Pink ball Exam (Test)
The Pink Ball Exam (Test)
Change they say is inevitable. Infact in a very paradoxical form of the way, change is forever constant .
On the 22nd of November, (6 days after the historic retirement of the iconic Sachin Tendulkar and 7 days after his debut !! ) the Indian Test cricket is on the cusp of a new history. India as always has always been the late adopters of the new improvisations in cricket but like in the past history, it will take to this change as well as a duck takes to water. Eden Gardens already wears a festive atmosphere and the first 4 days are fully sold out !!
Day & Night Test match cricket is here upon us and the "Pink Ball Test" is here to stand the "test" of time. This will be the first time that both Bangladesh as well as India will feature in a Day & Night Test match as well as it being such first Test to be held in India. And what better venue than the iconic Eden Gardens ! Saurav Ganguly, the local super hero as well as the president of BCCI has rolled out the red carpet for all the luminaries from the past. Sunil Gavaskar, Kapil Dev and Sachin Tendulkar will be amongst the honoured ones to witness this historic moment.
Purists of cricket are against this whole idea of Day & Night matches and some even advocated that we don't use helmets and other protective equipment to take cricket to the past era and make it interesting for the viewers. Now that would be a caveman thinking for the longest time. But today, we need to evolve and transform over a period of time. I have heard several old time cricketers cum commentators complaining about the jersey number and the name written across the back of the jersey, in red ball cricket. They claim that they can easily identify the batsman / fielder without the name on the shirt. That's exactly the point. The game is not just about the over informed commentators. It's about the spectator's viewing as well. I may know a Ronaldo or a Suarez but if I can identify the 10 others, it will make my viewing that much more enjoyable.
Moving away from the traditional purists stereotypes, we need to understand that the game has changed over the years. At each point, there were detraction and counter arguments. However, in order to survive, the game had to be relevant to the spectators. Like it or not, that is where the money and hence the scalability of the game and the players come from. Broadcasters, sponsors and the advertisers are more interested in knowing how far their reach can be and what would be the ROI. Evolution has been the name of the game so far.
We started with a 60 over World Cup in 1975 and then in 1979 where India fared as poorly as one would have thought. 1983, changed the road map of Indian cricket, nay, Indian Sports totally. For that matter Asiad and this 1983 World Cup was instrumental in getting colour TVs at most homes. Somewhere in between Kerry Packer staged an uprising of sorts and though his Channel 9 league was officially banned, a lot of South African and Australian cricketers joined in that what was called as a "coloured clothing circus". Soon after, all the official associations accepted 50 over ODI in coloured clothing as a norm. T20 was a similar such incident. India had furiously rejected it. Top players opted out of the inaugural T20 world cup in 2007. As luck would have it, India won the WC. IPL started post that and rest is history !
This then now has transformed into a T10 as well as a 100 ball game. The idea is to capture the spectators attention and imagination. Like it or not, all the stakeholders earn from here and as long as they don't make money, the game will cease to exist ! Now, let us try and look at it from a game perspective. There are some who say that the players should have been given adequate game time before the actual Test. Given the hectic scheduling and the way our international players are managed, getting them into some local matches with a pink ball or even a 3 day friendly match with Bangladesh was not possible.
So, you have to start somewhere and somehow. If you don't start now, you will never know. That also brings me to the relevance of this series. India is already 1 up. This has no top billing apart from being a Pink Test. India has a reason to fail and not surrender any pride. Next Test series is most likely against the Aussies. Lots of bragging rights there will be at stake. It's better that we match up v/s Bangladesh than to wait for nemesis Australia.
Filtering it down to the playing conditions .. Colour is important but not much I assume. With so many practice sessions, it should be under control. Seam might be an issue. Might aid the pacers to start with and then maybe spinners will struggle due to dew and seam going away. In India, the colour due to the outfield and then later due to dew may have a huge impact during the 2nd half of the day An even match approaches ... a start of a new beginning. A first of many. A 300 has been scored by a batsman on a Pink Test and a bucketful of wickets taken by a pacer. Hoping for a fair and square contest at a historic venue and historic event 👏🏻👏🏻 Let us now get on with the game on hand.
I find it surprising that most of the commentators as well as umpires talk about getting fit for a D&N game. How different is that? For them, it should be like any other D&N ODI. I did read about umpire Ravi changing his sleeping pattern to adjust to the rigours of night match Test cricket. The day ends at 8 pm. Did not quite understand the logic. The playing conditions for the players, would be a lot different though. Firstly, the spotlight would be on the ball. Spotting a pink cherry under lights won't be an easy task especially when the mind has been mentally trained to spot a red or a white ball. Next up for debate would be how long the ball would hold it's character. The seam would be a problem. If the seam gets less pronounced then the swing and especially the reverse swing will become an issue. Similarly, with the dew coming in at this time of the year, the ball can get soggy and spinners may find it difficult to ply their trade. The outfield too would play a major part in discolouring the ball and make life more difficult for the batsmen as well as the bowlers.
At the end of the day, the spectators want to see a result in the game. Not too long ago, the defensive tactics of teams led to a slew of games ending in meaningless draws. A no result after 5 days of daily 7 hours of cricket, was as excruciating as a root canal. Thankfully, a lot of mindset has changed now. With the ladvent of Test Championship, this will get a bit more fillip. All in all, it promises to be a great advertisement for Test cricket and a move forward in the evolution of the game. May the games BEGIN !!
On the 22nd of November, (6 days after the historic retirement of the iconic Sachin Tendulkar and 7 days after his debut !! ) the Indian Test cricket is on the cusp of a new history. India as always has always been the late adopters of the new improvisations in cricket but like in the past history, it will take to this change as well as a duck takes to water. Eden Gardens already wears a festive atmosphere and the first 4 days are fully sold out !!
Day & Night Test match cricket is here upon us and the "Pink Ball Test" is here to stand the "test" of time. This will be the first time that both Bangladesh as well as India will feature in a Day & Night Test match as well as it being such first Test to be held in India. And what better venue than the iconic Eden Gardens ! Saurav Ganguly, the local super hero as well as the president of BCCI has rolled out the red carpet for all the luminaries from the past. Sunil Gavaskar, Kapil Dev and Sachin Tendulkar will be amongst the honoured ones to witness this historic moment.
Purists of cricket are against this whole idea of Day & Night matches and some even advocated that we don't use helmets and other protective equipment to take cricket to the past era and make it interesting for the viewers. Now that would be a caveman thinking for the longest time. But today, we need to evolve and transform over a period of time. I have heard several old time cricketers cum commentators complaining about the jersey number and the name written across the back of the jersey, in red ball cricket. They claim that they can easily identify the batsman / fielder without the name on the shirt. That's exactly the point. The game is not just about the over informed commentators. It's about the spectator's viewing as well. I may know a Ronaldo or a Suarez but if I can identify the 10 others, it will make my viewing that much more enjoyable.
Moving away from the traditional purists stereotypes, we need to understand that the game has changed over the years. At each point, there were detraction and counter arguments. However, in order to survive, the game had to be relevant to the spectators. Like it or not, that is where the money and hence the scalability of the game and the players come from. Broadcasters, sponsors and the advertisers are more interested in knowing how far their reach can be and what would be the ROI. Evolution has been the name of the game so far.
We started with a 60 over World Cup in 1975 and then in 1979 where India fared as poorly as one would have thought. 1983, changed the road map of Indian cricket, nay, Indian Sports totally. For that matter Asiad and this 1983 World Cup was instrumental in getting colour TVs at most homes. Somewhere in between Kerry Packer staged an uprising of sorts and though his Channel 9 league was officially banned, a lot of South African and Australian cricketers joined in that what was called as a "coloured clothing circus". Soon after, all the official associations accepted 50 over ODI in coloured clothing as a norm. T20 was a similar such incident. India had furiously rejected it. Top players opted out of the inaugural T20 world cup in 2007. As luck would have it, India won the WC. IPL started post that and rest is history !
This then now has transformed into a T10 as well as a 100 ball game. The idea is to capture the spectators attention and imagination. Like it or not, all the stakeholders earn from here and as long as they don't make money, the game will cease to exist ! Now, let us try and look at it from a game perspective. There are some who say that the players should have been given adequate game time before the actual Test. Given the hectic scheduling and the way our international players are managed, getting them into some local matches with a pink ball or even a 3 day friendly match with Bangladesh was not possible.
So, you have to start somewhere and somehow. If you don't start now, you will never know. That also brings me to the relevance of this series. India is already 1 up. This has no top billing apart from being a Pink Test. India has a reason to fail and not surrender any pride. Next Test series is most likely against the Aussies. Lots of bragging rights there will be at stake. It's better that we match up v/s Bangladesh than to wait for nemesis Australia.
Filtering it down to the playing conditions .. Colour is important but not much I assume. With so many practice sessions, it should be under control. Seam might be an issue. Might aid the pacers to start with and then maybe spinners will struggle due to dew and seam going away. In India, the colour due to the outfield and then later due to dew may have a huge impact during the 2nd half of the day An even match approaches ... a start of a new beginning. A first of many. A 300 has been scored by a batsman on a Pink Test and a bucketful of wickets taken by a pacer. Hoping for a fair and square contest at a historic venue and historic event 👏🏻👏🏻 Let us now get on with the game on hand.
I find it surprising that most of the commentators as well as umpires talk about getting fit for a D&N game. How different is that? For them, it should be like any other D&N ODI. I did read about umpire Ravi changing his sleeping pattern to adjust to the rigours of night match Test cricket. The day ends at 8 pm. Did not quite understand the logic. The playing conditions for the players, would be a lot different though. Firstly, the spotlight would be on the ball. Spotting a pink cherry under lights won't be an easy task especially when the mind has been mentally trained to spot a red or a white ball. Next up for debate would be how long the ball would hold it's character. The seam would be a problem. If the seam gets less pronounced then the swing and especially the reverse swing will become an issue. Similarly, with the dew coming in at this time of the year, the ball can get soggy and spinners may find it difficult to ply their trade. The outfield too would play a major part in discolouring the ball and make life more difficult for the batsmen as well as the bowlers.
At the end of the day, the spectators want to see a result in the game. Not too long ago, the defensive tactics of teams led to a slew of games ending in meaningless draws. A no result after 5 days of daily 7 hours of cricket, was as excruciating as a root canal. Thankfully, a lot of mindset has changed now. With the ladvent of Test Championship, this will get a bit more fillip. All in all, it promises to be a great advertisement for Test cricket and a move forward in the evolution of the game. May the games BEGIN !!
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