All the razzmatazz and excitement created by the IPL has made me sit back and wonder whether I’d rather watch a brutal Brendon McCullum innings in a T-20 game or a finely crafted test match innings by someone like a Mark Waugh or a V.V.S. Laxman. For all the goose bumps that a 20-20 innings generates, I would any day go a million miles more to watch a stylish batsman construct a century in a test match or to watch a back-to-the-wall match saving innings by a Steve Waugh or an Inzamam Ul Haq.
The sheer pleasure of watching a Mohammad Azharuddin front foot flick or a Damien Martyn caress through covers is indescribable. No words can possibly do it justice. However what can be said is that it far exceeds the pleasure generated by watching a batsman massacre the ball in a T-20 game. Beyond a point viewing an Andrew Symonds or a Shane Watson carting every ball out of the ground is unexciting and boring. There is no doubting the thrills and spills that are produced by a game of 20-20 cricket, but I am just one of those stereotypical conservatives who still love watching cricket played by men in white.
4 comments:
All your favorites nicely captured in one post! :)
I agree. Twenty20 is a lot like watching penalty shootouts over and over again.But on the other hand watching test matches means you sometimes run the risk of ending up with games like this season's Champions League Semi-Finals.
But actually there is a lot of scope for tactics in 20-20 cricket. One only needs to look at how the Rajasthan Royals have performed. Shane Warne has been superb as their captain. Dhoni too has been really impressive for the Chennai team. On the other hand if you look at Harbhajan or Yuvraj, they have been plain awful. The problem is that 20-20 games being played continuously for over a month might turn out to be a bit of an overkill.
And yeah test matches could turn out to be quite uninteresting at times, especially the final day when everyone knows the match is going to end in a draw. But it still makes for a more fascinating contest i think.
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