twenty-twenty vision

As a cartoon character said many years ago: “I have seen the future and it is us”.

This time I want to apply the quote to cricket. The new game of cricket called Twenty20.

First we had those interminable five day tests that sometimes got washed out and often ended in a draw. Even though one side may have scored 400 or 500 runs. I could never understand why, if rain interrupted play in an international test, you just didn’t add another day to the schedule. I find weather deciding a match in any sport rather quaint.

Then Kerry Packer blew the game apart with one day cricket and with the help of John Cornell he secretly signed more than fifty of the world’s best cricketers for a game which made traditionalists aghast. That was 35 years ago believe it or not. And it worked. Cricket fans love one day sloggers.

And now we have this newfangled game called twenty20. I watched the game between Australia and South Africa on television last night and enjoyed it. And I am not a true cricket fan.

I told a friend who was also watching the Aussies cream South Africa that it looked like baseball in pyjamas. But who cares? It was entertainment.

There was a record crowd of 37,000 at The Gabba in Brisbane. Music from everybody from Ray Charles to Bob Marley. And the players actually looked like they were enjoying themselves. I saw a South African fieldsman drop an absolute sitter. What did he do? He shrugged…. And laughed.

They belted fours. They belted sixes. And you wonder why that talent and aggression isn’t there in the middle of one-day matches.  I guess it’s because batsmen take risks in Twenty20 because there is a heap of talent coming up quick-time behind them. And you only have twenty overs to do it.

I don’t profess to know the rules or the complex fielding structures. But, as I said, I was entertained.

I think it is a bit childish to have player’s nicknames on the back of their shirts. What if a player’s nickname is Dickhead?  But what the heck. It was fun to watch.  And it will catch on.

As Andrew Ramsay wrote in The Australian today: “last night’s Twenty20 international in Brisbane represented a landmark in our sporting development”.

Sorry cricket tragics. I think he is right. As I said – it got me in.

Tuesday, January 10, 2006

©Copyright Derryn Hinch 2006