Sports : life magnified

A few months ago, Jagmohan Dalmiya made the point on Sportcentre India that this form of cricket is not in the agenda of India for the near future. The Reason? As its 40 percent of a limited overs match (in terms of overs and time involved), it results in 40 percent of income.

Tim de Lisle points out in cricinfo why a Twenty20 World Cup is the logical step forward:

It is the first professional cricket format to fit into the lives of people who have a job or a school to go to. A typical game starts at 5.30pm and is over by 8pm. For the first time, you can see a whole match without a meal break. Ergo, it attracts people who wouldn’t normally have the time.

Perfect for nations where cricket is merely a sport. In the subcontinent, however, cricket is more than just sport. So matches will be played to packed houses, revenues will come in despite the period of the match. Interest will not recede. In simple economic terms, the demand is inelastic.

The people who head the BCCI have changed. But the stance remains the same in this regard. Sharad Pawar has said:

The working committee of the board unanimously decided not to participate in that for a lot of reasons. The BCCI decided that it was not in the interest of the game.

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I will not elaborate further on the joke that has been the super sub. I wrote on it when it first surfaced which can be viewed here.

I am just glad that it is going according to reports. A Twenty20 world championship? Bring it on!

A very interesting discussion is taking place at Wicket to Wicket on racism.

Sport is about trying your best to succeed. If you do not, never mind. At least you tried your best. Applaud your opponent and try harder next time, learning from the experiences of the previous battle.

The sportsmen in the modern era forget this and try to win at all costs. The common excuse given is – sport has become more competitive, there is so much of money involved. Joey Cheek, an American speed skating champion who won gold in the 500 metre race at the Torino Olympics yesterday, donated the $25,000 he won for the refugees in Chad. Sadly, such attitudes are more exception than norm.

While sport simply meant a battle of skills earlier, it means much more today. The media attention, spectator interest, money, external pressures are all there. Players expect more. Spectators too want more in every regard. Expectations aren’t always fulfilled. As a natural consequence, anger results. Anger in displayed in various ways by various people.

I was at the Eden Gardens when the semi-final between India and Sri Lanka was abandoned. Some people threw bottles and oranges. Others hurled abuses at Azhar. Abuses were also hurled at Sangita Bijlani, the actress Azhar would marry after divorcing his wife. India had lost and Azhar was the main culprit as far as the emotionally charged crowd was concerned. In such a passionate state of mind, some people felt the above actions were excusable. Others felt bringing in their racial slurs were excusable as well.

Society has a lot of evils. As cricket grows, it is harder to resist such evils. Jagmohan Dalmiya wanted to globalize cricket which is good for the game. But a level of maturity is needed to deal with the evils which globalisation tends to bring with it. Without maturity, the evils take over and the significance of sport is lost. In the recent past the cricket world has dealt with quite a few issues with immaturity – The Zimbabwe issue, the ambush marketing issue.

I hope some maturity is shown to rid the game of racism or at least shrink it to its minimum.

I had brought this up in this post a few days into the 1st test. Rudi Koertzen agrees to an extent. He says:

There is nothing wrong if the ICC considers a change in laws that allows such Test matches to be called off at tea with the consent of both captains when a last-day result is not possible.

I wrote regarding it when it first surfaced. A lot of reactions have come up in the cricketing world regarding the same. Kamran Abbasi has written an authorative article on the subject.

I particularly like parts of the last two paragraphs:

Leadership, though, carries responsibility and requires values. India’s unilateral declarations of the past month - and importantly outside the sphere of the ICC - are an irresponsible beginning. Derogatory remarks about other countries, such as those about Bangladesh, expose a shortage of values other than pursuit of profit.. ..But the test of leadership really begins here. Unless cricket’s Age of India allows the minnows and the big beasts to thrive together - and works in partnership with those outside India and Asia - this month’s milestone may become difficult to celebrate. Cricket’s Age of Empire, ruled by Australia and England and governed by the clubs of Marylebone and Melbourne and the Imperial Cricket Conference, once seemed immortal too. It is now dead.

It’s not the umpire’s fault that the technology is better than the past. Also they travel an extra ordinary amount of time which doesn’t make their task easier. Blame the ICC for not implementing technology where its conclusive and the ICC for not appointing at least a few more umpires than they do currently. The ICC panel of umpires has gone down to 7 from 12 when it started off if I am not mistaken.

Make the job more lucrative and make their schedules less hectic.

Looking back, I will not say the super series was a bad idea. I will speak regarding the test match because it is the cricket which concerns me much more than most one day cricket.

The match saw brilliance in parts. The bowling of Murali, the bowling of Warne, some tight contests. But where the match failed - lies in the fact that it was a match rather than a series.

It was really clubbed in the cricketing calendar which is really not the way to go about it. A proper cricket tour by the ROW would have been much better wit 3 tests, a few first class matches opening with a match VS the Prime Ministers XI maybe. People may argue that this is 2005 and not the 70s.

But all I am asking for is a space for the ROW like any other international team would have had. It would give players more team, focus their efforts properly at the right moments.

The World XI could have had more time to gel as a TEAM - the common arguement against the concept till now. And regarding the players not taking the whole thing seriously - this is cricket at the top level. Can they, despite being the best players, just create magic if they want to?

Even the best need preparation.

So the selection committee for Asia for the Asia vs South Africa.. ooooooooops Asia vs Africa contains one member from each of the 4 Asian test nations who is not a national selector as specified by the ICC.

Harmless clause if you look at it at first glance. But then why were the selectors from the current national selectors for the Tsunami Asia vs Rest of the World match? Why the difference?

ICC is on a mission to wield more power than ever on member nations. So ICC will decide that it should not be one of the national selectors. It should be some one else who is not best for the task in their own nation currently but should pick the team for Asia. ICC stop all this non sense.

All I can say is thank God series like the Ashes are still existent.

Mukul Kesavan has written one of the best pieces of cricket writing I have ever read in the August issue of Wisden Asia Cricket. That’s saying a lot considering I have a collection of Sportstars, Sportsweeks, Sportsworlds (many courtesy my cousin brother) spanning 25 years apart from usually reading articles which are easily available on the net today, Wisden Asia Cricket, and whatever comes my way.

In the article (linked here where a long 3 page article is abridged which does injustice to the article on many levels) Kesavan strips the ICC bare. World XI vs Australa? Africa vs Asia? They are just the tip of the ice berg.

Official international matches should be played between national teams, and no contest organized on a different or supra-national principle should be given the status of an international contest. This includes not recognizing individual performances in such matches as Test or one-day international performances. Plainly put, a five wicket haul or a century in a `Super’ Test or inter-continental limited overs circus should not count towards a players Test record, simply because such a contest is by definition not a match between two nations.

Kesavan basically states how the ICC has poked its nose into every thing and the traditional billateral tours with many first class matches is all but dead. The 4 tests per series (maximum) except traditional tours is indicative of how the ICC would rather have meaningless tests - the likes of Bangladesh vs England rather than longer proper tours. The Natwest Challenge has already brought statements from players, blogers and journalists alike of how they would rather play the Ashes at this point.

The interests of the ICC and the members and cricket is not the same.

The ICC will always strain to expand its jurisdiction, to make itself indispensable to the organization and conduct of international cricket. Given the peculiar nature of international cricket, this institutional will to power will sometimes threaten the bilateral foundation of the game. Cricket’s public opinion and the national boards that make up the ICC will have to make sure that this bureaucratic urge is held in check.

I will not go into the details of the article. Get the latest issue of the magazine for that piece alone. I will only say I don’t care any more what is done with one day cricket – which will truly become Mickey Mouse cricket in the next 5 years with more changes I feel. Really what was the need for the substitute rule when one day cricket was already a golden goose. Less control please. Atleast I hope they leave the sanity of tests intact although tests schedules are always getting eroded upon with options like limited overs internationals (the term really can mean any thing now) and twenty20 in future looking financially more viable. Tests are some thing many the true cricket lovers including me love to the core of our hearts. I hope the dinosaur, as Kesavan calls it, doesnt become extinct.

The allowing of limited overs international status for more teams is the way to go. This means more matches between comparable stature teams and less of tri nation series involving two top nations and a Banladesh or a Zimbabwe. It also means financial rewards for the teams which the ICC has specified. This more than any thing is the biggest plus point.

But test cricket is a different ball game. In an excellent article in the August issue of Wisden Asia Cricket on why Bangladesh should not be allowed to play test cricket, Ramachandra Guha – one of the best modern Indian writers, conveys with conviction my firm beliefs.

26 out of 26 test defeats if tests versus a depleted Zimbabwe and West Indies are excluded. Many of them innings defeats. As Guha goes through the emergence of star players, results of other teams like New Zealand, Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka, the situation was never so pathetic. And Kenya should have got the status before Bangladesh if based purely on results. Known points all of these and many others but after the one off vctory versus Australia, people have taken it as justification of the test status.

Guha recommends an 8 team structure – top 7 plus one from the second tire promoted every three years; the last of the 8 after 3 relegated. I recommend the last of the 8 and the top of the second tire play a test or a three test series or 2 tests in each country or any such play off to decide the 8th team or a way to include a new test team.

A common argument is how will the second tire improve. The depression and negativity which sets in with constant losses is definitely not the answer. Play versus A teams of the top countries, play in the domestic tournaments like Kenya did a few years back. The improvement will gradually come.

The substitutes bring in many possibilities as I pondered over the thought of how they can be used a few days ago. Most of the arguement against it has been the fact that cricket is traditionally a 11 a side game. But if we look at the history of the sport, there was 12 a side games, 13 a side games, games of all kinds - even 22 vs 11 a side games until uniformity was set in.

We always resist change and thus my conservative view on the substitutes when the law was brought into place.

Derek Pringle, one of the most intellegent cricket writers around, analyzed the situation perfectly in yesterday’s Telegraph UK. I knew it would be relevent soon and thus book marked it.

With football allowing the use of three subs, and basketball allowing entire teams to be replaced, it is surely just a question of time before cricket follows suit now the first breach has been made. With players expected to play and travel more, multiple substitutions could be a way of prolonging careers.

In the next few days, we will see the cricket world analyze how England and Australia used the substitutes in the Natwest Challenge which begines tomorrow. But we will also see more comment from every one on the question of how many can/will be used by cricket in due course. John Buchanan, who always likes to speak on changes which are made on cricket and always excited with new possibilities believes 15 players to be used a game is realistic thing in the future:

At the moment all touring teams travel with parties of 15, so the concept could be that we actually play all 15

Its to be accepted then that one day cricket which has existed since Kerry Packer, for nearly 35 years, is going to change more than ever before in the next two years. Surely the game has evolved in the past (Greatbatch - 1991, Jayasuriya and Kalluwitharana - 1996) but it is a totally different ball game now.

I am happy with my 5 days of test cricket and twenty20 and one day cricket will be taken as masala remixes of the game I call cricket. I have never given much weight to one day cricket and till they dont tinker with tests or encroach into the schedule of test matches(which is my real fear), I have no qualms.

Play 12 a side, play 15 a side, play 30 a side. Its nothing new ICC.

After deciding to have the top 6 associate members the capacity to play official one day internationals among themselves, which will also have financial rewards which is more important and can boost the development of these regions, the ICC has made another major announcement of merit.

The change in format of the Champions Trophy means lesser weaker versus stronger team matches. Also, the ICC one day rating mean much more because of this. A flaw is that they have not made a provision for the previous champions to qualify automatically for the next Champions Trophy. After the Liverpool drama in football, the ICC should have thought of this but it is some thing they can easily rectify.

Will the World Cup of cricket have lesser importance because of this move? Not really. There is anology from other sports which supports the claim. The Confederations Cup can never be more important than the FIFA World Cup. Neither can the season ending Masters featuring the top 8 ranking players ever match the prestige of Wimbledon.

Kudos ICC

What is concerning about the rule changes in limited overs cricket is how much more batsman friendly it makes it all.

The twenty over field restrictions instead of fifteen means more runs will be scored than ever before. The general feeling is that teams will replace a batsman with a bowler and vice versa while substituing. This would mean the bowling will become more effective.

However, the flip side to it is that chosing an extra batsman keeping the same bowling line up would usually give the team a lot more space to bat freely and treat the bowlers with disdain. And with the twenty over field restrictions in place, it would make around 330 the norm in one day cricket rather than 300.

The new rule changes also go away from the basic aspect of cricket of chosing the best eleven with an oft faced dilemna of whether to chose an extra batsman or play with an extra bowler and the likes. The teams usually have to do a lot fo delibaration in chosing the 11.

The 5 over rule means more confusion than ever before. When you want to attract new people to the game, you want to make things simpler, not make them more complex. And how will Saurav Ganguly, who has problems finishing the overs in time under the earlier rules, ever manage to finish them with all these complexities?

Did I ever take the one day game seriously? No.

Will things get more interesting and worthy now? Not a chance.

Perhaps the ICC’s defence would be that the fools watching cricket will continue to watch it no matter what they do and with a few quirks like increasing the over restrictions for the fields, the 5 over rule and substitues, it would keep the couch patota from switching the channels in the middle overs, thus ensuring more revenue.

But do you really want to change the rules so much that the game itself changes? Its silly.