The engaging tussle between bat and ball

The gentleman’s game has never been the mass’s game as football is. Stretched over a period of five days (few more in timeless tests era) by relatively nonathletic players in dull white formals, it doesn’t really set the adrenalin rushing of the first timers. Being a non Olympic sport and played by just ten countries at its highest level (or is it nine), most people around the globe have never even seen a complete cricket match.

But for a true connoisseur there is no other sport that captures the imagination and engages the emotions as majestically as cricket does. In its grandest form, the game, like a great novel, goes through its share of twists and turns and unfolds slowly plot by plot. It also stirs up the intellectual side of a spectator, as only in cricket one gets the time between deliveries to debate about the proceedings.

The most prominent thing that sets the game apart is the two different and distinct set of skills taking on each other. No other sport (with the exception of baseball) has protagonists playing roles as varied as batting, bowling and fielding. It is only in cricket that Brian Lara, who didn’t manage a single wicket in tests and Glenn McGrath, a bunny with the bat, end up as legends.

The biggest complain of most skeptics is a number of contest ending in draw even after a tussle of five days. What is the point of going through the whole ordeal and still not have a winner, they say. What the cynics fail to appreciate is that sometimes a no result is the actual reflection of a contest. While one side might be slightly better than the other, it has to dominate the game to a certain degree (take 20 wickets) to be adjudged as the winner.

Besides the notion that draws are boring is also a myth. Brett Lee and Glen McGrath’s brave efforts to earn a draw for the Australian side at Old Trafford in 2005 or the English tail barely managing to save tests in Cardiff, Centurion and Cape Town produced as many heart stopping moments as any other tight finishes.

Cricket is also one of few sports where, at times, the sub plot takes precedence over the actual contest. When two colossal figures clash, the outcome of the game becomes secondary and the onlookers become more engrossed in the blows exchanged between the champions.

Case in point being the third test between India and South Africa in Cape Town in January 2011. The match ended in a draw but the battle between Dale Steyn and Sachin Tendulkar on the third day was one for the ages. The world number one bowler was at his very best and looked set to blow the Indians away but Tendulkar summoned all his greatness to score his fifty-first test century and take his team to safety.

Even in the artificial age, by allowing the elements to play a major role, cricket has managed to retain the charm of the old. The moisture in the air, the cloud cover, the wear and tear on the pitch, the wind direction – they all affect the proceedings to a very high extent. For the purists, it is these traditional touches that has allowed the game to preserve its serenity even in the commercial era.

And finally, the seamless change of gear that a test match goes through over it course of five days subjects the viewers to an unmatched emotional roller coaster ride. A team looking to score quick runs and take a lead can find itself trying to slow things down and save the test on the last day. It is the length of the game that allows teams on back-foot to launch epic recovery and magics like Headingley 1981 and Kolkata 2001 can only be reproduced on a cricket pitch.