When India won the second Test match by the morning session of ‘Day 3’ in Delhi during the recently concluded Border-Gavaskar Trophy, talks about the pitch not being ‘sporting’ enough, or not providing a healthy contest between bat and ball began surfacing mostly by the Australian media.
Advertisement
During England’s tour of India in 2021 as well, a couple of matches in Ahmedabad too ended within three complete days, with the hosts demolishing the English line-up with their spin attack. Some of the English players and their media had cribbed about the pitch back then as well.
During the India Today Conclave 2023 a few days ago, the legendary Indian batter Sachin Tendulkar was invited as one of their guests, and the ‘Master Blaster’ went nostalgic thereby providing the audience and his countless fans some precious, evergreen memories from his playing days.
He was also asked by the anchor for his views on what he made of the fact that quite a many Test matches fail to make it through to the final day these days.
Sachin Tendulkar remarks he doesn’t mind Test matches ending within three days
Tendulkar answered by stating that the changes in playing conditions and laws has made White Ball Cricket Cricket skewed in favour of the batters. In ODI Cricket, targets in the range of 300-320 runs are relatively easier to chase down.
Thus, to make sure that Test Cricket remains the No.1 format, there is a need to make it more engaging and if that means that the matches are not going into ‘Day 5’ then be it.
“Test Cricket should be engaging. It should not be about how many days does it last, five days or whatever. So, for me the most important factor is the kind of surface that we play on because that is the heart of Test Cricket.
We have two formats which are heavily titled in favour of batters. So I strongly believe that to keep spectators engaged, to have more eyeballs, we need to have something for bowlers,” remarked Tendulkar.
“Questions asked by bowlers has to be interesting enough” – Tendulkar
Tendulkar further remarked that the only way Test Cricket can be the No.1 format is when the questions asked by the bowlers to the batters, become interesting.
“Bowlers ask a question every ball and batter has to answer that. So if that question itself is not interesting enough, how are you gonna have more eyeballs? There has to be something in the pitch for the bowler. If you keep a dead track, the bowlers think that there’s nothing much help for me, I better play around batters’ patience. The end result is not interesting Cricket. Yes, everyone wants a Test match to go on for a longer period, but if it doesn’t last for five days and the Cricket is interesting, that is what matters,” Tendulkar remarked.
For more Cricket-related news, click here.
