IPL Kills Test Cricket.

What a laugh!

Everyone(read reporters) and their granmum(as Geoff Boycott) would say is crying themselves hoarse that the IPL is gonna kill or has killed the Test Cricket phenomenon. That Test Cricket is "the" form of the game to watch for - the "purest" form of the game. So on and so forth.

Firstly, I was as keen a observer of the Test Series between India-Aus as any. And I slept through the India-SA series with the same gusto. It was the competition level, and the level of cricket on offer that kept me glued to the websites, to the score cards, reports and write-ups. Nothing else. Most teams suck at Test Cricket - and most Test wickets SUCK. Those are the reasons Test Cricket will die. It hasnt yet died because of the phenomenal competition that the Aussies have brought to the table - which has spurred intense rivarly between them and India, and Aus-SA as well. Also, the pitches for most of these have been good pitches - for bat and ball. (except certain instances). Anywhere where its been only the bat or only the ball talking has been mighty boring. Except for statisticians. And that brings me to the IPL.

I'm not a big fan of the IPL. I dont like the city based league format, I rarely like a team that's not bound to geography - and the IPL teams are hardly bound to geography. Robin Uthappa plays for the Mumbai Indians team, Praveen Kumar plays for the Bangalore Royal Challengers, Dhoni plays for Chennai Super Kings etc., That's only the Indians who've gone across teams. Add in 4 foreign players per team, and where's the connect to geography? Nowhere.

However, it may *not* be a bad thing to have the team named after cities but have the players from everywhere. One positive is that there's no hard-bred "loyalty" and good cricket by anyone can be applauded. Having said that, I already am thinking that the Kolkata team is a bit too strong for most other teams and hence as the superior team, I'm rooting for anyone else to beat them! :D

I had a ball of a time watching the form McCullum was in, when he was mauling my "supposed"(notice thick layer of sarcasm) home team. An Innings of 158 in a 20 over game where most people get out before reaching 50, is stupendous to say the least. More so when one gets in 70 odd balls.

Another observation - The other good thing inherent to Twenty20 - and seemingly absent in One-dayers is that it is not often that you get one man belting the daylights out of, or bowling the stumps off the oppostion so often that you forget the rest, or that they become non-existent. In a sense that makes it more of a "team" game than the ODI version. That, however will only last in the initial stages, I think. Maybe one or two years down the line, we'll be moaning about how one-sided T20 games can easily become.

Those are really the key for me in Twenty20/ IPL - requiring the full team to perform, close matches - and with the IPL, no team loyalty.

The big problem I have with the IPL is that it doesnt look likely that the games will continue to be close matches - it looks more or less certain that there are some very strong teams which will wallop the rest of the field.

And what is it with the 6's and 4's? It doesnt even look like there's anyone doing anything but touch the ball, and whoomp! six. the biggest so far? 102M!! Gimme a break! Yuvi's T20 WC six was 119M. Someone please get us decent wickets and boundaries!

As most people(read cricketers) in the league have asserted, people will come to watch good cricket. However, I'm afraid that good cricket will mostly be translated to "one-sided / 6's n 4's" cricket. And that would suck.