I.P.L. Focus in the Midst of a Spicy Test Championship!

What’s wrong with the picture? Some might ask as the second Test of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy is poised on a knife’s edge. Some might even go as far as to ask, with a berth in the final in the I.C.C World Test championship at stake, did not the overemphasis on the release of the schedule of I.P.L 2023 seem out of place?

There was almost a sense of a forced façade on display as the announcement that the I.P.L schedule would be released at the end of the playing day was made. While making a remark in passing is one thing, to dedicate an entire post day’s play to talking up the I.P.L seemed an exercise in redundancy.

While it was important to inquire if the I.P.L needed this impetus – the I.C.C Women’s World Cup could have used a spotlight, it was far more pertinent to ask if the broadcasters were not better advised to keep the focus on the hosts having the upper hand on the tentative visitors?

After all, it was in the course of the second day’s play that it was pointed out yet again that getting spectators to the stadium for a Test match was a problem in India but not restricted to India alone. Wouldn’t it have made better sense to highlight just how important this already high profile contest was and what it meant for Test cricket and for the second I.C.C World Test championship?

It should have been about Cheteshwar Pujara, playing his 100th Test. To be fair, there was a snippet of a mention but not nearly enough of how much this understated cricketer has done for India in the middle of an admitted weak batting backbone.

However, more than sufficient time was dedicated to highlighting a maverick’s success, as the commentators put it about Hardik Pandya not being able to find a place on the Mumbai Indians team, having lost his bowling ability briefly and suddenly leading the Gujarat team to victory last year.

Talk about not having one’s finger on the pulse of the nation. For the broadcasters and the B.C.C.I looking to the influential social media generation, they should have known better that Pandya has been in the limelight as people chose to vilify rather than celebrate the supposed renewal of his marriage vows. While unfair speculation about his personal life became a free hit at the range, it seemed that the game under progress was of little interest at the end of the day.

How about highlighting the relevance of this Test in particular, about India becoming no.1 and closer to sealing a spot should they put Australia out of business? Much could have been made about strategy, focussing the individual players particularly since the last Test became the centre of unwarranted conjecture over pitch matters.

Time could have been spent bringing to light some of the unsung heroes on both teams over history. There is a historic stake as well as a World Test championship hanging over this big Test series, which is really as high profile as they come in a world that seems to be shrinking fast where Test cricket is concerned.

If anything the fact that the host cricket board, the B.C.C.I in this case, was not unperturbed by this skewed focus on the part of the broadcasters only goes to show that cricket boards have been as much as a part of the problem as anything else where it comes to upholding the state of Test cricket.

With boards increasingly focussed on the bottom line, as a matter of sustenance for some and bordering on avarice for others, there is no doubt that Twenty20 is being done to death. While there is something to be said for the limited short term pleasure that these tournaments provide, it is hard to put them in the same bracket as a bilateral Test series with such historic relevance like this one, let alone the ICC World Test championship.

So much could have been dedicated to drawing focus to the inaugural World Test championship. Perhaps the International Cricket Council (I.C.C) should step in in this scenario rather than baseless calls about favourable pitches and request of the broadcasters to keep their focus at the task at hand.

It is in the broadcaster’s interests to headline what brings them the money. But it is also the responsibility that comes to earning the broadcast rights to matches like these which are fewer and far between when it comes to bilateral Test series. Should they be made more accountable?

It almost seems like Test cricket is (and has been for a long time) been given the cold shoulder. While Test cricket might be struggling for an audience in certain parts of the world, the problem that ails it is also plausibly what is also India’s.

It is hard to imagine in a cricket passionate country like India – the broadcasters themselves collected a handful of supporters of all ages displaying their banners and support on the streets of the city – that were the gates thrown open or tickets reasonably reduced (while a significant number of seats usually go reserved but unfulfilled by the board and sponsors), there would be no takers who would not even fill half a stadium.

This experiment needs to be conducted in real time before so-called facts are presented by vested cricket boards about the imminent demise of Test cricket, without the rug being pulled out from under the feet of the traditional five day format.

Suffice it to say, that a Venn diagram would demonstrate more clearly the few common fans that follow Test cricket with as much passion as the I.P.L. A simple survey will reveal the enthusiastic summer fans who follow IPL exclusive of the sport and those who are mere Test enthusiasts who will not even blink in the direction of the I.P.L, or even Twenty20, polarising fans that are also now part of this cricket fraternity.

In that light, it could be argued that the section for which this space was created by the broadcasters were likely not even tuned into the match because Test cricket is not their cup of tea. Is that not defeating the purpose? Or an embarrassing self-goal by a misguided on-air strategy?

Did the Indian Premier League really need someone like Sanjay Manjrekar reminding all and sundry that domestic cricket in India rarely gets the attention of the Indian fans? While pinning the blame would be the subject of another debate, I think few were in agreement about Manjrekar’s reservations that the I.P.L having been billed as a domestic Twenty20 tournament would hold it back.

That was never in doubt given that from the outset the I.P.L had plucked the leaf straight out of the Indian Cricket League (I.C.L), the latter scuttled successfully in a big brother policy adopted by the B.C.C.I and admitted to as much as by the then I.P.L ‘Czar’, Lalit Modi.

Those who had followed the novelty of the I.C.L had already witnessed the amalgamation of local and foreign talent and therefore, the I.P.L model was hardly a surprise even if the franchisee and the so called ‘cattle fair’ as the player auction was dubbed was, even to some of the more seasoned cricketers like Australia’s Adam Gilchrist.

One would have thought the broadcasters would have wanted to emphasise the dominance of the hosts team over the tentative visitors who are on the backfoot after the first Test ended within three days. Would that not have been a greater advertisement for Test cricket to bring the new No.1 Test team into focus on their own home turf, and for the game of Test cricket itself, to have feisty commentators going at each other about the prospects of the respective teams?

Instead it is a somewhat sad sight when commentators, versatile and experienced in these high profile scenario of bilateral Test series, were made mute spectators, touching upon I.P.L history even as Test cricket remained consigned to the back burner, even as it presented a cliffhanger of a challenge in the run up to its World Cup equivalent. What else can Test cricket do when its custodians and bastions desert it?