I watched a lot of T20 World Cup games and was glad that Pakistan won. After the Lahore attack on Sri Lankan cricketers, this was a much needed boost for Pakistani cricket. No cricket lover would like to see the game suffer in Pakistan, especially at the domestic level. Even if no international cricket is played in Pakistan for the next couple of years, if Pakistani Cricket powers to be could ensure that domestic cricket survives at all levels, then all will be fine. In these days of satellite television coverage, it’s not difficult to ensure Pakistani cricket lovers get a steady diet of international cricket involving their national team.
Couple of thoughts on T20 games.
Like all other forms of the game, T20 too is about skill and not simply slogging and power. So we got to see a lot of really good bowling, and more surprisingly, traditional innings building kinda batting. T20 strategies and tactics are still evolving and it is kinda fun to watch that process unfold, both at the IPL and T20 World Cup.
We also saw a lot of new young stars emerge at the T20 World Cup and instead of listing them, let me add a caveat. While Parnell et al look quite skilled and likely will succeed in other forms of cricket too, there is one aspect of cricket, the mental side of the game, which can not be evaluated on the basis of T20 games. Let me explain a little. Bowling a great 2-3 over spell isn’t indicative of whether a bowler is any good. What made Shane Warne great weren’t his dramatic dismissals of Gatting et al but a 7-8 over spell when he would try to set up a batsman and when we could see him thinking aloud with each delivery. T20 has no space for that.
In interesting ways, T20 began to remind me of baseball. More on that on some other occasion.
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