The super-sub rule is a welcome change in one day cricket and does bring an element of excitement to the game that was starting to become mundane. Apart from everything else that is being spoken about how good it is for the game, I think the rule is bound to benefit sides that lack quality allrounders more (say India & West Indies) than sides that already have a bunch of quality all-rounders like Pakistan and South Africa.
Take the case of India. If it bats first and like always packs its side with 7 batsmen. During its innings it can retire a batsman like Dravid or Kaif and subsititute one of them with a bowler to give them depth in bowling. This would level the playing field with a team teeming with allrounders like Pakistan - which typically on any given day can call upon 3 top-class allrounders who bowl decently - Razzaq, Afridi and Shoaib Malik. These all-rounders are better than a lot of non-regular bowlers. Mind you a player who has been substituted can still field - so India does not lose Kaif in the field if he is subsitituted.
If it bowls first, India can quickly bowl out one bowler on the trot at the beginning of the innings and bring in a batsman. I am not sure of this interpretation of the rule . Does anyone else know better?
2 comments:
Hey Ghai,
I did look at your blog, and even clicked on the ad for cricket books and memorabilia, as I've been looking for a cricket print, of a nice pastoral English cricket scene, to decorate my cube.
Great blog, but shows how rusty my knowledge of cricket has become. I had no idea about the supersub rule. And i read about Twenty20 only early this year (i think it will lamentably turn cricket into baseball, and the stands will be full of women who look on the Great Game like a "date" event instead of as a Sacred Ritual). I myself have always been a purist, and only grudgingly accepted the one-day version of the game. For me cricket will always be billowing white shirts etched on a lovely green canvas, accompanied by the click of willow on deepest red leather.
I guess I'm one of the last of the "flannelled fools at the wicket."
Cheers
ninad
Ninad,
Yes, it has been a time of change lately in cricket - a lot of purists like you do not like it. Interestingly the changes are being driven by two forces - the urge to take the game to the "new world" and the fact that the important markets of Australia and England have been seeing a waining interest in the game. Australia more so as a result of their one-sided dominance of the game, whereas in England, Football has been the undisputed number one sport by an ever increasing margin for quite some time. I personally do not like Twenty-twenty since it takes away the "endurance" aspect of the game. Staying at the wicket and scoring runs over a longer stay at the wicket appeals to be more than a low risk slam bang affair.
You are amusingly dead right on what a baseball game really is - a social event. Twenty-twenty does risk making the game of cricket just that. But I still have my doubts over whether there is room for cricket in the USA - it does not have the physical aspect that popular sports in the US have. We will have to wait and see.
Post a Comment