Ever since the Inaugural Edition
of The Indian Premier League (IPL) in 2008, T20 cricket has caught the
imagination of cricket fans worldwide and particularly in the Indian
subcontinent, where cricket is considered to be a religion for the majority of
the population. The Inaugural ICC World Cup Twenty20 was played in South Africa
in 2007 with India winning and ever since the popularity of this form of the
game has seen an upward graph in India.
To begin with listing the pros of
this form of the Gentleman’s game; Indian fitness coach Ramji Srinivasan
declared in an interview with the Indian fitness website Takath.com,
that Twenty20 had "raised the bar" in terms of fitness levels for all
players, demanding higher levels of strength, speed, agility and reaction time
from all players regardless of their role in the team. Former Australian
wicketkeeper Adam Gilchrist pushed for Twenty20 to be made an Olympic Sport
saying "It would be difficult to see a better, quicker or cheaper way of
spreading the game throughout the world."
Such is the
adulation for the game that it creates a concert-like atmosphere providing
nail-biting action and entertainment not only for those who see the matches in
the Cricket Stadiums but also those who watch it at home on TV. Such is the
quality of coverage that many now claim that watching the match on TV is a
better experience that even watching it in a stadium. It is proving to be a
huge money-spinner as a part from the revenue earned by the ticket sales for
each match, the live telecast rights of the series also fetches crores of
rupees.
Cricket is no
longer played for just fun and glory, but it has proved to be a big business
altogether. Twenty20 premier leagues are owned by a multinational cartel of
sports syndicates regulated by the International Cricket Council (ICC). The
tournaments have a high-volume, high-intensity business model heavily financed
by corporate sponsorships, franchises, and equity ownerships. Production costs
include contracting the rights of players, technical experts, technology-based
equipment, and financing salary streams. Revenue flows accrue from gate
receipts, bidding proceeds, exclusive broadcast rights, and investment
royalties.
On the other hand, T20 has also
attracted a fair share of criticism, the most acute of which being that it
steals the lime-light from other sports in India such as ‘Hockey and Kabaddi’
which are already being heavily ignored by the masses in India. Apart
from that, even though it was supposed to boost performance of players in
International ODI and tests but players seem to increasingly face burn-out as a
result of increase in number of matches played, draining them of energy and
undermining their performance. The huge sums of money involved made it a happy
breeding ground for massive corruption in Cricket administration such as the
IPL scandal involving Lalit Modi. T20 has its benefit, hence the messiah of
Cricket but at a high cost.
Thus to conclude, in the words of one the greatest
cricketers of all time, Sachin Tendulkar, “T20 has changed the dynamics of
cricket, the way it is played. For example, nobody thought that batsmen could
play reverse sweeps off fast bowlers to short third-man stands. It has changed
cricket big time.”
Aakruti Shah
( PG MEDIA 2015-2017)
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