28 March 2014, 06:41 PM IST
Let me confess that I'm not a fan of T20 cricket. I entirely agree with Michael Holding that it's not cricket.
The basic problem is that it's not a contest between the bat and ball; it's a marriage between hungry TV audiences and TV channels, ambitious administrators; "outwardly charitable" franchise owners and cricketers who are always in some financial and opportune 'plight'. Of course, with some exceptions.
Any sporting contest becomes fair and refined when two rivals are equally interested and fearful of something. e.g. A batsman afraid of losing his wicket; and a bowler afraid to give momentum to the batting team; a batsman wanting to keep the scoreboard ticking and a bowler wanting to take a wicket. Or a batsman looking for boundaries and a bowler highly motivated to bowl a 'dot' ball. But such things hardly happen in T20 cricket because it's too batsmen-friendly; and batting team friendly.
Of course, my have got crystalised after reading these two fascinating articles from Kartikeya Date.
Links here:
http://www.espncricinfo.com/blogs/content/story/730319.html
http://cricketingview.blogspot.in/
Being a shorter contest than desired, having wickets in hand is a huge advantage in T20; and the last three-four overs are far more important then first 16. This phase is quite ridiculous. You consistently get wickets in this phase despite not bowling well; and you consistently score runs with a huge slice of luck accruing from field restrictions, inside edges, wickets in hand etc in this phase. So, these last three-four overs become equivalent of golden goal in football without playing the full 90 minutes; or a penalty shootout after unequal and far fewer than 45 minutes on either side. Or the equivalent of playing tie-break in tennis at 2-4 (you read it right) instead of 6-6.
Batsmen can throw their bats around and get 30-35 runs in the last three overs with luck on their side and thereby win the contest (It's like giving you a set 7-6 if you serve four aces while serving at 2-4). Similarly a bowler can end up taking wicket in this phase without intending to do so.
In other words, the good performances in T20 cricket, nay largely lottery, are largely measured by its success and not effort or process behind the execution of a skill-set. A good outswinger is not necessarily a good ball here; a good attempted yorker may end up with edged four and will turn the contest decisively in batting team's favour. A bowler can't even set the batsman up because he bowls one-over spells!!
In the current form, T20 cricket is nothing short of gambling and not surprisingly, leads to gambling.
But hey, I'm not going to complain excessively about T20. For, it needs to survive to win a 'real' audience (those who throng the grounds despite fixing scandal are 'no audience'. They are tamasha seekers). Cricket should be more interested in the 'existing' refined audience. That means those guys who can't watch the match these days largely because it's too long. We need to give purer cricketing entertainment to these real fans. And not bother much about 'tamasha' fans. To those who want to see fours and sixes, WWF is a good choice.
Now, to the real part. How to change T20 and make it a real contest between the bat and ball?
Like batsmen's swing, here are some wild suggestions.
Six wickets all out: Going by the reduced number of overs vis-a-vis 50-over game, four wickets should be all out. But that would be too farcical. Six wickets could be just right. Any seven of the playing XI can bat. It will ensure that batsmen will put a price on their wicket (the threat of all out will be there even if you have lost just one or two wickets by the 13th over). And since four players per team won't be allowed to bat, the team will have to think hard about the role of bits and pieces players. For, you may not need to pick a bowler because he bats a bit.
Bowling restrictions: No restriction on the number of overs per bowler. But a minimum four bowlers should be used in a completed innings. So,the distribution of overs among bowlers could well be 9-9-1-1 or 10-8-1-1. It will ensure that we will get to see quality bowlers operating. And since six wickets is all out and there are no field restrictions, unskilled batsmen cannot hit such bowlers out of the attack. It means bowlers will have chance to set the batsman up. Clap for a real contest.
Field restrictions: Not much. As applicable in Test cricket. Principle: runs and fours have to be earned; not begged for in the guise of entertainment.
Incentive during the first innings: If a bowling team gets three wickets in space of 12 balls, they can ban one opposing bowler when they come out to chase! (So,if MI take three RCB wickets in 12 balls, they can say one of Rampaul, Starc and Albie Morkel cannot bowl!) And, if a batting team scores more than 16 runs in a sequence of six balls, they can ban a batsman while defending a total (So, if MI score 16 runs in an over against RCB, they can ban Chris Gayle during the RCB chase! In that case, a substitute batsman among those four non-batters can be allowed to bat). Please don't argue.... it's an entertaining thought. An effective batting sequence can take out an opposing batsman of your choice; and an effective bowling sequence gives you a right to take out an opposing bowler of your choice.
Match intention with execution: There should be two such overs per innings. A bowlers goes at the top of his run-up after setting up his field. He tells a match ref, TV audience and the batsman what he is going to bowl through a wireless device. The batsman will tell the ref, bowler and the audience what he is going to do to that particular ball after listening to the bowler's plan. Of course, scoring will be complicated to decide upon. But the intention is to reward intentional excellence in those pre-determied two overs of the innings. Intentional excellence is horribly lower in cricket as compared to other quality sports despite cricket. Yes, that makes cricket closer to life: you try to do something; but end up doing something else. (But that will be applicable for 18 overs anyway). Despite being a linear sport; and not positionally flowing one with other bodies obstructing you like in football, cricketers get too frequent rewards for edged runs, unintentional movement of the ball and so on. Two high-fidelity overs in 20 will be a nice, short beginning to introduce this facet. And it will be thrilling for TV too because they will hear batsman and bowler's intention before the ball is delivered.
These are just ideas and principles to make T20 a skill-oriented fair contest between the bat and ball, far far away from tamasha, gambling, lottery... you decide the name.
Of course, these ideas can be polished further keeping the same principle in tact.But that's the only way to turn gambling into calculated skill-show of real cricket with just rewards for good performances and not too harsh a punishment for bowlers (boundaries due to excessive number of wickets in hand and other circumstances) and high rewards to bowlers (free wickets when a batsman is forced to try out something over-adventurous having wickets in hand) for average performance.
Anything logical for a three-and-a-half hours package (the basic intention behing the T20 game) should be tried out!
Anda sedang membaca artikel tentang
How to save IPL & T20 cricket
Dengan url
http://osteoporosista.blogspot.com/2014/03/how-to-save-ipl-t20-cricket.html
Anda boleh menyebar luaskannya atau mengcopy paste-nya
How to save IPL & T20 cricket
namun jangan lupa untuk meletakkan link
sebagai sumbernya
0 komentar:
Posting Komentar