casual intimacy. It might be “McGrath” to the scorers, but it's “Pidge” to you and me. Adam Gilchrist? You must mean “Gilly”. And it's not just been done to make a saving on iron-on lettering, either. Chaminda Vaas is “Vaasy”.

Cute, no? - though it does leave you wondering about the players who choose, despite the option, to go with their formal names. Brett Lee, for instance, who is just “Lee”, albeit in letters that are almost as tall as he is. Does nobody care enough about Brett to give him a nickname? Or are none of the nicknames people give him suitable for reproduction on a globally broadcast shirt?

Certainly, if this takes a hold in the English county game, where a particularly upfront culture of nicknaming thrives, we can expect to see the likes of “Wingnut”, “Spamhead” and “Plonker” taking the field, and maybe it's not, in the end, the tone that the game is looking for.

People putting in the most effort at this point? That's an easy one. It's the cheerleaders. They never stop. And the cameras never stop showing them never stopping. The odd thing being, of course, that you have never seen crowds less in need of leaders for their cheering. This is India, after all, where cricket goes down pretty well of its own accord. And, sure enough, in the IPL so far, a batsman only has to walk out, loosening his shoulders, and it's the Beatles at Shea Stadium all over again. In this context, a girl with a big American smile and a fistful of tinsel could hardly be more surplus to requirements.

We're glad they're around, though. Without them, the commentators would have nowhere to go with the euphemism “razzamatazz”. They also seem to get the local vote, despite the competing spectacle of the cricket. As a poster in the crowd put it, “Cheerleaders rock.” Quite right.

At least the tinsel-thrusters are thematically consistent. IPL is, itself, you could argue, cricket in a short skirt, the only shame being that it isn't taking place in Venezuela, because then we would have to call it VPL, which would be even more appropriate.