Chris Gayle’s comments make interesting reading. At the end of the day he is only symptomatic of the age we live in. Test cricket is tough going, it is the ultimate test of a batsman’s ability, the ultimate examination of a bowler’s potency and craft. I can quite understand why a batsman, who’s primary skill appears to be the ability to whack bowlers to all parts on flat decks, would love 20/20 cricket more than tests. After all, being out there for an hour and a half is a darn sight better than batting for two days. In 20/20 there is a result all the time, in tests, that day and a half for 200 is most likely to get your team a bore draw. In 20/20 the pace of the game, the coloured clothing, the music, the dancing, is all designed to get the punters into it. In tests, well, the punters have to get into it because of a contest, not because one is manufactured.
Oh. Did I forget the money? Silly me.
I will tell you what is putting test cricket in trouble, and it isn’t 20/20. We’ve had limited overs cricket for the best part of 40 years at international level, and we’ve seen test cricket survive. No, test cricket needs to be the meeting of the best sides with no limitations put in place. No, you can win a team because you have a great batting line-up and your bowling is a joke. Nor the opposite applying where your bowlers may be able, but your batsmen aren’t up to it. I’m no fan of Bangladesh because that isn’t “test” cricket – it is a five day game, in theory, against a team not sufficiently strong enough to provide a test. Even when Australia were rolling England over at will, it was rare that a series went by when England either won (Sydney, Adelaide, Melbourne, The Oval (twice), Edgbaston, Headingley) or had the Aussies worried. Though the series victories were clear, Australia always had to play really well to achieve them. If their standards slipped, as they did at Edgbaston in 1997, they could come a cropper. No-one, no matter how good they were, could ever take a trip to the West Indies for granted.
Once you have two decent teams in place the next thing that needs to happen is for there to be a wicket which gives both sides of the equation encouragement. Why is 150 plays 150 seen as a dreadful game on a terrible surface but 600 plays 700 not slagged off anywhere near as much? People may moan about green-tops but it is certainly better than playing on a surface where the only hope of a result is if a team has a brain-fart and chucks all its wickets away. And in the case of Chris Gayle’s West Indies team, they won the series in the winter by winning on a result pitch and providing shirt fronts for the remainder where taking 20 wickets would have been an immense achievement. And yes, I know St John’s was used as a stop gap, but the pitch world reputed for being the death of bowler’s ambitions clearly had not changed immensely. While it is entirely within your home country’s right to prepare the pitches that suit you, when you come over to alien climes and are faced with something not to your liking, don’t pout and moan about it.
Chris Gayle is being paid royally for his exploits in the cricket circus that is the IPL. Good on him. There are many legends created by that form of the game, aren’t there. Go on, other than McCullum maybe, and on a local scale in England Napier, who else? Neither are test greats, neither would make anyone’s cricket hall of fame. Neither are going to be looked upon as well as the greats of yester year. It is telling that the world’s greatest players seem not to care for 20/20 that much. Ponting does his best, sometimes, to conceal his contempt for the game. I note Sachin is not playing in the World 20/20 (I don’t recall seeing his name in the squad). It is a money spinner, the IPL, for these players, not a realistic opportunity to make themselves even more famous, because their deeds in one day cricket and much more in tests put them in the pantheon of the greats. Not doing well, and getting paid handsomely, for a hit and giggle game designed to fill regional sides coffers and fund local cricket.
Chris Gayle can moan about tests in his personal view all he likes. It is a free world and he can say what he wants. He can also criticise others if he wants and be criticised by others. In a world where attention spans diminish, test cricket is an anachronism, but it still is important. It is the sporting equivalent of reading a novel. There’s a load of trash about, but the one’s you remember most are those that take a long time in the plot developing, and then a tumultuous ending. If English people don’t put Edgbaston 2005 in the top five matches they’ve ever seen, I don’t know what more sport can do.
The average 20/20 game is a little bit of hit and giggle for three hours to help pass off a sunny evening. Few games are at all memorable, and hardly ever attain “event” status, which top class sport needs to be. A poor test is still more of an event than any of the 50 odd IPL games going on in South Africa. I maintain that for now, but if players get dragged off to play that, putting their livelihoods above the game (and I can’t blame them) then that is the threat. Chris Gayle doesn’t dislike test cricket, because he made his name in it. He would prefer to get paid more for doing less. He said that as much himself. I can’t really blame him for that either. It is just a bit sad, that’s all. I like test cricket.
