Cricket

Yeah but if the best players in the world don't want to play, then where is the "test". Who will want to watch it and who will pay for it? And even if, say, all of England's top players carry on playing Test cricket, what is the point if they have no one to play against?

It's how England managed to beat Australia in the 70s!

Chris Gayle: This Fuckin' Guy

At least he's living up what would have been a typical May/June second division Test series.

Give him a fucking baseball bat and send him out to play rounders

Hmmmm....sounds like this one might go for the full 5 days...1.25 runs per over...pitch described as a "rice pudding" by Aggers...ho hum.

http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Sport/Pix/pictures/2009/5/14/1242296496291/England-cricket-captain-A-001.jpg

http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Sport/Pix/pictures/2009/5/14/1242296496291/England-cricket-captain-A-001.jpg

The kid's face cracks me up for some reason.

Why's Brendan Nash wearing an England cap?

xps Test cricket has weathered these kind of storms before, not least the Packer period Tom refers to upthread.

I'm concerned for it mostly because there doesn't seem to be any appetite for it in India, which is where the shots are going to called from from now on. Whether Chris Gayle likes it or not is irrelevant really. India seems to like its cricket as vulgar as possible from what I can see

This brought some gentle lols:

http://wisdencricketer.com/blogs/blog/2009/05/14/chris-gayle-another-day-in-my-living-hell/

I’m depressed. This hotel room is freezing. My hotel room in South Africa was a perfect temperature.

I look at my watch: 2.30pm. No rest for the wicked. I managed to snatch a quick 14 hours sleep but I’m still worn out.

He needs Mrs. Alan Stanford there to warm him up a bit

India controls what happens in cricket. It's not looking good for test cricket.

India controls what happens in cricket. It's not looking good for test cricket.

fair enough

I just await the new sexed up version of Test Cricket that is bound to be tried out.

Duncan Fletcher in the Guardian was suggesting a 400 over match, with allocation of innings as the bowling teams wish. Would at least get rid of time-wasting that is so prevalent these days.

They could call it 400/400

Sorry 200/200

That would get "the kids" flocking in!

I think the demise of Test cricket is greatly exaggerated. We're going through a period remarkably similar in tone to the period in the late 70's when ODIs were becoming popular. It's novel, exciting, and this time it's all over in 3 fleeting hours, but the core fanbase (and it is a strong fanbase) in every Test-playing nation will support Test matches above all.

They just won't bother going to them, anywhere but England, Australia and South Africa

I certainly hope so. Why are the grounds so empty though? Everywhere apart from Australia and England anyway. Although the ECB (and independently Lord's/MCC) are doing their best to make sure ticket prices are so extortionate that no one will be able to afford to go, and not in groups of more than two. And not allowed to drink unless they buy £4 pints of piss.

I notice that Lord's have extended their corporate seating areas into the upper Edrich. This was going to turn into a rant, but I haven't got the energy to cogently marshall my thoughts so I'm just going to limply flop to a halt... here.

xpost

I said South Africa, without even knowing if people actually watch test cricket there. It might just be England and Australia then.

The creeping corporatisation of cricket is something that's not unequivocally bad (it's easy to talk about the halcyon days of gentleman and players, which were actually deeply class-ridden and divisive), but I agree that £40+ tickets put a lot of people off, even if that does actually compare well to other days out e.g. a big stadium gig, football match etc.

Boring flat wickets where it's impossible to get anyone out for days on end don't help matters

True dat. I would recommend Mike Marquese's "Anyone But England" on that topic, which lifted the scales from my eyes on that and many other aspects of cricket.

Re: empty grounds, I think it's a psychosocial issue concerning the historical willingness of member nations' citizens to actually attend sports events in person, along with more esoteric concerns about management urban space, transportation, established community atmosphere etc.

*management OF urban space

It's certainly true that Britons and Aussies are probably the world's most willing live sports watchers (obviously partly due to economic reasons), cf. 5,000 attendances for non-league football matches here in the UK.

The Indian guys here at CMU give me hope. Most of them see IPL as at best a sideshow and are way more interested in England vs WI and the coming Ashes. A lot are staggeringly pissed off that England India series was only 2 tests. There needs to be balance. Champions trophy needs to go, World 20/20 should be every 4 years and staggered with World Cup and the Test Calendar should allow for 5 test series between the major nations (England, SA, Australia, India) and 3 test series for the other test playing nations. If this means that the ashes needs to be every 3 years instead of 2 then so be it.

Either that or we split the game and there can be dancing girls, fancydress leather stickball for those that want and test cricket for the rest of us.

Like I say, the initial sugar-rush will wear off when it becomes widely acknowledged that 2020 is not the messiah, it is just cricket but with more slogging and less unpredictable nuance.

Anyone know how I can get TMS in the states?

It's on the World Service sometimes, I think.

Like I say, the initial sugar-rush will wear off when it becomes widely acknowledged that 2020 is not the messiah, it is just cricket but with more slogging and less unpredictable nuance.

― sorry for british (country matters), Thursday, 14 May 2009 13:27 (3 minutes ago)

Certainly hope so. I just worried that the powers that be are so concentrated on making cricket EXCITING that they forget that sometimes the opposite of boring can also be 'interesting'.

Test cricket can of course be exciting, but it's the narratives that build up, the possibility of ebb and flow that is its true strength. I know I'm preaching to the converted here. It's just I think that the emphasis should be on allowing people to have access to cricket and enjoy its gentler tempos, rather than trying to make it exciting to attract these mythical crowds of youths whose minds have been damaged to such an extent that they will only part with their cash with the promise of flashing lights.

Daft scenes at Cardiff the other day in a limited overs match, where some damp old coots were treated to a blast of 'Chase the Sun by Planet Funk every time the ball trickled to the boundary.

Trying to make it like foopball is not the answer.

Unfortunately they switched off shortwave for north america and you have to have XM/Sirrius for that which requires a subscription.

xpost

I think that since cricinfo is owned by ESPN we are at their whim for whatever snippets of coverage we might get. I can stream the Giro, legally for free and I can't even pay for TMS.

I think the extent to which youth has been corrupted is also exaggerated. Youth with no previous interest in cricket HAS been corrupted, which is a good thing. Gateway drug and all that. Not all will make the leap, but some is enough.

OK, I had to watch danica patrick get a milky top lip and bang on about how chocolate milk was good for you but still free cycling, not even paid for cricket.

OK, so I was wrong TMS is available worldwide via the website, but only for home games, which for now is fine.

Certainly hope so. I just worried that the powers that be are so concentrated on making cricket EXCITING that they forget that sometimes the opposite of boring can also be 'interesting'.

You mean like they do with television news?

Genie... bottle... bottle... genie... I fear

I think the extent to which youth has been corrupted is also exaggerated. Youth with no previous interest in cricket HAS been corrupted, which is a good thing. Gateway drug and all that. Not all will make the leap, but some is enough.

Absolutely. All the youths that I know who have even a passing interest in cricket completely prefer Test to Twenty20 (which is curiously boring unless it's one of those infrequent thrillers). I just think that cricket administrators have had their minds so addled by marketing concepts that they think that the reason people aren't going to cricket is because it's not modern and flash enough. Whereas actually most people I know find that is in fact a very good reason to go to the cricket.

Genie... bottle... bottle... genie... I fear.

Same here.

You go to cricket in order to spend a day drinkin' and chillin' in the sun while a sporting drama slowly plays itself out in the surreally distant, almost incidental background

I could phrase that even more poetically but you know what I mean etc etc.

the thwack of leather on willow, the spew of the drunken spectator

The crackle of plastic pint glasses underfoot

xposts

Twenty20 is boring for the same reason that one day games are boring - you are reducing cricket down to a batting game; bowling (or at least taking wickets) is not important in this form of the game, if you can simply contain your opponent's batting attack. In Test cricket you can't win unless you take all 20 wickets, so there is a wonderful balance at the heart of the game between needing to score runs and needing to defend your wicket. The narrative develops organically around that.

Obviously preaching to the converted, but that is basically why one day stuff has died a slow death and why Twenty20 may well go the same way. The danger is that the administrators will gut Test cricket chasing Twenty20 profits and then end up losing both because there won't be any players who want to play Test matches and no one paying to see Twenty20. Hopefully that is an extreme scenario...