11.6.08

What's the Point?

For sport to really have meaning it has to have a competitive context - usually this is provided by tradition, time-honoured rivalry or a major competition - but, to me, the central weakness of the series of matches announced by the ECB (or should that just be Sir Allen Stanford?) this afternoon is that they have none. In fact, do they have any point at all apart from making the players rich?

Now, although I can easily be mistaken for a cricket purist (probably because, at the end of the day, I am one), I enjoy Twenty20 as much as the next person. But an annual series of what will basically just be exhibition matches? I'm getting bored just thinking about them, let alone watching them.

And who the hell are the 'West Indies All Stars'? I've heard of the West Indies, and I might take some interest if they were playing, but the 'West Indies All Stars'? No thanks, although, with the amount of money available most of the main side's main players are bound to be there, trying like mad to stick their fingers as deep into the pie as they'll go.

This could be good for the game; it could be bad. Until now I've tended towards neutrality and optimism on the subject of the Twenty20 'revolution', but this feels more like boredom and cynicism, coloured with a tinge of distaste.

3 comments:

Rob said...

From the people who stepped off the helicopter maybe Viv Richard, Des Haynes and Curtly Ambrose are going to play.

Homer said...

Strong words Brian....

Brian Carpenter said...

Thanks for the responses, guys. I just have the feeling that these games are all about money (for the players taking part, mainly) and it remains to be seen how much benefit they'll have for wider cricket, either in the West indies or here. At the tip of the iceberg, as someone mentioned last weekend on TV, you're going to have Michael Vaughan captaining a range of people in the Test side against whom he'll be a relative pauper. Maybe that won't be a problem for him, but when you introduce such massive earning inequalities into a team environment I think it makes the maintenance of team harmony much more difficult.

Time will tell...

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