And they ruined Test cricket....

Test cricket, from nowhere became the main course of fans across the globe in the heat of the 2-match tussle between India and South Africa this February. Of course, what lent to that spectator eagerness was the high stakes involved in a contest that decided the best Test team in the world.
But now as India stand tall in that glory basking above the rest of the cricket world at that level, there are qualms about matters of competition. As No.1 India does not have an equitable allocation of matches. So much so that the interest takes a lull until as late as December when the same two countries meet in a heavyweight contest.
Among the top four - India, South Africa, Australia and Sri Lanka, the first and the last do not get a fair share of fixtures. India has only five matches - two against lowly Zimbabwe in May and three against South Africa when they tour South Africa in December. The return series between the top two nations is bound to draw the same interest it did in India. The Proteas will be out to make amends for their defeat in that second Test in India. On their familiar home terrain South Africa will have the advantage. For India too it will be an acid test in that they will be playing away from home where their ability to prevail on South African wickets will be at stake. But that is another nine months away.
Sri Lanka is the worst affected with just a solitary 2-match series for the whole year when the West Indies play here in November. South Africa, the runners-up, has 12 matches, the best share. Four against the West Indies in the Caribbean in May, two versus Zimbabwe in September and three against India back home. Third positioned Australia have 7 matches - two versus New Zealand in March and the five-match Ashes series back home in December.
Certainly no equitable distribution of fixtures. Distinctly, India as world champions have got a raw deal in terms of the number of matches allocated. Considering the fact that they had been knocking on the door for sometime.
Indeed, this sorry state of Test cricket, leaving aside the causes that have seen the game back pedal over the years, lies in primarily there been no equitable distribution of Test matches by the ICC. Starkly, India, going by their ascendancy in the last few years, has not found the recognition they deserve in that respect. Sri Lanka has pointedly been cold shouldered.

Severe blow to Lanka

To put it blandly, while it is a severe blow to Sri Lanka in their crusade in the Test match lane, it is also very harsh on the Indians considering the impact they have made. Going on the basis that they were among the top three or four for sometime, India should have got a fair share of Test series’ this year. Of course, off the official ICC fixture card, talk has it that India is down to tour Sri Lanka for a Test series.
Indeed, this lowly line-up of match distribution by the ICC for a start leaves Test cricket for the worse in an already eroding scenario of neglect that has evidently seen this setback to the game. The commercial arm creeping into cricket has of course, been the main bane. This has hit the longer version of the game for a six by the ever mounting instant cricket. From 50-over stuff to more recently the Twenty-20 form which has gobbled up cricket in a fast flow of instant action of the hamburger stuff that has seen it wholly commercially dressed up and sold to a thirsting cricketing public. A cricketing public that has more by creation by the sport’s keepers’ commercialism robbing up instant stuff as an entertainer progressively sweeping Test cricket off its feet. Therein, it can be argued whether cricket lovers have really lost interest in five-day cricket or whether the ICC, eyeing the big dollars into its coffers, has been more in search of the pot of gold, courtesy television rights than salvaging Test cricket.

Still holds sacred

While the ICC would hold strong in the contention that no sport prospers without big money and more so in the face of growing competition from other sports mainly football, it is also questionable whether cricket’s keepers by their money motivation have left Test cricket to drift instead of having strived to give it a commercial dress up that would still make it appealing to fans. Of course, notwithstanding the fact that true lovers of the sport still rate Test cricket above whatever other form for its traditional bondage that still produces the type of enthralling stuff like an Australia-West Indies tied match when Richie Benaud led the Aussies and the late Sir Frank Worrell the Windies in the early 1960s. That was when without the TV, cricket was electrified by the calibre of players that adorned it such as Sir Garfield Sobers, Rohan Kanhai, Worrell, Ken Mckay and Lindsay Kline; the last two who took the barrage of West Indian fast bowling on their chests to ensure Australia tied that famous match on Australian soil.
And we cannot forget the famous Australia-England series when Richie Benaud bowled his heart out to stop an England march to victory in that famous Old Trafford Test match. England, needing 180 odd to win, on 100 odd for 1 wicket following an explosive innings by Ted Dexter. Benaud then bowling England captain Peter May round his legs to set the rot.

India deserve more

Returning to the hemisphere of Test standings and the remaining fixtures, India, despite being No.1 do not have the voltage in so much as fixtures to hang on to that position with Australia, by its share of seven matches could very well be in a position to reclaim that status quo that it lost to South Africa. The Proteas too with 12 matches have the opportunity of getting to that elusive spot. Analytically, it is worth asking whether the ICC still continues to give blue eyed treatment to the better known names in the game. From an Indian perspective, in the wake of their recent triumph, Indian players and the media have voiced concern at the little pace at which Test cricket moves and called on the lords of the game to give India a fair share of Test cricket. And India justify in loud mouthing for their Test cricket cause considering the progress this sub-continent nation has made in deservedly outdoing two of the super teams in the game in South Africa and Australia.