I've been reading with some interest the growing talk about the introduction of Twenty20 cricket. The rules are quite interesting, and go something like this (from here):

# Twenty overs per side.
# Bowlers are restricted to 4 overs each.
# Fielding restrictions in the first six overs - 2 fielders outside circle with a minimum of two stationary fielders.
# Fielding restrictions for overs 7-20 - maximum five fielders allowed outside of circle.
# A 'no-ball' is worth 2 runs, and the batsman gets a free hit after a no-ball.
# Each side has just 80 minutes to get through their 20 overs. There is 15 minutes between innings.
# There are run penalties for each over which hasn't been bowled in the allocated time.
# The next batsman has 90 second after the fall of a wicket to get to the crease.

Even purists like Mark Waugh seem to be in favour of it, which I guess makes me a super-purist, for I don't want any of it! Or, at least, it doesn't sound like the sort of thing that should entirely replaced the current 50-over ODI's. The biggest reason the concept is getting such a big push is the fact that cricket appears to be dying in many parts of the world (if we exclude the sub-continent, where it is still religiously followed). The West Indies for years now have been playing with sides that are pale reflections of the unstoppable Windies outfits of the '80s, and it has been noted that cricket as a sport has been losing out to many American sports that are now making their way to the Carribean, such as baseball. It therefore seems a bit unpragmatic to suggest that cricket should stay the way it always has been, in the face of dwindling interest worldwide. Yet, I suppose that because I've been brought up loving the game, I find it a bit saddening to think that it should be forced to adapt the needs of people, rather than people adapting to the game and finding how to love its flaws and foibles.

But, I suppose when ODI's themselves were introduced all those years ago, there would have been purists back then who downplayed the idea, and saw it as breaking the tradition and spirit of the game. There's no denying that ODI's were also introduced to make mass-consumption easier, so it is a bit hypocritical of me to reject the concept of commercialization. I suppose the nature of commercialization is somewhat relative; ODI's for me are the norm*, but purists of yesteryear would probably vehemently disagree! I think therefore that any arguments I give against it could be equally applied to ODI's when they were first introduced...

There was the alternate suggestion of shaving off ten overs and making ODI's into 40 overs, which goes down a bit better. I think anything less than 30-35 overs just "feels" too short, as though all the careful strategy goes out the window. No room for early over collapses followed by careful consolidation, for starters. With twenty overs, there would be very little notion of careful batting - if a team has an explosive opening pair, then in all likelihood the first and last five overs would be spent in hard hitting, which, albeit entertaining, again just "feels" wrong. Hmph, I really don't know how to express it - almost like cricket is being reduced into a small, mass-market snack instead of an acquired taste. Heh, I'm probably elitist too; maybe I just want cricket to be appreciated by a select few, rather than the masses? Who knows.

So I don't really know where this leaves me - someone who admits hypocrisy and elitism but still feels Twenty20 is "wrong" sounds close enough (pretty convincing argument, eh?). Maybe in another twenty years I'll talk about how blasphemous Ten10 cricket is, and how it will destroy the great tradition of Twenty20!! I think that if Twenty20 is introduced alongside ODI's (i.e. it doesn't replace them completely, like ODI's didn't replace tests), then I will be wary but try to be a bit open-minded about it. I have my doubts though!

* I still watch and love test cricket, but it's just so different, so I don't really think either is the "norm" for cricket itself.