The golden age of cricket can be defined by the careers of two great batsmen,
one a 19th-century Englishman, W.G.Grace, and the other a 20th-century
Australian, Donald Bradman. I was once lucky enough to see Bradman score an
impeccable double century at Taunton.
The silver age of cricket best expressed itself in the Somerset county eleven
of the period around 1980, when one county side had the world's greatest
batsman, Viv Richards, the world's greatest all-rounder, Ian Botham, and the
world's greatest fast-bowler, Joel Garner. Somerset was still unable to win
the county championship, and ended up quarrelling with all three of its
heroes.
The history of cultures is a bell-shaped graph. There is the gilded morning of
discovery and delight; there is the classical centre period, the Augustan
age of the culture; there is the afternoon, with cucumber sandwiches at
tea-time; there is the evening when the night is coming on.
A rather obscure 18th-century clergyman, the Rev James Bramston, described the
process in lines of poetry far above his usual standard. Indeed it had been
suggested that they were supplied to him by a poet of genius, Alexander
Pope. “What's not destroy'd by time's devouring hand? Where's Troy, and
where's the Maypole in the Strand?”
The culture of cricket now seems to be going the way of Troy, or indeed of the
Roman Empire. The glory of cricket, with its intelligence and the complexity
of the interplay, is sinking into the past; we are moving, surprisingly
rapidly, into the dumbed-down cricket of Twenty20. Cricket first developed
on village greens such as Hambledon; it looks as though it may come to an
end at Bangalore.
Why do I instinctively dislike Twenty20 so much? It is not that I ever played
cricket with even the lowest degree of club competence. I did have the good
fortune to be a contemporary of Peter May at Charterhouse. He was the
leading batsman of the under-16 eleven, and I was their scorer.
My objection to Twenty20 is that it purports to be cricket but is a quite
different and much less interesting game. Cricket seems to me to be the most
fascinating of the team games of summer. Twenty20 is a good deal less
interesting than baseball, which is itself less interesting than cricket.
Twenty20 is also less interesting than the other forms of one-day cricket. In
a one-day match of 40 or 50 overs, time is an essential element, as it is in
four or five-day cricket. Different phases in these games call for
well-judged captaincy and varying batting and bowling skills.
No doubt, given the financial rewards, players will emerge who are
particularly suited to the Twenty20 game, but they will be operating inside
a much narrower time frame. Twenty20 compresses the skills as well as the
timing of the game. In particular, it leaves far less room for the skills of
defensive batting.
I also object because Twenty20 is distorted to too great an extent by the
requirements of television and the power of huge sums of money. I enjoy
watching cricket on television, but I do not want cricket to be redesigned
for television. I am all in favour of cricketers - or other sportsmen -
earning large sums of money. Why should they not? W.G. Grace did in his
time. I do not feel that cricket or football, or indeed other cultural
activities, benefit if they are dominated by the hypermoney they attract.
I also find it offensive to see cricket becoming part of a culture of instant
gratification. “We want sixes and we want them now,” is a poor spirit in
which to watch as subtle and flexible a game as cricket.
A well-hit six at a critical point in a Test match can indeed come as a
thrilling surprise; it is a meaningful part of the struggle, but even a good
six can be meaningless by repetition in Twenty20. Sixes can become a bore,
like the battues of pheasants by the thousand at Sandringham in the days of
King Edward VII. Sixes laid on in Twenty20 matches can be mere satiation.
This may indeed prove to be the weakness in the Twenty20 project. Sixes are
not particularly exciting in themselves. They consist of a well-built man
lifting a small plank
of wood and hitting a leather ball a long way. They owe their power to excite
mainly to their context, just as the marzipan on a Christmas cake owes its
appeal to the cake underneath.
One Twenty20 match, as seen on television, is very much like another. No doubt
the new Indian teams will acquire some loyal following in the subcontinent
itself, as the Premier League has its own loyal following in England. But it
does not follow that these Indian cricket elevens will acquire more than a
purely local following which may itself lose interest. The Premier League is
supported by a worldwide following in Japan or Nigeria as well as in England.
Cricket lovers are still the main audience for cricket. They do have an
initial curiosity, and will watch some Twenty20 matches on television. Some
viewers will be hooked, and will continue to take pleasure of sixes being
hit in large numbers. But others will get bored. They will not make the
vital connection of loyalty which underlies the global interest in
Manchester United. I hope this will be the case. I do not wish Twenty20
well, though I welcome new funds for cricket and cricketers. I think
Twenty20 is a decadent, dumbed-down, third-rate formula for sub-prime
cricket. I would not therefore welcome its success.
Love the IPL 20/20...makes me dream of buying and building my own franchise team...it connects the fans more ot the game...then the other formats.
Andrei, manchester, uk
Twenty20 is to Test Cricket what "mang-patta" (call a card) is to a langurous game of Bridge.
amir jafri, Elkins, U.S.A.
I will like to know how many years it took to EPL becoming popular all over the world and what information he has that says that IPL will not become popular all over the world.How popular the game was when England was ruling the world body is for everyone to see.
SALIL, Delhi,
Test cricket is still the most satisfying form of cricket but one of the most wonderful aspects of cricket is the fact that anyone can play and 20/20 is an expression of that accessability. The success of Warne in the IPL is evidence that the best players will still be those with the greatest skill.
Henry Chase, Cambridge, UK
I couldn't agree more. The matches in India are bizarre, with South africans bowling to Australian batsmen, with young Indian fielders scrambling about. You might as well watch net practise for all the tension and excitement that is generated. Ghastly.
colin stoy, london,
If County and Test cricket were as wonderful as you say, then Packer and 20/20 and IPL would never have been invented. Cricket lovers and the Blazers at ECB have a choice - adapt or die. Unfortunately for the few fans left, I think some of the people in charge of cricket would rather do the latter ......
Al, Weybridge, UQ
I watched my first game of 20/20 on Saturday it was shown on Setanta channel 2. Kings v the Super Kings.
It is undoubtedly a game played for the benefit of the spectators, it was absolutely brilliant, both exciting and exhilarating.
The county game is for the entusiast to watch, the Test matches moreso, occasionally there is a spark of brilliance but generally both can be totally boring to watch, unlike 20/20.
James Leasor, HARROGATE, ENGLAND
I quite agree. Cricket, like so much else in our culture ,whether music, film or visual arts, other sports, even food and drink, is being reduced to the lowest common denominator in order to maximise profits. Money talks and far too loudly; whether or not twenty20 is good for the future of the game is frankly irrelevant. Patrons are no longer asked to to engage on any level of depth with a subject, a passing and apathetic acquaintance the any number of crude allurements from naked flesh to flashing lights or gratuitous violence - in the case of cricket the quick wickets and heavy scoring - is all that the advertising demands. Market conditions are reducing our culture to the same grey, indulgent slop, "exciting" enough to demand a transient attention, more than boring enough to ignore. WRM adumbrates the symptoms but does he recognise the disease? The allusion to Peacock's essay on the Four Ages was especially apt.
Bruce Johnston, Aberdeen,
I take exception to one thing you've said Mr Rees-Mogg.
That Ian Botham was the greatest allrounder ever! That HAS to be a joke right?
Sir Richard Hadlee, Kapil Dev and Imran Khan were all better than Beefy. The stats support this, as does the fact, that England were awful against the then best side, West Indies with Botham being anonymous in those contests. The same cannot be said of the other three, who upped their game[s] against the WIndies.
Tarun Yadav, Essex, UK
To Mr Saj Ishaque,
You Sir, need to gain an understanding of the past; the point of Mr Rees Mogg's words is lost on you. Bollywood stars and cheerleaders flown in...would they be the same cheerleaders, perchance, whose presence led a team owner to cancel some of his bollyrazz promos yesterday? Wake up and learn about what cricket once embodied, then maybe you won't need "a complete entertainment package" in your life. You might instead have found meaning.
Harold Joseph
Harold Joseph, Adelaide, South Australia
The two games can exist side by side, as long as 20-20 isn't lumped in on top of the seemingly endless fixture list of mostly very dreary and predictable 50 over bores. Replace the 50 over games largely with 20-20 and you might have something.
But if you love 20-20 and can't stomach test cricket, you don't know anything about cricket, simple as that. The long version of the game is difficult and time consuming in the modern age (I would say that the modern age is at fault there, not the sport), but there is no comparison between the two. It's like comparing champagne and Babycham. The sheer scope of the drama and skill on display in the 2005 Ashes cannot be equalled by a 3 hour thrash.
And whither a Shane Warne in this new world? He can play in it, sure, but his successor would never be able to develop in it: in a one day dominated game, there will be no new Shane Warnes. As he remains one of the all-time greats of any time and any sport, that's a tragedy.
Eric Ambleside, Yorkshire,
Mr Rees-Mogg is right of course- but as Neville Cardus pointed out, cricket more than any other game reflects the sociological climate and structure of society.
Another quote that springs to mind is from the Bible and is along the lines of selling your birthright for a mess of potage.
Anthony Roberts , Shoreham-by-Sea , West Sussex
Yes, I have many sympathies with the way the classical off-drive has been replaced with the slog-sweep as the shot de jour and the various tactical battles fought over the course of a 1st class match are being lost.
However, the simple economics of cricket dictate the need for Twenty20. I could go to my local county game at Northants and count on one hand the number of spectators in for a first class game yet Twenty20 is a mad sell out, engaging youngsters in the game.
Without these youngsters, the game will continue to dwindle as a participation sport in the UK in the face of peoples time pressures and other more attractive pursuits.
Stephen, Northampton,
Hear hear, Lord Rees Mogg. What we are visualizing today is the milking of the cricket cow, and providing Bollywood entertainment under its guise. In fact, I can also say that I used to play the Twenty20 cricket way back in the 60-s on the streets of Calcutta, only it used to be called "gulley (alley) cricket" then - we had to give way to every car that passed down those streets.
One only hopes Twenty20 provides the cash for the real cricket to survive financially. The great Laurence Olivier used to charge a million Pounds for appearing in cameo roles in B and C-grade films, so that he could give his best roles on the stage, maybe not earning anything by way of remuneration.
Rana Maitra
Abu Dhabi
Rana Maitra, Abu Dhabi, UAE
Cricket is at the cusp of a change that is going to alter the dynamics of the game forever . I believe that this change could potentially damage the very ethos the game . Cricket as I know it , is about subtlety , variation and those clever artifices that can keep you riveted for long. However , as the author has suggested , 20\20 is a dumbed down version of the game that has little in common with it. What we are witnessing is the demise of a great form of art . RIP the beloved game !!
Anupam Bhattacharjee, Bangalore, India
Cricket, baseball, basketball, football (both kinds) are all fundamentally athetic competition based entertainment and at the professional level simply businesses, and big ones at that. Players work their rears off and expect to be well rewarded, and tthis requires spectator revenue, TV or ticket sales. Every other consideration is naive romance. Most of the above named sports (except cricket) sports take up 3 hours, give or take an hour or so. Twenty20 takes about that long I understand and makes economic sense. Years ago tennis didn't have tie-breakers and matches sometimes went on forever, but with the introduction of the tie-breaker the length of the match became more predictable and the sport took off. Yes, I know baseball games can go literally forever and this does present a problem. In Japan however they do not, except in special circumstances
Mark, Washington DC, USA
The main factor that makes any sporting event interesting is competitive tension: if it's absent (as it too often is in the Test match and county game) then the viewer quickly loses interest. The attraction of 20/20 is the fact that batsman and bowler are under pressure from first ball to last. Not as satisfying to the cricket lover as the ebb and flow of a great Test match, but demanding new skills, adaptability and much greater athleticism. Rees-Mogg's reaction is probably representative of the English county game, who now see 20/20 as a threat rather than opening up new opportunities and new markets. If some of the dynamism of 20/20 transfers to the Test match arena (and the moribund county game), it may in time come to be seen as the saviour of the game.
Roger Goodacre, London,
It's funny to see how all this boohaa about Twenty20 being bad for the game comes about after the IPL, not when the game was invented 4 years ago. It seems like a lot of the English media have problems with India minting money out of the game.
The Indian and Australian journalists have the right to Twenty20 bashing given their initial opposition to the format. In the case of the English, it seems like more a case of sour grapes. What say Mr. Rees-Mogg?
As for the "global fan following", give it time and see how it evolves. It's time you got out of the mindset that cricket remains an English game. The immediate future of cricket is in the subcontinent. It's time the English grew up and understood that fact.
Anjan, Boston, USA
Dear Ree-Mogg
Life in the 80's and even the early 90's was slow and placid compared to the break neck pace of today. At those times you easily could have had five days to watch a match laidback. You cant even imagine it now or in times ahead. Sports is meant to be an entertainer. Every sport evolves with the times. Cricket too did evolve from the days of village greens in Hambledon and still is. Twenty 20 is just another phase of evolution. One can't resist changing times and the changes times bring. It's nice to be nostalgic, but we also need to adapt to the present and be prepared to welcome the future, if we are to keep up with life. Or else we will be lost in the past among the by gones.
Dr.J.P, Kuwait city, Kuwait
Excellent article. Some of the replies only serve to confirm how correct are your conclusions.
Sadly, everything is now dumbed down in favour of instant gratification. Twenty20 is to real cricket what the penalty shoot-out is to football.
But perhaps Twenty20 only serves a part of the global audience. It is obviously popular in India. It might even catch on in the USA, where baseball, a dull 2-dimensional ball-dominated substitute for cricket enjoys unmerited interest.
Each to his own. Having recently watched high-quality Test cricket, played to packed stadia of enthralled fans in England, Australia and Sri Lanka, I am pleased to report that it is not yet dead.
Bob Barrett, London, England
Suddenly, after the exposure that the IPL has given to 20-20 cricket and the format seems to be well received, it is deemed that it is not cricket.
When 20-20 was contrived in the ECB offices as a desperate attempt to draw audiences to a dying county scene, it was seen as a necessary measure to revive English cricket. Take it out of the ECB monopoly and it is cricket's greatest enemy. I can understand some of the criticism leveled at the format, but to criticise it now, when it has resulted in county cricket being stripped of its status by a nation fiercely resisting the lures the IPL has to offer, which once flocked to 20-20 finals days begs certain questions to be answered.
The neo-colonist attitude has to be dropped, the reaction of Hampshire's chairman (that it is 'our' game) leaves a lot to be desired from a country which doesn't seem to have acknowledged past indiscretions....interpret that how you will.
Viraj Chotai, Edgware, London, UK
This author does not seems to know the history of cricket, if one person says (in fact thousands say) that the Twenty20 is not good for cricket and its audience, then there are billions all over the world who love to watch in the stadium, if not possible at least on TV.
When one day games were started with the same fanfare as twenty20 some 35 years back in Australia, the same kind of people said it is the end of glorious days of cricket, See now cricket is still alive and kicking because of one day games. It is the same with Twenty20.
Vijay, Boston, USA
Alexander Pope or James Bramston?
George Ross, London, United Kingdom
no i think ure wrong may.
twenty20 is muchhhhhhhhhhhh more interesting rather than test matches its is boring to watch a game 5 days
atta, london, england
With regard to testing a player's skills, I believe the inclusion of members of India's recently triumphant u-19 team ridiculous and potentially damaging to their careers. Players at this age should be exposed to the longer format of the game whtere hey can learn how to build an innings together, defend and know when to attack. Bowlers would also learn how to work a batsman over and formulate plans and strategies. There is no better part of cricket than when a bowler gains a wicket purely by thinking about it. An example would be Brett Lee during the Ashes of '06/07. He bowled to Andrew Flintoff five consecutive outswingers which he did not connect with. Instead of becoming frustrated at these plays and misses, Lee persevered and bowled a sixth outswinger which Flintoff edged to the slips. A further example would be a bowler pinning a batsman back and then throwing in a fuller ball to catch the batsman prepared for a short ball unawares. A young bowler will not be afforded the opportun
Thomas Daly, Derry, Ireland
To paraphrase that old law of economics -bad cricket drives out the good.
Anthony Roberts , Shoreham-by-Sea , West Sussex
I agree with Mr. Mogg - T20's devalued the six, made almost redundant the four, and rendered ones and twos a stigma.
Siddhartha Chaliha, Dibrugarh, India
As Test cricket is no longer on terrestrial TV, it is slowly slipping out of the national consciousness . There is now growing up a young generation who will not be introduced to the game. Indeed a youngster asked me recently if Test cricket was practice cricket, i.e testing! We can thank the England and Wales cricket board for this by selling test cricket to satellite TV.
tari, London,
Mr Rees Mogg.-we all get old but not necessarily wise. I am 50 and I played for my school and college teams in India. For a long time test cricket had become boring. One day cricket changed that. Today test cricket is better than at any time before. There are now more than two teams that can play good cricket. Limited over matches are popular because there is a result at the end of the day and it is not a coincidence that test cricket has become interesting because we are seeing less drawn matches. This is because run rates have gone up and Mr Boycott's cricket is a thing of the past.
Turn off your tv. Fast cricket wont miss you. Or better still turn it off completely since you seem to have missed whats happening in test cricket lately and why it is more popular today then ever before. Please also accept graciously that the power center has changed and it wont be coming home again
Abby, London,
Mr Morgan seems pretty bitter about T20. I'm not sure why. As a process of ageing he should learn expect the changes in culture.
I still like test cricket, and im sure it will continue to be played. I feel this constant railing from the establishment in England seems to be more spite than anything. If they don't like T20 then they should not participate? Why do they want others not to play it. The writer comes across as one of those crazy stubborn old men who find everything they don't like as being 'wrong with the world'. The kind that controlled cricket in the world not so long ago before market forces (capitalism) took it away from them.
Thanks,
Manoj
Manoj, India, India
Yes....good for you and the 5-day game and all William, but people like us have normal 9-5 jobs due to which we cannot follow Test/ODI cricket so intensely. If I were to closely follow the intricate strategies and battles (which I respect Test cricket for) every time India played, I'd be unemployed. I'd rather see a condensed version of the matchups and strategies employed in a T20 game, in an evening of fun filled with beer, friends and T20
Ravi, Chicago, USA
How could the Cricketing authorities have been so blind in the first place as to allow this totally different game to be called Cricket.
Sloggit - yes, Whackit - yes, Hackit - yes, but Cricket it isn't.
Just one more of our great traditions bites the dust in the name of progress.
Michael Ross, Harrogate/Hofit, UK/Israel
I'm not a big fan of Twenty20 either, but let's not overreact, shall we? I mean, when one-day cricket started, a lot of people said similar things to what are being said now. And it turned out to be quite the opposite: one-day cricket has helped Test cricket become a lot more interesting. I think it just shows the strength of this game that it can exist in three separate formats at once.
Aditya, New York, USA
'decadent, dumbed-down, third-rate formula for sub-prime cricket.' - joyous words to the ear indeed!! this is not cricket - it is a seditious subversion of a fine game to suit the cantankerous whims of film stars and liquor barons (who it seems are the main promoters and beneficiaries of the new format).
it is also heart rending to see the game so crassly dumbed down in my country, India, which has given the cricketing world some of its greatest heroes!
but like all fads, this too shall meet an ignominious and quick end. 5 day cricket SHALL come back!
Shishir Baxi, Dubai, UAE
There appears to be a couple of things to consider here, both of which largely corroborate Mr Rees-Mogg’s opinion;
1) I don’t think there can be anything other than a consequential reduction in the intensity of international matches when the players are team-mates in the IPL. Would, for example, a fast bowler on a spring tour of the Windies be as willing to send down a barrage of rib-ticklers when he knows he’ll be playing alongside the target batsman a couple of weeks later in the IPL, where presumably win-bonuses are valuable?
2) Secondly, will someone like McCullum, who by all accounts is a fine cricketer and man, be easily able to adapt to a field with 4 slips, a gully and a silly mid-on, and a bowler like Broad [hopefully] relentlessly aiming for the top of off-stump at Lords in a month? Personally, if I was a Kiwi, I’d be a bit worried about seeing my batsmen warming up for a test series in England by playing intensive Twenty20 on sub-continental pitches.
ST, London,
One of the joys of test cricket, along with watching perhaps golf and maybe even snooker (two other oft derided sports of which i am a keen fan) is watching a skilled and compotent sportsman, over the course of a number of hours (if not days) slowly build a good score whilst battling his opponents and fatigue. Yes it is not an instant gratification, and no it will win itself millions of new fans, but there is a common theme amongst many sports (notably rugby) that in order to justify themselves they have to be more "entertaining" and appeal to the masses. Yes cricket must evolve, but do we have such short memories that we cannot remember three years ago when the entire nation was gripped by one of the most entertaining, closely fought and succesful Ashes series in many many years, and without any twenty20 games (or none that i can remember anyway).
Conor , London, UK
Point made - Twenty20 is indeed about instant gratification.
However, for the sport to survive it must pay its own way. One look at empty county grounds for championship matches, vs the same grounds packed with keen spectators for Twenty20 matches speaks volumes about the contribution this format has made.
Secondly, test matches are a lot more interesting when sides can score at 4+ an over. The recent England vs NZ series was a turgid affair to watch due to appallingly low scoring rates.
Twenty20 brings a new dimension to the test arena as well; the creativity developed in this format transfers to other formats of the game too, as well as making them more exciting.
Greg, Sheffield,
Dear Ree-Mogg
Most people like new format of twenty20 and enjoy it. who is going to believe you!?
jon sangtani, london, london
To be honest, it's just the influence of 'showbusiness' , we now need brilliant colours, to entertain those with the concentration span of a gnat. It's all about, money, noise, and bashing. Like so much of modern life.
David Vinter, Louth, Lincs., UK.
To Mr Rees Mogg
Please stop living in the past. Cricket is not dying. Yes The ECB is definitely doing its best to acheive it. Cricket is now, I am pleased to say the most exciting sport in India. I am just waiting for the cricket stadiums in Dubai to be completed and then there will be real fireworks. It wont be the lazy afternoon stuff ever except perhaps here. In India Cricket has moved from being just a game to a comlete entertainment package . It has joined hands with Bollywood stars, is now welcoming cheer leaders flown in from Washington and players who are from many nations.
Saj Ishaque, Guildford , UK
The origin of cricket was the one afternoon game. Floreat Hambledonia! The Bat and Ball has seen it all.
Cee Cee, Malvern, worcs
Cricket has long been dying.... Which is why Packer had it easy 30yrs ago with one-dayers, and why IPL is working with 20-20 now. Any game that needs to reinvent itself , and reinvent itself again, is struggling for its last breath. Lets face it, without India's current economic boom and population (and therefore abuse of power), the game would have little audience outside England, Australia and South Africa. However, I concur with the author. Twenty-20 is, crassly put, a prostitiution of a game that was once noble. It would be like Disneyland in Kew gardens...or turning the Taj Mahal into a casino....just to get people to watch and pay....
Fulvio, Sydney, Australia
Unlike good old days , people don't have the time or patience to watch an entire game of test cricket. Even a whole one-day match is tough to watch without a break. I believe 20-20 is a good adaption of cricket to the modern times where people need a quick burst of entertainment. It does not mean skill has been thrown out of the window. One of the IPL 20-20 games yesterday was amazing to watch with the ball turning like crazy on the pitch and making it look like a bowler's game. If such instances are seen in 20-20, I think there is nothing wrong about it.
The only complaints I have about the game are that it has too much of bollywood influence. I still don't think cheerleaders and cricket go together, especially skimpy clad ones in front of a conservative crowd. Also some of the team colors are too bright, especially gold color helmets. Arrgh !!
Ashwin, Bristol,
It puts me to sleep but then I hate football as well.
Frederick, London, UK
Test cricket is the most boring game ever invented.
I would rather listen to Genesis !
michael newport, london,
I fully agee with this article. Twenty/20 is dumbed down and it is already ruining the county season where we now have an incomprehensible mixture of 4 days games, a 50 over and a 40 compettition and a 2 week break in the middle of the season for Twenty/20. The season has lost its rythm and rationale.
Couple that with a surfeit of meaningless one day internationals at the expense of the 5 day test and the purist weeps. I suspect it will only get worse with an EPL being formed here in a year or two's time.
And what impact will it all have on the junior game? Not good, I'm sure.
William Thomson, Guildford, UK
The 20/20 in its current format does supply instant gratification to the masses - agreed. What Rees-Mogg fails to grasp, as with all members of the old tie brigade, that there are positive spinoffs for Test cricket. This will come from the confidence top batsmen gain in their ability to score quickly, and as such improve the quality of test cricket. The 'bad old days' of Geofrey Boycott dominating the crease, and resulting in the 5 day draw (having said that - some draws can be thrilling), will be consigned to the dustbin for good.
Charles, Cape Town, South Africa
This piece could have been written 45 years ago! The same was said when they introduced limited over matches in the 60's. If anything it saved the game from certain extinction. In the late 60's and early 70's I watched 3 day games as sole occupant of stands built to take 1000.
My very first match attendance was to watch Peter May's testimonial. A one day game!
Anyone who has watched Warne, Lara and most of the Australian batsmen know that cricket is still strong.
Cricket has to compete with other sports and pastimes
20:20 is here to stay, evovle or die.
Mick S, Rochester, UK
Twenty20 is not a better form of cricket: it is a better form of baseball.
Geoff, Sydney,
Why can 20/20 and first class cricket not continue to both exist and dare I say prosper?
The IPL is going to be held for a mere 6 weeks a year.
The future leading cricketers are not going to be bloomed in IPL test tubes but are going to hone their skills in first class matches in the various test playing countries.
The good news is that cricketers from West Indies, New Zealand, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and South Africa are going to have additional financial reasons to excel and no longer burn with resentment at the contracts that English, Australian and Indian players have been enjoying for the last decade.
Furthermore, first class cricket's supposed suitability to the English summer is hardly demonstrated by the man and his dog attendances seen in the county championship.
This will be contrasted with the full houses and big tv audiences so far seen with the IPL.
Andrew Morrel, Manchester,
Living abroad, I haven't watched cricket for decades, but Bedser, Evans, Hasset, Graveney and even Washbrook are still magical names to me. But from what I've just been reading, I think cricket today must be suffering from the same misconception as football on TV (at least here in Germany).
If a whole broadcast is dedicated solely to showing goals being scored, scoring a goal also becomes boring.
What's more, football on TV is spoilt for me by the endless "slow-motion replays" of goals or shots at goal. I want to see the action all over the field as it's taking place, rather than see a repetition of something I've already seen.
Replays should only be shown if the situation is unclear (offside, foul), for example, but only then sparingly.
The solution: Take away most of the TV cameras. Five at the most would be enough.
alan, germany,
Well -written piece. I agree with most of what you have written, except for the last bit about Manchester United. This so-called loyalty to the Reds is built entirely on hype and marketing, and has nothing whatsoever to do with any innate sense of loyalty. It is hard to imagine any of the Premier League teams being supported out of loyalty by the locals since more than 50% of the palyers are not local. I have watched local (i.e, Asian) fans of Man U in action, and if asked to pinpoint why they support their team, give answers of varying shades of subtlety, none of which is entirely convincing.
Subbu Venkatraman, Singapore, Singapore
Well, I respect the opinion of the writer and agree with him to a great extent when he says that T20 is dumbing down of cricket. Cricket is supposed to be a complex, subtle yet engaging sport which truly comes to life in the longer version.Mr. Rees also uses the example of EPL as an analogy for the potential popularity of the IPL,however, we should not forget that EPL or Football has remained the game it was, it hasn't dumbed itself down to attract new viewers. Sadly cricket is banking on a modified version to sell itself but what will happen once people get bored of T20? It will definitely happen, so, where do we go from there? T10 maybe or simply Bowl offs? I think for cricket to become a major sport it is important to make traditional formats more interesting with better, simpler regulations, because therein lies the future of the game.
Anyway, just before I end, why ithis grudge with T20 now, England began it three seasons back, nobody called it death of cricket then.
SAURABH SHARMA, NeW Delhi, INDIA
I think you are wrong, I love to watch test cricket and recently watched 2 tests between India and South Africa here in Thailand. One had a South Africain bowler blowing away the Indian batsman with extreme pace and the other the Indian batsman and bowlers outplaying South Africa on a very dry wicket. Great stuff.
Last night I watched a 20/20 match between 2 Indian sides with players from NZ, SA, Aussies etc etc, low scoring, ball going sideways, amazing skills on display in the field not to many six hits but the atmosphere was fantastic.
Never seen an Indian player jump all over an Aussie player before after he hit a 6 to win the game.
And unlike what would have happend in the UK the light went out, they waited 30 minutes and even after they had decided to call it a draw, they came on again. In the UK it would have still been a draw, not here get warmed up now and finish the match. Great to watch.!!!
james, Brighton, uk
It is sad, when people refuse to look openly at developments. While Twenty20 cricket does have deficiencies, it has strengths that will pull cricket and its players out of the endangered sport pile and back onto the 'alive sports' pile.
Looking through the opinion articles, it is surprising how similar the derision is for one day games, but now they have become an integral part of the sport.
Twenty20 has seen 5 games in the IPL, already interesting growth is being seen in the developments - low scoring, medium scoring and high scoring games - the bottom 2 seemed like they could not exist in this format. We have had the rise of a bowler - a batsman's six used to be a rare pleasure, now a bowler's maiden over. Earlier conventional shots ruled the roost, now a new vocabulary is emerging, new field placements and an influx of adaptation.
Every culture must evolve, sometimes it may take wrong turns - but that is evolution. Twenty20 is good for the game, people enjoy it!
Ananya Singhal, Medstead, Hampshire
William, I understand your points. However I believe that all the publicity and popularity that cricket has seen due to the 20-20 format can do no harm to the future of the game.
Easing more kids with slightly lower attention spans onto 20-20 cricket (where they would never have given cricket the time of day(s) in the past), then allowing their passion for the game to expand to the longer formats as well, is nothing to be dispirited about.
As a child, I caught the 50-over cricket bug. I now appreciate the subtleties that make cricket so unique just as much as the next connoisseur.
Once hooked on 20-20, then cricket in general, the masses will soon come to appreciate them too.
James, Loughborough,
I think he's got it wrong. cricket is much less interesting than baseball which is incredibly boring and surpassed in the snoze factor by golf.
Bruce Northwood, Washington, D.C., USA
Right--I am sure that the author is talking about the kind of loyalties that are generated for a team by watching hours of goalless play during footy. I get it, in order to generate loyalty to a team, the players must have a soporific effect on the viewers. Maybe that works for the older gentleman who has difficulty falling asleep?
Amar, nyc, USA
Dear Sir Madam,
The IPL is not good for the game. It portraits the wrong image with money and glamour, when the game needs quality Test teams to be competitive against the Australian national team, and beat them in given Test series, such as the England national team did in the last Ashes series that was played in England. Therefore, to state that IPL is good for the games is incorrect, and if the IPL is good for the game why is the Indian Board of Control for Cricket in India and the International Cricket Council jointly not promoting the game in Europe, South East Asia, the Middle East and the United States to name a few regions. The reason for this is to keep the power, money and position within certain quarters, which is most unfortunate. The next aspect is providing effective infrastructure faculties to under privileged communities with the cricket world to promote the game proactively. This is not happening, but a few flim stars, cheerleaders and the Indian public, who like the game of cricket, but are doing extremely well financially do seem to enjoy the game, not forgetting the television audiences around India and around the world. But again this does not promote Test Cricket, nor does it produce quality test players or countries. Please realise that this will only spoil mediocre players to think that they are great players, such as M. S. Dhoni, who will struggle to hold his spot in a quality State team in Australia, because he has tremendous weaknesses in regard to his batting technically and is a solid wicket keeper, but not a quality one, at least at the present moment. He is paid very heavily, but for only swinging from his bootlaces, not for playing good quality cricket.
Yours Faithfully,
M. R. Somasunderam.
Muralidaran Ramesh Somasunderam, Perth, Australia - Western Australia