Twenty-20 : The New Face Of Cricket

September 2007 witnessed a new chapter in the popular game of cricket, i.e. Twenty-20 (T20). The first official, international world-cup for T20 took off in South Africa and people welcomed it with open arms. What does T20 have in store for us? Sure, the main thing it's built upon is the entertainment factor. It has been given a baseball kind of feel in many ways and has been reduced to a three hour stint, where people come, have a blast, enjoy the game with balls raining all over the stadium, and go home with a definite result in hand. (Unless the rain doesnt play spoil-sport for a very long duration, that is)

But the real question is.. "Is Twenty-20 here to stay for the good or for the worse?? Is this game here to give what ODIs and TESTs could not, or to take away what they had to offer??" And as any situation generally has it, there're two sides of the coin here too.

Firstly, I personally feel the players in T20 do not require any methods or techiniques to play the shots. If the ball hits the bat and fetches you runs, then it all counts. Some teams or players display more of negative batting and bowling skills, which is harming the reputation of cricket, as a game and its modus operandi. So the real technique is being lost, if one sees it in the long run. There were categories of shots and proper ways to execute them, which youngsters learnt from the cricketing heroes of the likes of Tendulkar and Lara. Now, what do they have to look upto?? The way any international batsman is playing the game is the same as any child plays gully(street)-cricket. Hit the balls no matter how and score. So the youngsters would see their heroes (in new avtaar) hitting blindly, and they would ape that technique itself.

Besides, the new players would be selected on their ability to slog, rather than play correctly, following proper cricketing rules. They wont grow as a batsman and would fail in ODIs or TESTs which test the real endurance of a cricketer. It's spoiling the batsmen and challenging the bowlers to improve their bowling by conceeding as little runs as they can, in their quick spell. But what's the solution to pinch-hitting?? Bowl full length and yorker balls. That's what, or rather, that's all the bowlers will learn.

But apart from that, it also is lending a new definition to the batting of experienced players. There are natural sloggers who are stripped off their natural talent by the coaches who ask them to play with a restrained attitude. So most of the times, they do not get a chance to actually free up their arms and really hits shots when the situation demands them to, in an ODI or a TEST. Here they can play their natural game, and they'll be applauded for their talent. So it's a great platform for born sloggers such as M.S. Dhoni, Virendra Sehwag, Yuvraj Singh and others to be themselves on the field.

Besides, the other batsmen, who are not born hitters, also get to learn how to hit shots, which can later be useful in the ODIs or TESTs if the situation requires. So, in a way, batsmen are learning how to be more aggressive, through this medium of cricket.

This also means that we might get to see a further increase in the total runs scored scored by any team in an ODI, owing to the aggressiveness lent to them in T20. Already the average score in an ODI has increased to twice its orignal value since the advent of ODIs. Now a further increase in the score also means ODIs would be more interesting henceforth.

One grim question everybody has in mind is, "What's the future of Twenty-20?" People, everywhere are having mixed feelings about the game as well as the audiences are giving mixed responses. The tournament that's going on currently is the World Cup of Twenty-20, but still there's no hype or feel of the world cup, that's generally associated with a conventional tournament of such magnitude. Whether Twenty-20 is here to stay or not, that is something only time will tell. Maybe this new style of cricket may disappear into the dark some night or maybe this may change the face of cricketing forever, as ODIs did when only Tests were prevalent...