Disarm the bowler, kill the contest

very well written Harsha. if there is one thing that will make the five day game extinct it's these dead and dusty wickets that are criminally altered in batsmen's favor. none wants wans to give bowlers any freebies. certainly not i. but at the same time it has to be a fair contest. additionally , these free hits and power play restrictions are awful. having said all of this , the way the insurance is bought for cricket matches and the involvement of merchandising and televison revenue you can forget about the good old days green tops.

The ICC is to be blamed for this.Never mind the ODI's.Even in the tests too , the host nations are given the preference to produce pitches to their bowlers likings.ICC should act immediately & see that all the grounds all over the world produce the same kind of pitches & then we can compare the talents.The way the pitches are prepared right now , I dont see good technically correct players deserve their recogition as a lot of players who dont have that technique to survive the international standards hit all over the park with these kind of pitches.WAKE UP ICC.

Here are my two bits - 1. Get rid of bouncer restrictions - let bowlers bowl as many bouncers as they wish per over. 2. Change the leg side wide rule - If a ball pitches in line with the stumps and then goes outside the leg stump it should NOT be considered a wide. These two simple changes allow the game to be better balanced between the ball and bat - even with all the other rules (powerplay et. al) in place, dead pitches and smaller boundary lines.

Good article. About time. Also why is the power play considered such a sacred cow. The two fielder maximum outside the circle has turned out some worthless batting talent while killing the incentive for bowlers. Now we have a bewildering complexity of power plays. Why not just say a maximum of 5 players can field outside the circle at any time and be done with it. With the way cricket is set up right now, I think umpiring and bowling would be better served by robots.

Yes ,this kind of batting formula never help the cricket,it is just show of batting not technically

A kid growing up on a regular diet of T20 may grow up with an inability to differentiate between a Sachin Tendulkar & a Shahid Afridi, in the years to come. He may grow up with the wrong impression of who is the greater batsman of the two.

The title is apt and it means a lot, we cannot have any sport going forward or sustain its popularity with one sided contests, here in this sceario was bat dominating the ball, from the word go, cricket from its earlier days was considered a gentlemen's game and it stood its reputation, with even stevens when considering the oppurtunites the wicket offered to its players, as the days gone by and during the current trend of commercialiazation of the game, it is evident that the people who put in money would like to rule the game, hence the current scenario, where ICC has no control over the type of wickets being prepared and there are all but restrictions on the bowler these days. I see there would be a day when there is no term in cricket named as bowler, there would be 11 batsmen or more if they wish, they would go out and bat with the machines bowling to them and whichever team scores the most , they win. I don't know how much attractive this would be, But I bet there is no differ

Indeed, cricket is going towards downfall, pitch should'nt be batting nor balling, realy if we see normal tracks in future, then anyone who perform well, will win, and this is a kind of entertaiment cricket requires, and i would like to make you look towards test cricket as well, we are seeing batting tracks in majority test matches since many many years, which results in draw at the end of match.

Thanks Harsha, I have seen the battle between Aus and SA in world cup semi-final 1999 or in 2006 either. That was only 213 runs all total Aus made and unforgettable tie....yeah huge runs from both sides don't turn a match alive.....a real battle is among batsman and bowlers, fielders. But now a day's pitches becoming desert for bowlers and paradise for batsman! High scoring matches becoming more likely. We may not find one day batsman like S. Tendulkar, Jayasuria, Lara, Ponting no matter because teams will get runs and more runs without them because cricket is not going to find any Washim Akram, Glen Macgrath, S. Pollok or Waqur Younis or Murali because no one will dare to become a bowler in such dead pitches and this is not cricket. All rules of cricket is changing it's becoming a computer game....its losing its uniqueness..everyone wants runs even 8 runs per over but not want see the true art of in swing or out swing how batsman survive himself against such bitter attack

I agree that a contest between ball and bat is good.It just does not appeal to the paying audience.While watching in home,I know what a bowler or batsman is trying to do over all the analysis shown through numerous replays from the television. However,when u r one in the crowd,all u knw is a dot ball,4,6 or wicket.So "most people" wud choose 4 or a 6 over a dot ball.Yes, a wicket is cheered but only when the home team is bowling.This applies to all countries.So batting friendly pitches are the way to go(for ODI & T20). But the size of the ground can be bigger so that the batsman has to work hard, run harder & earn their runs rather than mishits flying to sixes-this would call for an intriguing contest like in Nagpur.I see people complaining about cricket is all about money.Well,its nt BCCI paying the money right?Its the public right?All are not millionaires u see, they pay a lot.So BCCI just tries to satisfy,what is wrong in tht?Wudn't you want your monies("most people") worth?