Penguins Stopped Play!

How's that for a clickbaity title for a blog post? :-)  Actually, it's the title of a wonderful book I discovered and read recently.  It's written by Harry Thompson, and the subtitle hints at what it's all about --- "eleven village cricketers take on the world".

Thompson was a writer and radio/TV producer in Britain, but more to the point, he was the 'founder' and captain of a village cricket team called the Captain Scott XI.  The team was named ironically, after Captain Robert Scott who made it to the South Pole in 1912, only to discover that he'd been beaten to it by Roald Amundsen by a mere four weeks!  So Scott came second, but tried his best, and that inspired these village cricketers of no particular ability, to name themselves the Captain Scott Invitational XI -- anyone could 'invite' themselves to play, as long as they tried hard!

Starting small at Oxford University, taking on local teams on the weekends, etc. the Captain Scott XI then started touring as well.  They made cricketing trips to India, South Africa and Malaysia for example, playing mostly against club sides, while also taking in the local tourist attractions.  The book sketches the village cricketers' characters and their variegated cricketing settings in lovely prose, peppered with characteristic British humour.  Sometimes it's easy to forget that these aren't fictional characters, but real people he's talking about!

Then one day, Harry Thompson got it into his head to plan a "world tour", where the Capt. Scott XI would play at least one game of cricket on each of the continents (except Antarctica).  The rest of the book is basically a hilarious travelogue covering this three-week tour and the preparations and planning that went into it.  The team played in Barbados (technically, sort of covering North America), then Buenos Aires (Argentina, South America), Sydney (Australia), Singapore (Asia), Cape Town (Africa) and then back in London ((Europe).  Many of the matches resulted in abject defeat for the Capt. Scott XI, but that was never in doubt to start with!  The sporting spirit of the team was amazing, as you can imagine.  The team also visited many interesting places during their tour, drank like fishes, even tried some dope, all of which incidents are described beautifully by Thompson.  The travails of air travel (covering nearly 40,000 miles) -- the incompetence of airline staff, missing tickets, problems with Customs, visas, etc. are inevitable and frequent, but the way Thompson narrates them make you laugh out loud much of the time.

What about the title of the book though?  It wasn't part of the "world tour", but separately Thompson did end up going to Antarctica and arranged for a game of cricket there, along with other Brits, Aussies and New Zealanders!  And during that game, apparently a large flock of penguins did indeed invade the pitch (such as it was), curious to know what these strange visitors were doing.  The game had to be abandoned, probably the only time in history that "Penguins Stopped Play"!

Book review: "Cricket Crusader", by Gary Sobers

For some reason, I really enjoy reading cricketers' autobiographies.  Biographies are good too, but when it's in the cricketer's own voice, it's special.  I have previously written a blog post about some biographies and autobiographies, and also reviewed several of them.

Just finished reading an autobiography of one of the very greatest cricketers of all time -- "Cricket Crusader", by Gary Sobers -- and it was a fun, educational read.  Sobers wrote this book around 1965 while he was still playing, at the peak of his career.  He played Tests till 1974, so the book doesn't cover his complete Test career of course.  But it gives great glimpses into his early years, the development of his cricket, his attitude towards the game, etc.

Sobers writes in an interesting, unusual style, mostly in first-person present tense.  And the language is lyrical, very evocative of the Caribbean.  It also appears quaint and old-fashioned at times!  This book is not a manual on how to play cricket, Sobers-style.  That's because he had already written another book in that genre -- "Cricket, Advance!".  This is a narrative, story-telling type of book.  Sobers doesn't fill it up with scores and statistics and dry recounting of events as they happened on cricketing fields.  In fact he consciously chooses not to supply exact scores and bowling analyses, saying that there are other sources for that kind of data.  He focuses instead on the thinking that goes into the game, his own as well as that of his peers.

The book is organized pretty much chronologically, starting with his days as a small kid playing "Lilliput cricket" in Barbados.  He describes how they play on any bare patch of ground, with knitted balls rolled in tar, on a 10 yard pitch, against underarm bowling.  The batsman actually bats on one knee, with one foot firmly anchored (else he could be out stumped)!  So he ends up playing lots of horizontal-bat shots, generating power using the wrists, arms and shoulders.  It's interesting to see how this influences their batting techniques when they graduate to 'proper ' cricket.  Sobers makes the point that, because it's a soft ball, you learn to play the ball from an early age without the fear of being hit.  Later in the book, he describes getting hit by a hard cricket ball for the first time, and how it changes him from a boy to a man.

The book goes over his graduation from local cricket in Barbados to the Test team, then going on various tours etc.  There is of course plenty of space devoted to his memorable moments in Tests, such as the record-breaking 365*, the tied Test in Australia, etc.  But equally, he tells stories from his days as a professional cricketer in England and Australia.  He talks about playing in the Sheffield Shield for South Australia, how they sponsored his knee operation, etc.  He is clearly deeply influenced by his time playing in the English cricket leagues (for clubs like Radcliffe and Norton).  He gives voice to the professional vs. amateur debate of that time, talking about the time when he and Wes Hall were debating whether to play for the West Indies (for a pittance), or play professional cricket in England or Australia.

Sobers uses the term 'world cricketer' a lot, to mean someone who has reached the 'world class' standard.  How he aspired to be one, how he learnt from his seniors in the West Indies team, etc.  How he doesn't "take his cricket to bed" at night...  He talks a lot about his captain Frank Worrell, the art of captaincy and man management, etc. There is an entire chapter devoted to his close friend and fellow Test star Collie Smith, the car accident that cost Smith his life (Sobers was the one driving!), and how the incident changed him.  He lovingly describes the pleasures (and the travails) of touring, especially in England with the unpredictable weather.  Some of it really seems quaint -- stories of daily exercise routines to keep fit, while on board a ship to Australia for example!

The book is interspersed with several nice photographs, not just from Test match action but also from the English leagues, tour games, etc. -- and a collection of statistics at the end which again features scores from league cricket.  Gives you a good historical perspective, in these days of jet-setting cricketers and IPL and Big Bash and...

Sobers wrote another autobiography much later in life... Now I can't wait to get my hands on that one!

Two great batsmen

Here are the career records of two great batsmen -- arguably, among the all-time greats.  These records compare favourably with the likes of Gordon Greenidge, Clive Lloyd, even Greg Chappell and Wally Hammond.

Player 1:

M  Inn   NO   Runs   HS   Avg   100   50
95  152   15    7877   217  57.49   29   31

Player 2:

M  Inn   NO   Runs   HS   Avg   100   50
90  153   17    7411  248*  54.49   22   33


So who are these two greats?  You won't find these numbers in the record books, because...


Player 1 is Sachin Tendulkar (from début to May 2002*)
Player 2 is Sachin Tendulkar (May 2002* through December 2011)

* Note that the May 2002 cutoff is an arbitrary choice, to divide Sachin's career into approximately equal halves (by innings played).

Right up to the 1980s, until Gavaskar scaled the 10,000 run peak, an all-time great batsman would typically have 6000 to 8000 runs, an average in the 50s, and about 20 centuries.  Remember that Gary Sobers held the Test runs record (8032) for many years, Boycott went past and finished on 8114, and then Gavaskar took over.

By that measure, Sachin Tendulkar has had not one, but two great careers in cricket!  These days, most of his records that the media and fans focus on, are those related to his longevity -- 50 Test tons, 100 international tons, 15,000 Test runs, most Test 50s, etc.  And his longevity (and continued productivity) is truly amazing.  But what gets lost is that he would've been an all-time great batsman even if he had chosen to retire half-way through!

While this has been, so far, a purely statistical argument, you could set aside the weight of numbers and still make the case.  In his early years, Sachin was a significantly more attacking, aggressive batsman.  If you compared highlight reels of Player 1 and Player 2, you'd see that Player 1 essayed more of the 'raw' strokes -- cuts, pulls, hooks, and lofted drives, often dancing down the pitch to spinners.  We aren't even talking ODIs here.  He also had the most elegant drives of course -- cover drives and straight drives in particular.  And Player 1 was up against a terrific batch of fast bowlers -- Wasim Akram, Allan Donald, Curtly Ambrose, Waqar Younis, Craig McDermott, etc.  He still managed to score big, score rapidly, and score attractively.  What made it all the more remarkable was that he was so young (Player 1 started at 16, and 'retired' at the age of 29!).  But even if you ignore the romance associated with watching a  young kid take on the giants of the game -- both literally and figuratively -- one must concede that he had an all-time great kind of career.

And then came Player 2.  Clearly, Sachin adapted his game over the course of a couple of seasons in the early 2000s.  For whatever reasons (a more injury-prone body? a more cluttered mind? the match-fixing scars?), he felt that his batting approach needed to change.  The aggression was significantly toned down.  The mix of strokes changed -- fewer pulls and hooks and lofted drives, more glances and deflections to leg, newer delicate strokes like the paddle sweep, the upper cut, the punched drives, etc.  The beginning of the innings was more tentative and defensive.  Ironically, all this happened at a time when the Indian batting was at its strongest ever.  Sachin had great support in the form of Dravid, Laxman and Ganguly in the middle order, Sehwag at the top often providing great starts, a more resilient tail, etc.  Nevertheless, his methods proved successful -- not as successful as Player 1 to be sure, but then Player 2 was a 30+ year old suffering a spate of injuries through his career, playing a surfeit of cricket with more ODIs and T20s than Player 1 had to.  If Player 2 could have debuted at a more normal age (say, 22), one can imagine that the record would be even better.  His more cautious approach also resulted in bigger 100s -- more double-tons for example -- as well as more success for his team.  Clearly the India team with Player 2 was far more successful than that of Player 1.  So you can't really argue with his decision to change his batting style, after playing more than a decade at the Test level.

I would argue that Player 2 is also in the all-time great category, not merely a great batsman.  Those numbers were achieved over a large span of time as well as Tests.  They have been achieved against some great bowling too -- McGrath, Lee, Warne, Murali, Steyn, Pollock, Akhtar, etc.  They have included innings in tough conditions (e.g., that battle with Steyn and Morkel in South Africa), and in tough chases (e.g., the 100 vs. England in Chennai).  And while his batting may have become less aggressive, it has hardly become any less attractive to watch -- witness his recent innings in the first Test at Melbourne just this week.  He still pulls in the crowds; the crowds still leave or turn off their TVs when he gets out (well, in India at least).

So there you go, two great batsmen rolled into one!

The New Definition of Talent

Harsha Bhogle has initiated a debate on talent and how to define it, in his article today in the Indian Express (also available on CricInfo and possibly other media outlets). He not only redefines talent, he has even given a formula for it! Or at least, the headline writers at IE have... And it is:

"real talent" = ability x hard work + consistency

To me at least, this is a new term he's inventing... "Real talent" is what he'd like to use, to gauge a sportsman, because it is a good predictor of "success" -- now there's another term that begs a clear definition! But going by what he writes in the article, he's interested in seeing talent converted to results in terms of metrics such as runs scored, wickets taken, matches won, and even career longevity. What he then proceeds to prescribe, are the prerequisites of success, but he labels those as talent. Therein lies my disagreement. We can keep those two terms separate and agree that talent isn't a pre-requisite to success.

Harsha references Malcolm Gladwell (from "Outliers") in saying that 10,000 hours of practice, in other words, "hard work" can make someone shine in any chosen field -- whether it's Bill Gates coding away, or Bradman hitting a golf ball, or Agassi hitting 2500 tennis balls a day, or Kirsten's now-famous throwdowns to Sachin Tendulkar. This is in keeping with the Protestant work ethic that dominates our current thinking, whether in middle-class families or in management books. And who can argue against hard work, and maximising your chances of success via that route?

But is that really talent? Can't we make space for those who are truly special in some ways? Who may or may not be successful by traditional measures? Harsha uses the example of Rohit Sharma -- how his strokes make you go "wow". I've written about talent and class in the past, using older examplars like Gower, Mark Waugh, Ganguly... You could take examples from other sports, like Federer in tennis, Jordan in basketball, Messi in football. The point remains the same -- these players are special in some way. It's their natural grace, their fluidity of movement, apparent effortlessness, their uncanny knack of timing, the lack of brute force -- all of those and more, combine to make you go "wow". A Rohit Sharma or a Yuvraj Singh belongs in that category. A Jonathan Trott or Ricky Ponting does not.

Now absolutely, that "class" does not guarantee success at any level of cricket. I believe the examples of Bradman, Tendulkar etc. are misleading -- they were both talented and hard-working. But their stupendous achievements owe a lot to their talent, not just to hard work. A Gower or Ganguly racked up great records (successes?) despite their aversion to hard work. Tendulkar might not have had as long a career, with as many records, but he would've gone down as an all-time great batsman even if he hadn't done all that practice with Kirsten. Hard work is admirable, sure. But talent is what makes you go "wow", lets you enjoy watching the sport.

Society today worships success to an inordinate extent. We value hard work and material returns over creativity and its attendant risk of failure. If an author writes a great novel but fails to find a publisher, he may be labelled a failure. But is he any less talented for it? A programmer may develop a great application, but his startup may "fail". Is he any less talented as a programmer? And a cricketer may play graceful, pleasing cricket, but not rack up enough runs to make it to the top. His game may not be seen by as many spectators as it might have, with hard work or luck or a godfather. But is he any less talented for it?

History is replete with examples of talented cricketers who underperformed relative to their talent. What does that mean? Doesn't it mean that they had as much talent as some others who achieved success, but didn't capitalize on it? Talent may need to be allied with hard work to achieve consistency. On top of that, you need some luck, and often the right contacts, to achieve success. But even in the absence of all these supporting factors, talent doesn't vanish -- it's there for all to see!

I call myself a "cricket stalker" for a good reason. There are some, perhaps many of us, who like watching cricket because it's a beautiful game. Not because we follow a particular team or player, and want them to win every time. Not because we want to see lots of runs scored, or wickets taken. Just for the sheer beauty of the proceedings. And you can find that beauty in a lower-division club game too, not just in international cricket. Talent, whether in batting, bowling or fielding (but I admit, mostly in batting) is what attracts me as a spectator. Just as beautiful prose is what makes a book worth reading, often, not the message contained therein. Please do leave some space for cricket as art...

The Allure, and the Pitfalls, of All-time XIs

It seems like the season for "All-time XIs" has returned with a vengeance, thanks in no small part to CricInfo's series of country-specific XIs, followed up with a World XI. This is really the armchair cricketer's ultimate delight. What better way to indulge your fantasies than to cook up a couple of all-time XIs and imagine (or even better, simulate, perhaps with book cricket!) a game between them?

Back in 1994-95, when Usenet was still usable, the newsgroup rec.sport.cricket saw a sustained frenzy of all-time XIs. The leader of the pack then was a respected poster called John Hall, who kicked things off by posting a series of "alphabet XIs" -- e.g., the "A Team" comprising of players whose names start with A, and so on. Not quite 26 of them, because some alphabets got combined to get to critical mass (e.g. the QXYZ team), but great fun nevertheless. Must have taken an enormous amount of research. He followed that up with teams from each decade in which Test cricket had been played, which was another tour de force! Of course, as soon as each team was posted, it drew in the rest of us on rec.sport.cricket, with our own "expert comments" on John's sins of omission and commission!

Naturally, no two posters could agree upon an entire XI, but that is almost besides the point. The allure is in reliving the careers of these all-time greats, debating their relative merits, etc. As a bonus, many a thread also spun off from these topics into discussions of the personalities and careers of those involved, especially the relatively lesser-known cricketers who made it to the all-time XIs because of these artificial constraints of alphabets or specific decades.

There are of course pitfalls in making these sorts of comparisons across generations. One argument goes that the relatively recent players, whom you've had the chance to watch, follow, perhaps even idolize, are more likely to make the grade than earlier ones whom you have only read about. On the flip side though, older players tend to be romanticized with the passage of time. History mostly records their successes while glossing over their failings; hagiographies abound.

Modern players are exposed to a wider set of playing conditions -- far more venues, varying equipment, with/without floodlights, with/without umpire reviews, bowlers using slower balls, doosras etc. -- that didn't exist in the old days. The oldies however had to deal with uncovered wickets, and that too in places like England with fickle weather! They didn't have protective helmets and arm-guards. They had to travel long distances by ship, train, buses... Flip again -- the fielding standards, and on average the catching standards, have improved dramatically. So the oldies might have got away with snicks through the slips etc. that they wouldn't, today. Or would've got boundaries for what would only be a single today...

With so many contradicting signals, how can the armchair cricketer even begin to compare cricketers across eras? Clearly, a direct comparison of statistics doesn't seem fair -- we don't know whether these factors cancel each other out. The written word is also unreliable -- whether it's the cricket correspondent covering a Test match, or an autobiography, or a book like Sunny Gavaskar's "Idols"...

I believe the closest we can get to an objective comparison is if we compare statistics within the same 'era'. This of course requires a clear definition of eras in cricket, and then identifying contemporary cricketers whose careers substantially fall within that era. This was relatively easier in the early days, when the World Wars provided some natural delimiters for eras, and several careers were terminated by those wars. In more modern times, perhaps we can identify two eras based on the teams that dominated those years -- the West Indies era (1970s and 1980s), and the Australian era (1990s and 2000s). Many careers don't fit nicely into those eras though -- a Bishen Bedi, or an Alan Border, for example.

Nevertheless the relative performance of a player, when compared with his contemporaries of the same kind (bat/bowl/keep/allround/captain), seems to be the only reasonable yardstick of greatness, and thus, selection in an Alltime XI. In batting for example, a Test average of 50 was considered the yardstick of greatness during the 1970s-90s, and possibly earlier as well. The very best batsmen of those years -- Sunny Gavaskar, Greg Chappell, Viv Richards, Javed Miandad -- reached and sustained that mark. Very few others were able to sustain a 50+ average over a long career. That benchmark seems to have shifted up by 4-5 points in recent years. Today's greats are all in the 54-57 range -- Sachin, Ponting, Kallis, Mike Hussey, et al. Dravid and Lara are lower, but probably dropped off from that range. Clearly we cannot claim that all of today's greats are significantly better than those of the 1970s (and a 4-5 point difference in batting average is significant!). Thus it makes sense to compare only with contemporaries whose careers overlapped for the most part.

All that is fine for a scientific, or statistically defensible exercise in selecting an Alltime XI. But, all said and done, it's eventually a very personal, emotion-riddled flight of fantasy! So who's to quibble with the critic who prefers a Dravid to a Vishy, or someone who selects a Dhoni ahead of Kirmani as his keeper? To each his own, and the more the merrier, and I'm all out of cliches now!

Cricket Australia on a roll

Australian cricket is arguably in decline -- after all, how long could they be expected to dominate as thoroughly as they did? But meanwhile, Cricket Australia seems to be on a roll. At least, they appear to floating some interesting trial balloons!

Separate Test and T20 teams

The first one came a few days ago when James Sutherland, the CEO of Cricket Australia, suggested that Australia could soon have separate Test and T20 teams playing simultaneously. On the face of it, a novel and even scandalous idea! How can there be two "Australian" teams? But surely, it's not as scandalous as England's two Test teams way back in the 1929-30 season. Then, England (or rather, MCC) actually played simultaneously in New Zealand and West Indies -- and won both those series! All those Tests were, and still are, classified as official Tests. But of course, at the time, England were a world power and the ICC was the Imperial Cricket Conference, so they got away with it.

More recently, at the 1998 Commonwealth Games in Kuala Lumpur, cricket was included as a medal sport. India and Pakistan had a pre-scheduled series in Sharjah at the same time, so both teams ended up sending weakened teams to Kuala Lumpur, and simultaneously playing full ODIs in Sharjah. However, the Commonwealth Games matches were not classified as ODIs (although they got List-A status of course). A similar situation seems set to occur again at the Asian Games later this year in China -- clashing with pre-planned series (for India, at least).

Back however, to Cricket Australia's idea -- separate T20 and Test sides. Why is that inconceivable? So what if there are two "Australian" teams? Clearly, Test cricket and T20 are very different sports... it's hard for me to even call T20 "cricket", as I've argued earlier. So it's like a country having a hockey team and an ice-hockey team at the same time! Sure the sports are similar in many ways, but overall they're so different that it's perfectly reasonable to call them two different sports. I think over time, Test (or first-class) and T20 (or even List-A) cricket will drift apart so much that it'll be easy to accept that they are different sports. Players will specialize in one or the other sport/format from a young age, so that separate teams will naturally arise. Already today, probably close to half the T20 internationals cannot find a place in their corresponding Test sides!

In the bargain, the 50-over ODI seems destined to die, neither satisfying the purists nor the bang-bang T20 audience. Which brings us to the second trial balloon floated by CA this week!

Two-innings One-dayers

So Cricket Australia is considering a new domestic competition in this new two-innings format, where each team will play 20 (or 25) overs in an innings. Actually "innings" is a misnomer here, because the idea is to carry forward the state of the game between a team's first and second innings (kinda like baseball). The batsmen only get one chance to bat, and the bowlers still only get to bowl their allotted quota of overs. Things don't start afresh in the second "innings", as they usually do in first-class cricket. So it's basically a 40 (0r 50) over a side, single-innings match.

The idea itself is not very new -- Sachin Tendulkar suggested it a few months ago, at which time I'd written a blog post supporting this "20-20-20-20" format, with a few suggested tweaks -- the main ones being that all 10 wickets should be available in each 20-over split, field restrictions should be eliminated, etc. What's new however is that a national cricket board is actively considering implementing it.

My take is that both these "innovations" by CA are welcome, and worth trying out. Cricket has already, clearly, split into two forms. The "pure" form still retains its attraction, if not to (lots of) spectators, then to the players themselves. Because as any player will tell you, Test cricket remains the best test of skill, unencumbered by restrictions on bowling and fielding. And the shorter form (whether T20 or 20-20-20-20) will clearly be attractive commercially, pulling in the spectators, TV audiences and advertising revenues. The demands (in terms of skill, physical, mental) of these two forms on the players are so different that it seems inevitable that specialization will occur naturally. Secondly, the two-innings format should also be tried out. The T20 version is a bit too short -- it doesn't provide enough advertiser inventory (time) to make two-country series viable. You need two T20 games in a day -- and thus, a four-team competition, at least -- to rake in the moolah. Might as well have a single "20-20-20-20" game instead in a day, between two teams!

The Business of IPL

Another guest post by Satya Prabhakar, the author of that last one I'd posted, dating back to 1994. This one's much more contemporary though, talking about the IPL business model and Lalit Modi.

Here's Satya:

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The success of a business depends on the following, in the order of decreasing importance: opportunity, competition, business model, resources and execution. First, there must exist a ready opportunity to exploit and a customer base willing to buy what you seek to sell. It helps – and, frankly, it is lot more fun – to have little or no competition so you may charge monopoly rents and frequently go on nice, long vacations. Then there must be a proven business model to maximize revenue and profits without having to suffer travails, trials and errors in arriving at the optimum model. The enterprise must then be adequately resourced to build the business. Finally, success demands focused, determined execution, a judicious mix of short-term performance and long-term planning.

If the first four work out to the advantage of the company, it affords a wide margin of error in matters of execution. If you enjoy a huge opportunity, no competition, proven business model and adequate resources, it doesn’t really take a genius to manufacture success. One still needs to be smart and work hard...it’s just that one doesn’t need to be extraordinarily gifted or lucky to triumph.

While IPL sure is a raging success, far too much credit is given to Lalit Modi for its success than he deserves. Even a Dimpy or Rahul Mahajan could not have messed it up too badly. Let us think this through a bit.

India has a voracious, insatiable appetite for cricket. We Indians are so stupid we will watch a 5-day test match, complete with tea and tedium, only to find it has ended in a draw…an activity that is only slightly more exciting than watching grass grow or paint dry or an RGV movie. In the small school playground opposite my house, there are about six different cricket matches going on simultaneously among local kids and adults. Such is our love for the game that finding Tendulkar among the pantheon of Gods in the puja room of a friend or relative doesn’t evoke much surprise. So the market opportunity for a more exciting, more localized, shorter game of cricket was a given. It was there on the table, nicely wrapped with glitter foil and red ribbon, waiting to be picked up.

IPL, from the start, enjoyed double firewall monopoly. Not only did it enjoy the monopoly cricket has as a sport in India, it also enjoyed the monopoly BCCI has over cricket in India. Indians care only about cricket and can’t tell the difference between Sania and Saina. In the US, for example, there is wide and comparable following for professional football, professional basketball, professional baseball, college basketball and college football…each sport has to compete with others for a share of the audience. Further, in India BCCI rules cricket with an iron fist, snuffing out any competition, however nascent, by withholding grounds and spots on the national team from players who cross the line (see Chandra, Subhash). Ask any businessman what causes the most grief and plummeting margins…it is persistent, pestering competition that drives down prices and eat into his market share: it is competition. IPL, thanks to the iron grip of BCCI on the sport and the monopoly cricket enjoys in the mind of the Indian had zero competition.

Crediting Lalit Modi with the innovation of local franchise-driven league business model is like crediting Tatas with innovating the automobile. The concept of local sporting franchises owned by businesspeople is more than 100 years old, devised and honed to perfection by the Major League Baseball (MLB), National Football League (NFL), National Basketball Association (NBA), and English Premier League (EPL). The business model with its various nuances such as revenue sharing, national/local sponsorships, TV rights, player auctions, salary caps, free agent trading, controlled expansion (to create artificial scarcity, driving up prices bid for new franchises) has been tweaked to maximize revenues at different levels and ensure a competitive, exciting league. Nothing that was done with respect to IPL is either new or ground-breaking.

When it comes to resources, the super-rich BCCI was the sugar daddy of IPL, willing to fund and bankroll it with whatever money is needed, eliminating the need for Modi to go and pitch to hundred different skeptical VCs to raise funding for this greenfield venture.

And that leaves execution for which Lalit Modi was extolled by many to high heavens. But recent revelations indicate even when the deck was heavily loaded in IPL’s favor, Modi couldn’t do a good job of executing. Allegations of missing documents, corrupted bidding process, secret kickbacks, sweetheart deals, sleaze, wealth and flash incommensurate with known sources of income and poor governance…all point to a person who is not fit to build an enduring enterprise with systems, processes, transparency and professionalism.

Modi is neither a founder nor an entrepreneur as many erroneously paint him to be. An entrepreneur takes risks and struggles to found a company against steep odds, and suffers endless syncopated rhythm of tribulations and triumphs. Modi was a political appointee assigned to the post and bankrolled by people in power whose favor he curried. He supervised a new business unit of the mega-corp BCCI which enjoyed unimaginably favorable odds. It shouldn’t, therefore, come as a surprise that he is fired from the same job to which he was appointed when he falls out of favor with the same dons that perched him there.

With or without Modi, IPL is set to continue its roaring success.

Satya Prabhakar is the Founder and CEO of Sulekha.com. He can be reached at satyaprabhakar@gmail.com

A blast from the past

My last post was an article I had written way back in 1994, in a university student magazine. That very same magazine had another, altogether more remarkable article -- a piece of fiction that, in hindsight, is remarkably close to today's reality! It talks about a city-based cricket league, and the business around it -- thus anticipating the IPL about 12-13 years before it started! It was written by Satya Prabhakar, who is now the CEO (and founder) of the popular Indian portal sulekha.com, and was then with Honeywell in Minneapolis. I'm reproducing the article below, with his permission. It's written in the form of a feature article for the New York Times, although it is of course fiction. While reading this, pinch yourself once in a while, and recall that it was written in 1994!

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"Hyderabad beats Sydney in nail-biting World Cup Cricket Finals"
How India cultivated a mega corporation -- The Authority

Satya Prabhakar (Eden Gardens, Calcutta, 23 October 1998)
Special to the New York Times
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As a record audience all over the world sat transfixed to their TV sets, Khaleel Ahmed of Hyderabad stylishly flicked a pacer on the leg side soaring over the boundaries of the lovely Eden Gardens. Had he failed to connect, he would have been declared out since he failed to score any runs on the previous three balls, and Sydney would have emerged the winner by 5 runs. And with that shot he crowned Hyderabad the winner of the highly prestigious and bitterly fought championship, organized by the Sports Authority Worldwide, a Bombay-based company. The two teams will split a total prize money of Rs. 883 million (equivalent of $3,258 million).

A BRILLIANT VISION FULFILLED

A record 680 million people from all over the world watched the final event and it is estimated that a totel of over 1.92 billion people watched various matches of this championship, which is a culmination of a 6-month-long playing season. A total of 12 teams from 10 countries participated in the event that stretched slightly over 4 weeks. (The US teams, along with 32 others, were disqualified in the qualifying rounds). The championship was held concurrently in 6 metropolitan cities of India, the permanent host of this magnificently successful annual event.

So successful that it eclipsed the World Cup Soccer, Summer Olympics and Wimbledon as the premier sporting event for the entire world. Television rights for the 1998 championship were sold for an estimated Rs. 12.1 billion. Janaranjan Network of India led a consortium of 20 networks worldwide to beat a BBC-led consortium, to telecast live and then to supply digital recordings of the match to worldwide audience over WorldNet. Merchandise sales exceeded Rs. 1.2 billion worldwide. Ticket sales for different matches totaled Rs. 5.6 billion. Calcutta paid Rs. 2.1 billion to host the championship this year. So on. The kind of turnout and cash inflow that dwarf Olympics, not to speak of events such as the American Super Bowl.

But for the Sports Authority Worldwide (known popularly as The Authority), the primary beneficiary of this championship, this is just another step in its spectacular evolution. Formed in 1994 by a group of Indian investors to fan the interest of cricket fans by organizing a championship of cricket-playing countries worldwide, the Authority showed remarkable initiative and marketing genius in turning this event into this wildly popular gala. Ms. Divya Prabhakar (not related to the reporter of this article), the self-effecting Chairman CEO of the Authority, and perhaps the most powerful woman in the world today, took the helm of the Authority in 1994 when she was 29. Since then Prabhakar has been displaying prodigious ability to visualize opportunities, convince scores of influential people and manage far-flung resources effectively. Pushed further, she gets closer to the truth: "Most people don't think, they just try to be logical. We were lucky in being able to visualize an opportunity and take risks. The best thing about this is that governments are not involved, meddling and fuddling things".

That is ironic, though, given that the Authority owes its existence to the brilliant vision of Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao who, following tradition, opened the finals yesterday in Eden Gardens. Consistent with the trail of visionary economic reforms he blazed in the early 1990s, Rao, without any discussion or debate, stunned the country one breezy morning in New Delhi by scrapping the BCCI and various state cricket boards and declared Cricket a very important national treasure that must be freed from the clutches of government bureaucracy. Following that announcement, the private industry displayed remarkable alacrity in forming the Authority within four months of the announcement. The rest is recorded in history as one of the superlative corporate achievements of this decade. The stock of the Authority is now traded on over 25 exchanges worldwide and is owned by about 50 million people from Mexico to Malaysia, giving investors an average return of over 163% per year. Thanks to the Authority's phenomenal worldwide advertising and marketing campaign, cricket has now become the most popular and exciting sport in the world today from Boston to Baghdad to Berlin to Bombay. Soccer is a very distant second.

CHANGING THE MECHANICS OF CRICKET

However, it was not always like that. Cricket has traditionally been an intensely soporific game, complete with the trappings of English tea, tradition and tedium. A typical Test match stretched on for 5 days, most often to end in a pathetic and irritating draw. The form of one-day cricket evolved from that, but still demanded day-long attention; this proved too onerous to most Indians who suddenly got very busy as the Indian economy took off perpendicular in 1994. When the Authority assumed control of the game, it cut down the play time to an average of 3 hours with a slight rule change: If you cannot score a run in 4 consecutive balls, you are out! That single rule change had a profound and electrifying effect on the game, its mechanics and its strategy. Further, it captured the consciousness of audience worldwide and held them in its thrall as it now combined the unparalleled elegance, skill, variation and finesse of cricket with rat-a-tat-tat shoot-from-the-hip action. The combination was potent and intoxicating.

Capitalizing on the raging trend towards privatization in India, the Authority in 1995 sold participation franchises to wealthy individuals who bought domains of control all over the world. For example, Dr. Alan Merchant shelled out Rs. 390 million to the Authority to purchase the province of Sydney. Expensive!, you say? Look at this: the franchisees and the Authority together reaped a phenomenal return of 135% per year on their investment over the last 3 years. Ms. Prabhakar, who is reputed to run the Authority with strong philosophical underpinnings of equity and fairness, adds, "When you care deeply for all of your constituents, you are bound to do well. If you have any questions, read Sam Walton's autobiography. Often, the most astounding successes are based on the simplest of truths".

Philosophy and profound quotes aside, the stakes are huge and the chips are stacked really high on the Authority's side of the blackjack table. And the Authority, like a many-sectioned rocket that keeps boosting itself up and up, has now turned its sights on soccer and has organized 35 teams from Boston to Bangkok. After the stunning success of this Cricket endeavour, organizing soccer teams was an easy affair. 2000 is slated to be the first year of the Soccer Championship to be held in, you guessed it, India, the acknowledged Mecca of sport in the world today.

However, there will come a time -- tick-tock, tick-tock -- when the Authority can no longer squeeze any more out of the world population for sports. It then will have to figure out what to do next. Says Prabhakar, "That day is still far away. But come that day, we will be prepared". Based on the phenomenal success of this young lady, it may be foolish to dismiss that claim casually.

-- Satya Prabhakar is a Principal at the Honeywell Technology Center. His main interests are digital multimedia management, distributed database access and investment strategy. Quite often, Satya and his 2-year-old daughter have fun playing hide-and-seek at home. Oh, BTW, his daughter goes by the name Divya Prabhakar.

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The End of an Era?

No, forgive me, this has nothing to do with the current shenanigans in the cricketing / political world, although currently we might be on the verge of ending an era as well, of innocence, of cricket as a sport, a fine art.

As I indicated way back when, this blog is about cricketing ruminations and reminiscences. What follows is an article I wrote when Kapil Dev retired, 16 years ago! It appeared in the Fall 1994 issue of "Baat Cheet", a quarterly magazine of the Indo-Am Association, a student association at the University of Minnesota, where I was studying then. Reproducing it here for nostalgia sake...

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An Indian cricket team without Kapil Dev?! That's hard for many of us to envisage, isn't it? Well, it's happened -- Kapil Dev recently announced his retirement from international cricket, somewhat prematurely according to some, too late according to others! But what's undeniable is the enormous service he has done to the game of cricket in India. Single-handedly, he shattered the conception that India could not produce pace bowlers worthy of a Test cap. Perhaps most importantly, his influence on the country's youth as a sporting idol resulted in the development of good fast bowling prospects in India. Till Kapil's emergence, the selectors had trouble finding two pace bowlers to open the bowling -- today, there's terrific competition for the Test place vacated by him.

Kapil made his Test debut in 1978 in Pakistan as a 19 year old. The raw young Haryanvi from Chandigarh immediately showed his promise, taking seven wickets in the three Tests, and troubling the batsmen with his pace and bounce. From then on, it was a meteoric ascent t othe top, breaking the record for number of wickets in a year, in his very first full year on the world stage. He leaves now as the top wicket-taker in the history of Test cricket -- he took 434 wickets in 131 Tests at an average of 29.64. Besides, he scored 5248 Test runs, with 8 centuries, a record worthy of a specialist batsman. Until recently, he was also the highest wicket-taker in one-day internationals (Wasim Akram recently passed him). He took 253 wickets and scored more than 3700 runs in one-dayers. Well and truly, an all-round performer. As a bowler, he relied on controlled swing and nagging accuracy -- plus considerable pace in the first half of his career. As a batsman, he was an explosive stroke-maker, capable of annihilating the best bowling attacks.

However, more than the statistics, Indian cricket fans will remember Kapil for his amazing feats on the cricket field. He leaves behind so many thrilling memories -- who can forget that beaming face holding aloft the Prudential World Cup in 1983? The spectacular catch to dismiss Viv Richards in the final? Or the astounding innings of 175* in the same tournament, coming in with the score at 9 for 4? Remember the 1981 Melbourne Test, when he took 5 wickets to rout Australia for 83? Or the Bombay Test against England in 1981, when Madan Lal and Kapil got England all-out for 102 to win the Test for India? Or that Ahmedabad Test against the Windies, when he recorded his career-best figures of 9-83? Then there was the 1985 WCC series semi-final, in which he thrashed Hadlee's bowling in the company of Vengsarkar, and took India into the final (where his bowling set up in Indian win). Another piece of Kapil magic was during the 1990 Lord's Test -- India needed 24 to save the follow-on; the last pair of Kapil and Hirwani was at the crease. Kapil proceeded to dispatch spinner Eddie Hemmings over the fence for four consecutive sixes! As recently as 1991, Kapil defied the critics and took 25 wickets in 5 Tests in Australia, troubling the Aussie batsmen constantly.

That however, was to be his last impressive series as a bowler. Since then, Kapil's pace slackened, his control wavered, and his batting was rarely reliable. Despite the occasional brilliant performance, critics started sharpening their knives, questioning his place in the team in the face of competition from younger fast bowlers like Srinath and Ankola. In recent Tests, India's spinners came to the forefront as wicket-takers, and reduced Kapil's role as a bowler even further. Kapil reached the historic milestone of 431 wickets (equalling Hadlee's record) against Sri Lanka last year, and broke it in the next Test. It was widely expected that Kapil would then retire, having reached the pinnacle. However, he decided to play on, setting himself a target of 500 Test wickets. That however, was not to be. An injury forced him to miss the three-nation Wills tournament recently, and Kapil decided to hang up those famous boots. Kapil had never missed a single Test match due to injury in 16 years, an astounding achievement for a pace bowler.

Kapil now takes up a new job as a television commentator for DoorDarshan. He is already a successful businessman, with a hotel in Chandigarh among his many investments. He intends to take some time off cricket to be with his family, and later, perhaps we'll see him back on the cricket scene as an administrator or coach. Whatever he does, the best wishes of millions of fans will be with him! Sachmuch, Kapil Dev da jawab nahin!

Book review: "SMG" -- a biography of, well, SMG

A new biography on my childhood hero -- I just simply had to own it, of course! I'm something of a collector of books on Sunil Gavaskar, so "SMG" was a natural addition to my collection. It's quite possibly the most comprehensive, deeply researched biography on Gavaskar yet.

"SMG" is written by Devendra Prabhudesai, a PR manager with the BCCI. Turns out that Devendra is from the same school in Mumbai as myself -- IES -- although *ahem* a few years junior to me. Also, rather late in the book itself he reveals that he was employed with Gavaskar's PMG (Professional Management Group) -- that really should've been stated on the jacket cover itself in the author's bio. But I can forgive a fellow worshipper of SMG and a schoolmate this one indiscretion!

What really sets this book apart from the multitude of Gavaskar biographies that came before it? I think it's the quotes and opinions of many, many contemporaries of Gavaskar, and Gavaskar himself, sprinkled at the appropriate points in the narrative. The author has done a phenomenal job of interviewing people who knew Gavaskar well, played with or against him, or worked with him. People, in other words, who had the opportunity to really get to know the man behind the cricketing automaton the rest of us saw on TV and other media. As a biography, the book proceeds predictably and chronologically through Sunny's life and times, but these quotes really add spice to the story. There are also many quotes from Gavaskar's own extensive writings on the game.

The book divides the "story" into five aptly and alliteratively named sections:

1. Advent
   
2. Ascent
3. Achiever
4. Apogee
5. All-rounder

The "Advent" section sets up the context to Gavaskar's arrival, talking about Bombay cricket, the social context in which it thrived, early stars like Ranji and P.Baloo, etc. It then brings us numerous stories and anecdotes from Gavaskar's school days, growing up in Chikhalwadi, with inputs from Sunny's father Manohar, his neighbour and cricketing colleague Milind Rege, uncle Madhav Mantri (who also played for India), other neighbours and friends, etc. We have of course heard the story before, in Gavaskar's own "Sunny Days". But this version is more detailed, and remains an interesting read. It then follows Gavaskar's cricketing exploits in domestic cricket, leading to his selection for the West Indies tour of 1970-71. It covers that tour, and subsequent ones to England etc. in lingering detail.... those really were historic days for Indian cricket.

The "Ascent" section covers what were really Gavaskar's most productive years as a batsman -- from 1975 through 1980 or so. Towards the end of that phase, Gavaskar at one point had scored 20 Test centuries from 50 Tests -- a phenomenal rate, comfortably better than anyone before him bar Bradman. This really was Gavaskar's "ascent" to the title of the best batsman in the world. The "Achiever" section then chronicles the subsequent turbulent years -- with fluctuating form, captaincy squabbles, the spat with Kapil Dev, etc., mixed with super achievements like the 1983 World Cup win, the counterattack against the West Indies in 1983, his high-score of 236* (coming in at 0-2), and so on.

In "Apogee", Prabhudesai describes the climactic final years of Sunny's career, when he rediscovered superb form and piled on the runs against all comers. It includes the 1985 World Championship of Cricket, where Sunny's leadership really stood out as India went unbeaten in the tournament. That was really the climax of India's one-day run in the 1980s. Through that tournament, India bowled out all teams in under 50 overs (except one -- the final, when Pak ended 9 down!) and kept their opponents under 200 (except one -- New Zealand, who scored 206!). Even in those relatively low-scoring days, these were phenomenal achievements especially for a team that didn't have any deadly strike bowlers bar Kapil Dev. Even after this, Gavaskar went out of international cricket in a blaze of glory, scoring big centuries and culminating in that phenomenal 96 against Pakistan at Bangalore.

The final "All Rounder" section is about Gavaskar's non-cricketing interests, achievements and influence. This includes his massive role in the professionalization of Indian cricket, the setting up of PMG and the CHAMPS foundation, his writings on the game, and his influence on India's modern set of world-beating cricketers -- Sachin, Dravid, Laxman, Kumble, etc. Towards the end, the author does get defensive with regard to the criticisms of Gavaskar's cricket and writings. But overall, the tone is hardly ever hagiographical, and the writing is of good quality. The prose is interspersed with numerous photographs -- some familiar to old Gavaskar fans, but many that I'd never seen before. And of course there is the obligatory, comprehensive, statistical review in the appendix.

Overall the book is a must-have for the Gavaskar fan, but also a good read for the youngsters of today whose cricket-watching started with the Sachin Tendulkar or Dravid-Ganguly generation. They see Sunny on TV, and the awe and respect with which he's treated by the cricketers' fraternity, but they may not know the scale of his achievements, and just how much they mattered to the India of the 1970s and 80s. They may not appreciate why, even today, many Indian cricket fans still believe Gavaskar, and not Tendulkar, is the greatest Test batsman India's ever produced. Books like "SMG" help lay out the case for that assertion!

Memories from School Cricket

While I was a "cricket-stalker" from an early age, I wasn't much of a player -- of the organized game, at least! Gully cricket, rubber-ball cricket, all that was fine. But I never even appeared for trials for the school cricket team, something I regret to this day.

A classmate of mine however didn't just appear for the trials, he played at various levels of Mumbai cricket -- eventually making it to the Mumbai Ranji probables, where he rubbed shoulders with the likes of... well, I'll let him do the talking. What follows is Mayur Ankolekar's account of school cricket in the mid-80s -- specifically, the rivalry between the perennial champs Shardashram, and our school IES (a.k.a. King George, in Dadar, Mumbai. This thread was kicked off by another classmate's discovery of an old school magazine in which I found a photo of our cricket captain, Sangram Sawant, who went on to play Ranji cricket for multiple teams.

Over to Mayur, then:

Here’s a narrative arc of some memories of school cricket. Sangram features like a phoenix in the 1983-84 season, a year where we beat Shardashram in the Giles shield.

This was my second year at school cricket; boys would get selected in class VIII, end up playing for 3 years, some would desiccate sooner, others continued into college, and an odd one persisted longer.

In my first year of school cricket i.e. 1982-83 we lost whenever we played Shardashram. In one such Giles shield match, we were chasing 300 runs. I recall how our stellar openers, unbeaten with 120 odd run partnership, made tepid comments when I went out serving drinks. We never thought we could beat the big boys, and unsurprisingly we never did!

A year later 1983-84:

We were now to play Shardashram at Shivaji Park in Giles shield quarter finals. We spent the first day bowling tight and fielding well – 180 runs for 3 wickets or so. As we ended the day, the venue was called off, which I suspect was to accommodate the congregation for Dr Ambedkar’s birthday. The sequel was to resume a week later, directly into the second day, at a different venue in Azad Maidan.

I had to sit the Bombay Talent Search Science exam the same day. I argued the conundrum – one or the other, exam or match, class or field, paper or pitch, or maybe both! I settled for the last option: I told our coach that I would write the exam and come. He agreed graciously. The exam was scheduled a 9 am or so at Ruparel College, and the match started at 10 am. Forty five minutes into the exam time, I was restless, doodling and daydreaming. I slinked out of the exam hall, received disparaging looks from many who considered me part of their scholarly zone of academia. Oh, what a waste of National Talent Search!

Flannels and shoes were mounted in the college rest room and I dashed to the Churchgate ground using the reliable local train. Shardashram had lost 7 or 8 wickets by the time I occupied the field, and in another half an hour were all out for 250 or so. Our coach said we need three 50 run partnerships. Most of us were novices, except Sangram. He had to play throughout. And there was no precedent to dwell our confidence on. We won the match, sliver margin of 1 wicket! The victory was a landmark in its offering us a leap of faith, not merely statistics. We lifted our century-maker captain – the personage of the immense achievement. Our bodies, hands and souls were upraised in imagery. That victory fed the best part of my body and elevated the sweetest part of my soul.

Another year later 1984-85:

This time we were again to play Shardashram in quarter finals. And this was my final year in school. Weighty and panoptic confidence was our forte in addition to skill-sets. We had at least four players who were in the Bombay junior team. We batted first and scored over 300. We went on to win the match comfortably. That match is etched in my memory: a young, skinny, fair boy was playing for Shardashram. He batted number 6 and lasted all of ten minutes. He is called Sachin Tendulkar.

Our school produced many first class cricketers later: Vinit Indulkar, Bhavin Thakkar – both played for Bombay, and now Dhaval Kulkarni, who has earned the India cap.

---x---

Thanks Mayur!

IPL works, CL doesn't?

It may be just a trifle early to pass judgment on the Champions League -- the 20-20 tournament between top domestic teams from various cricket-playing countries. But I'll do it anyway. #FAIL! #FLOP! #BORE!

Are you watching it? Is anyone? Frankly, I watch it only in passing, if I happen to be channel surfing and there's a game on. Every time there's an ad break (and we all know how often that is), I switch channels and usually forget to come back! There's actually more interesting stuff elsewhere on TV!

So what's the problem, wasn't 20-20 the big new hit form of cricket? Aren't these teams the best of the best from the cricketing world? Why is it that the Indian Premier League works, and Champions League doesn't seem to?

The game is of course the same, the rules are the same. Three of the IPL teams are playing the CL. But the problem is the other 9 teams. They may be good, but they aren't interesting! Really, the Otago Volts? Or Sussex Sharks? Even with a couple of good players each, they're not likely to bring in the average T20 fan.

With the sheer amount of money in the IPL, each of the 8 IPL teams has a galaxy of bonafide international stars, some current, some recently retired, but all of them capable of drawing the crowds. Any IPL game has at least 5-7 such stars competing. Even the relatively poor performers like the Mumbai Indians have Sachin, Sanath, Bravo, Duminy, Zaheer... sure to get people to tune in! Then there's the attraction of seeing the youngsters -- at least two in each team -- whose occasional brilliant performance adds to the romance of the sport. A Manish Pandey scoring a 100, or a Dhawal Kulkarni graduating to the Indian team on the basis of his performance against the world's stars.

Which brings us to an observation -- the success of the IPL probably lies more in its star power than in the quality of the cricket itself. Of course the presence of great cricketers also ensures a high quality of cricket. But I'd wager that the CL doesn't suffer significantly in comparison, in terms of quality. It just lacks the star power in most games. So the audience for T20 seems to be more enamoured of stars than high quality cricket, or even close finishes.

I believe T20 leagues will flourish in the future. But these will mostly be domestic leagues. Within say, England, a domestic T20 league could become popular -- well, certainly draw more than the traditional 2 men and a dog! There's a long tradition of county rivalries, and enough identification with the English national players. Similarly, Australia, South Africa and the West Indies could well have successful domestic T20 leagues. India, by the way, probably cannot -- too many domestic teams, which means not enough quality.

But the real attraction will continue to the the IPL. There's probably no room in the calendar for yet another, month-long international T20 league, with stars from all the countries participating. By virtue of being the first mover, and having the financial muscle to attract all the top stars, the IPL has grabbed hold of the eyeballs. An abbreviated international tournament like the CL has little chance of success in the next few years. As a concept, it borrows heavily from European football of course, but it's too premature. Only when the domestic leagues are firmly established with each team having a solid, reliable fan base, can the CL concept be expected to draw attention. Till then, I'll wait for innovations like the 20-20-20-20 to fructify!

20-20-20-20?

Recently, Sachin Tendulkar suggested that 50-over ODIs needed a refresh, and proposed a two-innings contest with 25 overs per innings. Of course the idea is not new, but it has caught some attention because it came from Tendulkar, and because the T20 game has thrown doubt on the future of 50-over ODIs.

One thing is clear, the day-long, 50-overs ODI game is dying, and that's a good thing. It's been losing spectator interest for a while now, and has been kept alive only by gimmicks such as super-subs, powerplays and pulled-in boundaries. Even with these gimmicks, it's only the multi-nation tournaments (not even tri-series) that attract some interest. And of course spectator interest (and TV viewership) is necessary to commercially sustain the game. While cricket boards may still feel some obligation to support a loss-making Test version of the game, there would be no such obligation towards 50-over ODIs if they stop being commercially viable.

There is of course a potential successor to ODIs in the form of T20 cricket. At least for now, it has captured the audience and thus TV revenues are a given. However, T20s suffer from one big drawback -- less airtime. The typical T20 game only lasts half a day, and thus there is lesser airtime for TV to fill with commercials, compared to the day-long ODI. So T20 is only really viable, long-term, in the form of multi-team leagues or tournaments. With a league like the IPL or a T20 World Cup, you can schedule two games a day, not overlapping of course, and thus get more commercial time. But two-team country vs. country matches are not going to be viable for long. Of course the stadium will be full, but that's not where the revenues come from.

In this backdrop comes Tendulkar's suggestion of a two-innings, 25-over game. There are of course a few tweaks possible. Should a team start each innings afresh, or would the batsman dismissed in one innings be unavailable in the next? In my opinion, the team needs to have all its batsmen available in both innings. The attractiveness of T20s arises from the fact that each team has 10 wickets to 'spend' in 20 overs, and thus batsmen can take much higher levels of risk, compared to the 10-wickets-50-overs ODI game. Splitting the innings into two, without restoring the wickets, will only have the benefit of equalising the batting conditions for the two teams, to some extent. It cannot increase the pace of the game significantly. So it's best to emulate the T20 game and enable higher risk-taking. Secondly, it may not quite be feasible to cram in a 25-25-25-25 game in a day, given the added breaks between innings. So, a 20-20-20-20 game seems more reasonable, with a lunch break betwen the two T20s, and 10-minute breaks for the changeovers.

While we're at it, there could be more tinkering with field restrictions, etc. What if field restrictions are eliminated? Given the ability to spend 10 wickets, batsmen would likely still take nearly as much risk as the T20 game, but bowlers would be more likely to take wickets, and scores would be a bit less obscene. Some encouragement to the bowlers is necessary, otherwise attacking bowling will be an extinct art.

So, what does this mean to the traditional cricket lover, the Test match fan? This may sound like blasphemy, but this comes closest to a "mini-Test"... a "one-day Test", even! Certainly it won't have the range of cricketing skills that are on display in a good Test match. But the dynamics of a two-innings game would make things interesting -- a second chance, to make up for a first-innings failure; follow-ons perhaps... And this would open up a range of other possibilities -- such as a consolidated bowling limit across two innings. A bowler would be permitted to bowl 10 overs (or 8, or whatever) in the day, but not necessarily limited to 5 in each innings. So if a bowler was in the middle of a good spell, the captain might use him up in the first innings! Or on a Sri Lankan or Indian ground, the captain might hold back his main spinner for the second innings. If powerplays are retained, the captains would have the option to split them across innings as well. Let's say each team needs to have 8 overs of fielding restrictions, but the bowling captain has the ability to split these across innings arbitrarily. The range of tactical possibilities would certainly be broader than in the T20 format. And you wouldn't need multi-nation tournaments to enable the commercial viability of the game -- bilateral series would be quite feasible.

I think this is an idea whose time has come. ODIs have certainly gotten more predictable, or too dependent on the toss, with conditions favouring one side right from the outset. I would certainly prefer a future with Tests and "mini-Tests", and possibly no T20s at all!

Book review: Sachin is God!

Just finished reading an interesting, different sort of cricket book, with the somewhat unwieldy title of "If Cricket is a Religion, Sachin is God".

At one level, it's just a biography of Sachin Tendulkar written by a couple of fans, and one might be tempted to dismiss it as a hagiography -- but it's not. It may read somewhat like a statistical analysis of his career, and those of his contemporaries. But it's much more than that -- the authors do a good job of bringing out the context to his achievements, both at the micro level ("he walked in at 14/2 with a first-innings deficit of 250 staring India in the face") as well as at the macro level ("he was probably battling not just his opponents but also some of his teammates" -- a reference to the match-fixing era). It reminded me a little of the Gavaskar vs. Richards, or even the same Tendulkar vs. Lara arguments we used to have on Usenet newsgroup rec.sport.cricket. But then the book also offers the occasional deep analysis of cricketing and social context, and an interesting comparison of Sachin's achievements with those of Vishwanathan Anand, the chess champ.

The two co-authors of the book, Vijay Santhanam and Shyam Balasubramanian, are both IIT + IIM-A graduates who describe themselves as big Sachin fans, but also "analysts". Both are of course followers of that religion, but they try hard to provide objective analysis. Starting with their analysis of Indian cricket fans and fanatics, and an attempt to explain why cricket has taken on a religious form in India, the book moves on to Sachin's career.

The 20 year career is neatly divided into phases -- the "wunderkind phase", the rise, the fall, and then the resurrection. Apart from bald statistics, the authors provide lots of quotes from cricketers, commentators and journalists. They analyse the criticism of Sachin by the likes of Ian Chappell, Sanjay Manjrekar and various Cricinfo columnists. They counter it with data, as well as opposing opinion -- for example, Ian Chappell's comments on Sachin's 241* at Sydney are contrasted with Shane Warne's, on the same innings.

The authors have made extensive use of Cricinfo's Statsguru to generate their data. One interesting phenomenon they seem to have uncovered is what they call "the thirty-three effect". Basically, around the age of 33 (give or take a year), many batsmen appear to undergo a drastic slump. This is usually preceded by a monster year or two, and equally interestingly, is followed by a reversion to mean. This effect is startlingly demonstrated using numbers for top batsmen like Gavaskar, Richards, Boycott, Sobers, Hayden, Dravid, Miandad, etc. Needless to mention, Sachin also suffered a slump around the age of 33, which also coincided with his injury problems.

Somewhat less surprising is the demonstration of just how critical Sachin is to India's chances of winning, of how rarely India win when he's out of the team. Again the authors use statistics to compare just how much Sachin has to lift his game for India to win -- how much higher his average is when India wins, vs. his career average. In contrast, the numbers for the likes of Ponting, Hayden etc. don't change a lot -- because they are ably supported by several teammates in the lineup. There is plenty more analysis, such as the performances of Sachin and his contemporary batting greats against Australia, or the Aussies against India, etc. In each case, using data as well as context, the authors demonstrate how Sachin is simply a class apart. The only comparable batsman in the last two decades is Lara, but he falls short of Sachin on consistency and adaptability. My only quibble is that the authors have perhaps focused a bit more on ODI statistics than Tests.

For a Sachin fan, it's fun to relive some of his great innings through this book -- amazing memories like the second-innings ton vs Australia at Chennai when he tamed Warne, and painful memories like the 136* at the same ground vs Pakistan, when India fell just short in the run-chase. Interestingly, there is no discussion of Sachin the captain, and hardly any mention of his bowling. The book is almost purely about his batting, and there too, it doesn't linger on his style, his technique or his range of strokes. It's all about data, team and social context.

The book ends with a touching story about one of the authors -- Vijay Santhanam -- who suffered a stroke, but willed himself into recovering in time to make it to an India match at the stadium in Mohali. There are also interesting personal anecdotes from the authors -- childhood hero worship, college hostel arguments, or changing hotels because they didn't have the cable channel telecasting the match!

All in all, a good read for Sachin fans (that's everybody, right?). The book is published by Harper Collins, and has a cover price of Rs.195.

Twoodies and One-tup catches

A lot has been written about local cricket in India, and especially Mumbai. Some good books include:

• A Maidan View -- The Magic of Indian Cricket, by Mihir Bose
• Guts & Glory -- the Bombay Cricket Story, by Sandeep Bamzai
• Wickets in the East, by Ramchandra Guha

These books however tend to focus on the (loosely) organized cricket on the maidans, the storied cricketing grounds like Shivaji Park in Mumbai or the Maidan in Kolkata. There is another, somewhat different cricketing experience that many of us went through as kids -- gully cricket.

Maidan cricket is played in the traditional fashion -- 11-a-side, kids in whites (even if dirty), proper cricket equipment (even if dilapidated), an umpire or two (even if biased)... It's usually organized, with teams playing in some sort of league or tournament, representing clubs, schools or companies.

In contrast, gully cricket is much more ad hoc. The teams are formed by identifying two captains, who then take turns, picking from the available players until there aren't any left. Pity the poor sod who's the last to be picked! The rules are decided, or made up on the fly. Gully cricket has its own lingo as well -- probably varying from place to place. In Mumbai for example, we'd decide whether one-tup was out or not! What this means is that if a fielder takes a "catch" after the first bounce, the batsman would be out. This is often necessary while playing in limited spaces, or in gullies where regular catches are hard to come by! Sometimes we'd switch to "one-tup out" midway during the game, because it was getting dark and we wanted to get the game over with quickly!

The playing area is often wierdly-shaped -- kids will of course seize upon any available space to play! That also necessitates a creative definition of the boundaries. In our colony for example, our playing area had a very short boundary (literally, a boundary wall) on the off side, and a more acceptable boundary on the leg side. Reaching the off-side boundary therefore wasn't worth four runs, it was decided -- two was all you'd get. Hitting this boundary was termed as a twoodie, i.e. "2D", short for "two runs declared"! Depending on the distance, you could similarly have onedies and threedies! In the rare case where there was actually an umpire, he'd signal a twoodie just like a boundary, but with two fingers outstretched.

Another cricketing space in our colony was a small, concrete-paved square patch next to the local temple, with a small boundary wall all around it -- barely a foot high. We'd play underarm cricket (slow bowling only), one-tup out of course, with this strange rule designed to deter hard hitting -- a sixer that landed on the road around this square was perfectly legitimate (a sixdee?), but if it was hit too hard and went across the road into the adjacent garden, you were out! Certainly made for some wierd lobbed shots that needed accuracy. They had to be hit long enough to evade the fielders near the boundary wall, but not too hard lest they cross the narrow strip of road!

An outsider would come across more strange lingo... jaa, sirf played kar, for example. That's advice given to a young kid going out to bat in a tough situation -- go, just "played" it! No that's not just a grammatical mistake. I think it originated thus: in Test cricket, whenever a batsman played a good defensive stroke, the radio/TV commentators would say "That's well played, bat and pad close together, etc. etc.". I remember hearing that over and over again from Iftikhar Ahmed and Chishti Mujahid for example, the Pakistani TV commentators, during the 1978-79 series. Somehow, "well played" came to represent a defensive stroke, just keeping the ball out, and then got shortened to "played".

Then there was the "connection out" rule, for run outs. This came into being because you rarely have one full set of stumps in gully cricket, let alone two. So the non-striker's end doesn't have any stumps. They're substituted with either a brick or stones, or merely a pile of footwear! Now if there's a runout attempted at the non-striker's end, the "connection" rule says that you can collect the thrown ball and step on the brick/chappals, baseball style, to effect the dismissal. You've provided the "connection" between the ball and the stumps! Just as major-league baseball players (and their coaches) get into arguments with umpires about whether the connection was properly made, we'd have all sorts of arguments and the occasional fight too! Although of course, we knew nothing about baseball in those days...

I'm sure there were other such quirks that I'm now forgetting... I hope to be reminded of those when my kid grows up and starts playing some serious gully cricket! Till then...

A Munaf and a Kamran...

What is it with Indian pace bowlers? They seem to start off fast, but dwindle to fast-medium and then medium-fast in no time at all...

Take the case of Munaf Patel, who has just been dropped from the Indian ODI team. When he came on to the scene a few years ago, he was touted as the fastest bowler in the country. And he really was sharp - even after making it to the Indian team and playing a few Tests. I saw him rip out a couple of England wickets in a Test at the Wankhede, beating the batsmen with sheer pace.

What's happened since? Is it the coaches, who insist on line-and-length, and "hitting the right areas" all the time? Especially in the limited overs games, he's down to barely medium-fast pace -- in the 120s kph, occasionally in the 130s, when earlier he used to touch 140-odd/90mph.

Munaf is hardly the only example. If you go back in time, we've had bowlers like Raju Kulkarni and Abey Kuruvilla who were both touted as among the fastest in the country. Again, I've seen them live in action and I can attest to their pace. Years of toil on the Ranji circuit reduced them to medium-fast by the time they made it to the Indian team. So at least we can't blame the India coach / manager in those cases -- Ranji-level coaches, perhaps? Or just the sheer futility of attempting to bowl fast on dead pitches?

And what about Ishant Sharma? Is he going the same route? It may be wrong to judge him on the basis of recent performances in the (very) limited overs game, but he certainly seems to have stepped down his pace a few notches. Why can't they let him go flat out for four overs in a T20? The way a Fidel Edwards or a Dale Steyn do? It's not as if he was economical in his reduced version. He certainly was ineffective as a wicket-taker...

During the IPL, we saw a new, raw fast bowling talent on display -- Kamran Khan of the Rajasthan Royals. Eighteen-year-old kid, exerting every sinew and generating very good pace -- 90mph certainly. With a bit more muscle mass, he could go even faster. Of course he got into trouble with his action - but for once, I think it's probably clean. He seems to have the sort of hyperextension at the elbow that Shoaib Akhtar does. If you look closely, his arm is really bent backwards at the elbow -- almost painful to watch! Certainly not a blatant chuck like a Siddharth Trivedi for example.

Someone like Kamran really ought to be unleashed on unsuspecting opponents at the earliest possible opportunity. And not just in Tests, but also in ODIs and T20s, trying to blast out a couple of batsmen in the opening spell rather than keep the scoring down. Best not to make him slog through the Ranji circuit, sacrificing pace for accuracy, etc. These days Indian teams in all versions of the game tend to have three pace bowlers -- surely we can afford to pick one Kamran, one Zaheer (the seasoned pro leading the attack) and then a Munaf type if necessary to hold up one end?

Is Federer the greatest ever?

I know, I know, this is a cricket blog -- so who's Federer, you ask... But bear with me, this is indeed a cricketing article.

Roger Federer's French Open win has ignited this debate on whether he's the best ever tennis player. Even though the question admits to only two answers, there are many shades of opinion! There are those who insist that players cannot be compared across eras, and the only measure of greatness can be vis-a-vis contemporaries. So a Rod Laver or a Pete Sampras could lay claim to the greatest-ever title just as much as Federer.

Then there are those who say that greatness isn't just about results, but also style. A John McEnroe wasn't nearly as successful as these worthies over the course of his career, or even compared with contemporaries like Jimmy Connors or Ivan Lendl. But I know whom I'd rather watch on any given day...

And then there are those who dare to compare across eras... Tennis, like other sports, has not just evolved, but improved over the years. If you took a 25-year-old Rod Laver and pitted him against a 25-year-old Roger Federer (with the 60s-era racquets, say), who do you think would win? Certainly, Federer. Similarly, if you pitted a Jesse Owens (or even Carl Lewis) against Usain Bolt in a 100m race, I'm pretty sure Bolt would win. There are some types of sport where human ability has simply improved over the years, and so the modern greats are indeed the all-time greats. Athletics (minus the doping) and tennis would seem to fall in that category.

What about cricket? Has cricket improved consistently over the decades? Can we claim that a Sachin Tendulkar is 'greater' than a Don Bradman, or that Kumble is better than say, Chandra? I don't think so. Over the long-term, there's definitely an improvement in human physique and conditioning over the population, in statistical terms. But I'm not sure that this applies at the level of the greats in cricket. Is today's fast bowler necessarily faster than those from the 1920s for example? Or even back to Fred Spofforth and the likes? Probably not. The outliers in the 1920s were probably just as strong, and fast, as those we see today.

And that's just raw physical strength we're talking about, not skills. Cricket (at least, Test cricket) is dominated by skills rather than strength or other physical attributes. Is there any reason to believe that human skill levels have improved over the span of a century? Are today's carpenters more skilled? Or weavers? Or bowlers? I don't think so. Certainly one could postulate that today's "strongmen" are (a bit) stronger than those of 100 years ago. But the likelihood of the true outlier in terms of physical strength also having enough bowling skill to become a feared fast bowler in Test cricket, is minuscule.

It's similar with batting. You do see rare examples of fierce hitters like Andrew Symonds or Yusuf Pathan doing well in limited-overs cricket. But the true greats of the modern game aren't greats because of sheer power. Better bats have helped, as have helmets and other protective gear. But the primary thing that differentiates Sachin, Ponting, Dravid, Kallis... from the rest is their skill -- skill in judgment, concentration, timing, placement... skills that haven't improved over the decades really. And what about slow bowling? Certainly, improvements in the human body haven't contributed anything to the art of spin bowling.

So my contention is that it really should be possible to compare cricketers across eras. But one needs to be careful with using statistics blindly to make such comparisons. Test statistics are inevitably influenced by various factors outside of sheer skill. For example, a bowler's statistics have a dependency on his fielders' catching skills. A batsman's career stats depend on the quality of opposition he faced, and even on the quality of his own support cast. Was he always shouldering the burden of his team's batting, or was he one of several good batsmen? And for many of the oldies, the sample sizes are simply not large enough for statistics to be reliable. So many of them played barely one Test series a year, and had large gaps between series. Today's cricketers play far more, are more fatigued, but can benefit from highly productive streaks of form.

So it's best not to rely on statistics for comparisons across eras, but on visual evidence of skills. Of course there is very little Test cricket footage available up until the 1960s or 1970s. But there is a lot of cricket writing, news coverage, etc. that serves us reasonably well. And we should be justified in making some conclusions on that basis, such as, Tendulkar better than Vishy (just as an example), or Richards better than Lara, or Lillee better than Brett Lee (surely no one who has seen both can deny that!).

In a subsequent post, I'll use this compare-across-eras justification to indulge in the armchair critic's favourite pastime -- picking "all-time greatest XI" teams! Till then....

The IPL -- a traditionalist's view

Are you a traditionalist? Are you one of those (like me), who cringe when they see a crude slog across the line being applauded merrily by the crowd, just because it went for six? You may be wondering what to make of the second edition of the Indian Premier League, which is starting today...

Twenty20 has become popular because it found the magic balance between cricket and entertainment. It attracts the vast majority of cricket fans, who have grown up on 50-over cricket, and also attracts a separate set looking for quick-fix entertainment -- the likes who might otherwise spend an evening watching a Hindi movie or a couple of TV serials. T20 is not too long and can be scheduled in the evening hours, so it doesn't require the "investment" of a day off from work or school. The off-the-pitch hype and hoopla, the cheerleaders, the fireworks, the music, all that is designed to please the entertainment-seeking crowd.

Furthermore, the fact that a team has all 10 wickets to "spend" over just 20 overs alters the risk-reward equation fundamentally. This makes the game more action-packed, and games are also closer-fought (or so it seems) because the variance of scores is likely to be significantly less than in the 50-over version.

Now the IPL is all this and more. It inherits all these attributes of the T20 format, but goes well beyond that because of the nature of the team composition. The obvious thing is of course the mix of international players representing an Indian city-based team. The fact that these players are usually from different countries, and have sparred (sometimes viciously) on opposite sides, adds spice to the mix. But there's more to it. There are the "local stars" -- the well-known Indian cricketers turning out for their "home" cities. And then there are the "local unknowns". The biggest innovation of the IPL in its first season, in my opinion, was the rule that insisted on two local players being part of every playing eleven. That really helped generate a measure of curiosity in each game, and led to the discovery of players like Dhawal Kulkarni, Manpreet Gony, Swapnil Asnodkar, Ashok Dinda, etc.

As a traditionalist, I used to try and watch as much domestic cricket as I could -- Ranji, Duleep games -- to try and spot the promising youngsters who had never made it to TV coverage. These kids are typically well coached, their cricket is "correct", and they have the freshness and enthusiasm of youth. The IPL now gives us the chance to see the young talent, thrown into the deep end against mega stars.

But the traditionalist still can't help but cringe at some of the strokeplay on display. Crude slogs are crude slogs, no matter what the risk-reward equation. Note however that the shortened game has given rise to a lot of non-crude slogs, if I may coin that phrase. The clean hitting of a Yusuf Pathan, Andrew Symonds or Freddie Flintoff, the hustle of a David Hussey, Kevin Pietersen, or Gautam Gambhir, and the pure, blissful, correct strokeplay from the likes of Sachin Tendulkar, Yuvraj Singh or Rohit Sharma... what's not to like??

Certainly, the traditionalist who loves to watch a sharp bowling spell has reason for complaint. The notion of a "spell" all but disappears in the T20 format. And the freedom of the batsman to take more risks leaves the bowling figures in tatters... or so it might seem. I believe that, given the reality of T20 risk-reward, we just need to recalibrate our expectations. In the old days of ODI cricket -- the 1970s and 80s -- a good bowler was one who went for under 5 and over. The very best managed to break under 4 RPO in fact. We have already recalibrated to expect much higher run rates in ODIs -- a career RPO under 5 is rare these days. Similarly, we might have to account for say, a 7 RPO in T20s as a good achievement. Note also that this will vary as usual with the conditions. So the second edition of the IPL is likely to produce lower scores than the first, because the South African venues will help the bowlers to a greater extent. This just makes wickets more likely, given the same level of risk taking by the batsmen. Or if the batsmen ratchet down their risk meters, they'll inevitably score less. Either way, aggregate scores should fall.

Now of course this is based on the assumption that pitches and conditions will be somewhat helpful to the bowlers. The Bullring at Johannesburg is always flat and full of runs, but the other pitches should encourage the bowlers. The saving grace is that the organizers didn't get a lot of time to prepare the venues -- so the pitches won't have had the life rolled out of them, hopefully!

Interestingly, the first IPL season, despite all the big hitting and batting exploits, produced more new bowling talent than batting talent. This may be because the T20 format makes the merely good batsmen look nearly as good, and as productive, as the true greats. But it's the bowlers who can stand out with a good performance amidst the mayhem being inflicted on their brethren. With the batsmen intent on hitting, small deviations off the pitch or in the air, subtle changes of pace, shortening of the length, or the surprise bouncer, all can get batsmen into trouble and reward the good bowler.

A traditionalist will never agree that the T20 (or even ODI) version of the game can provide the same, rounded test of talent, skill and temperament as the Test match. But you have to admit, it's fun to watch, and more practical to watch! I'm certainly looking forward to more of this entertainment and sport khichadi in the next few weeks, in what would've been the off-season for the Test game anyway!