ENGLAND’S inaugural Twenty20 international tomorrow should confirm the phenomenal rise of cricket’s latest format.

Just two years ago, Twenty20 remained merely an optimistic vision of the marketing department of the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB), which had invested £250,000 in promoting a concept designed to reinvigorate interest in county cricket. Market research had shown that people wanted shorter matches held out of traditional working hours.

The response was extraordinary. A total of 48 matches attracted an average gate of almost 5,000, dizzy heights for county cricket. Last year the figure rose to 5,800, boosted by a staggering turn-out for the Middlesex-Surrey game at Lord’s of 27,500.

With cricket administrators worldwide desperate to boost gates, it was inevitable that Twenty20 would be tested elsewhere. And it was: big time. Last winter, South Africa, Sri Lanka and Pakistan held domestic tournaments that proved hugely popular. The final in Pakistan drew a crowd of 30,000.

Australia, who are to hold a state competition next winter, dipped their toe in the water with a match in Adelaide between Australia A and the touring Pakistan side. It attracted 21,250 people.

It seems inevitable that Twenty20 will become an established part of the international calendar. Tomorrow’s game at the Rose Bowl, a 15,000 sell-out, is only the second such international anywhere, but others are in the pipeline. New Zealand were to host a game against Sri Lanka at the start of the year, but the match was cancelled after the Asian tsunami. They were still the first to stage a Twenty20 international, against Australia in Auckland in February. Again it proved a huge draw, 29,000 people turning up.

New Zealand appear ready to accommodate at least one Twenty20 international every season, as do Australia, who have arranged a game against South Africa in Brisbane next January.

Under the new television deal that starts next year, England have committed themselves to playing one Twenty20 against each visiting side: in 2006 it will be Sri Lanka and Pakistan. England are in negotiations to play a match in Pakistan when they tour at the end of the year. What is perhaps most significant about tomorrow’s match is that the ECB is keen to let the cricket stand on its own. In the county competition a key element in the package for spectators is the accompanying attractions within the ground: gimmicks such as jacuzzis, speed-dating and live bands.

An ECB spokesman insisted this match will be treated as a genuine cricket event, which may surprise the Australians, who found themselves in Auckland up against a New Zealand side sporting wigs and 1970s retro kit. That didn’t stop them turning in a brutal display to run out easy winners.

The players will walk out to musical accompaniment, but that is standard fare in conventional one-day cricket. Even the warm-up act is pukka: it is actually another cricket match. Before England and Australia take the field at 5.30pm, a Hampshire XI will take on a PCA Masters XI in a Twenty20 match at 1.30pm.

It would be best for everybody if Twenty20 becomes a proper game, taken seriously by players and spectators alike. Its original aim was to introduce a new audience to the game, so there comes a point when that new audience has to take the cricket for what it is, not for the peripheral attractions that come with it. The international model should be that place.

In Auckland, Australia’s superior class was in clear evidence, as it probably will be tomorrow. Although they lost Michael Clarke, Adam Gilchrist and Andrew Symonds by the end of the fourth over, they already had 46 on the board by that point. Symonds had smashed 32 from 13 balls.

Most impressive was the controlled aggression at the end, with Ricky Ponting and Mike Hussey plundering 77 from the last 33 deliveries. New Zealand were never in the hunt and lost by 44 runs.

What the administrators must avoid is the culture of Twenty20 cricket eroding the traditional one-day game. But recent proposals that 50-overs cricket be livened up by letting teams use substitutes and increasing fielding restrictions suggests that erosion has already begun.

Probable teams

ENGLAND: M Trescothick, G Jones, M Vaughan (captain), A Strauss or V Solanki, A Flintoff, K Pietersen, P Collingwood, G Batty, Kabir Ali, D Gough, S Harmison.

AUSTRALIA: M Hayden, A Gilchrist, R Ponting (captain), D Martyn, A Symonds, M Clarke, M Hussey, S Watson, B Lee, M Kasprowicz, G McGrath.