Powerhouses flex muscles in Power Cricket

Fasten your seatbelts, ladies and gentlemen, Australia are playing South Africa. Balls will fly into the stands, fielders will move like lightning, sliding and diving, throws will be rifled in from 70 yards, and batsmen will find inexhaustible supplies of energy not only to muscle the ball beyond the ropes, but to continue charging between the wickets till the very end.

The above scenario might or might not play itself out in St Lucia on Wednesday. The pitch could be slow and low, it could break up, it could turn and it could be a low-scoring game. But there will be no let up in intensity. Australia are pioneering a new brand of one-day cricket, and South Africa are not far behind. Power Cricket is here.

Power cricket does not merely mean hitting the ball hard and long. It means keeping up an unrelenting stream of aggression and incredibly high level of intensity, and pushing the limits of physical prowess and human endurance. It means marrying a strong body with an equally strong mind.

In March 2006, Australia and South Africa were involved in an epic one-day match which South Africa won chasing 434. Eighty-seven fours and 26 sixes were hit. Ricky Ponting scored 164 off 105 balls only to be outshone by Herschelle Gibbs' 175 off 111. The match was considered a freak, never to be bettered again.

Almost a year later, they met again. Australia batted first and scored 377. In response, South Africa were 160 for 1 in the 21st over. It was a direct hit from Shane Watson from the backward square-leg boundary that ran out AB de Villiers and changed the tempo of the game; Graeme Smith cramped and South Africa ended at 294. If the pitch plays true in St Lucia, no one knows what score will be safe.

It's not a change that has come overnight. Australia have been at the forefront of pushing the boundaries for years. In 1987, under the leadership of Bob Simpson and Allan Border, they perfected the art of total cricket, mastering stealing and saving the singles. Under Steve Waugh, they lifted the pace of Test cricket. Under Ponting, they are taking one-day cricket to another level.

They are closely followed by South Africa. Mickey Arthur, the South Africa coach, minces no words. "It is a power-based game now," he says, "it's all about being aggressive and having the confidence to take risks." It was a path he and Smith chose when Arthur joined the national team two years go. They reckoned if South Africa were to stay a force in the limited-overs arena they had to change their brand of play.

"It was called brave cricket then," Arthur says, "and it has become an over-used term. But that's what it is. It is a game based on the confidence to hit over the top, the confidence to take the sweepers on, and while bowling, having the confidence to go for wickets all the time. We are always looking to strike, with both bat and the ball."

It's a spirit embodied whole-heartedly by Smith. In South Africa's must-win match against England, Smith and de Villiers came out needing to score just over three an over, but there was not even a pretence of trying to play out the first few overs safely. The second yielded 14 and from then on, South Africa galloped at more than eight an over. de Villiers was dismissed trying to play a shot too many and it was the cue for Smith to step up a gear. Monty Panesar was bludgeoned for two fours, and a few overs later, Andrew Flintoff was spanked for three more. His 89 came off 58 balls and contained a dozen forays down the wicket.

Smith is a big man with shoulders and forearms designed to hit. But de Villiers and Mark Boucher have been revelations. They are both small men, but they clear the rope with relish and effortlessness. In the Super Eights game against West Indies, de Villiers injured his calf just after he got to his hundred. He hobbled on, however, hitting four sixes and three fours in the next 15 balls, grimacing and collapsing to the ground after every effort. It seemed like madness, but there was serious method in it.

There is a lot going for the power hitters. Small boundaries and high quality bats are big factors. If Viv Richards had the modern bat, Ian Chappell says, they would have had to fetch a lot of balls from out of the park. Chappell had a chat with Andrew Symonds recently and Symonds told him that the quality of the bats had become far superior in the last couple of years.

In Australia's Super Eights match against West Indies, Matthew Hayden, who has belted three hundreds so far, charged down the pitch to Marlon Samuels, and found himself a couple of feet away from the ball. Struggling and almost kneeling, he managed somehow to reach and scoop out the ball with one hand. It sailed over long-on for six. "That was so bloody unfair," Chappell says. "If a spinner beats the batsman in the air, the ball has to at least stay within the ropes, even if it doesn't end as a catch."

But short boundaries and the big bats are not the creation of players. Australians, South Africans, and, to an extent, New Zealanders, have been smart enough to consciously develop their game to take full advantage of the changes. And the concept of power cricket goes beyond batting. It's a predatory approach that involves all aspects of the game. If either India or Pakistan had been on the field instead of South Africa at St Kitts, Australia would have perhaps ended at 430. It is unimaginable that the Indian or Pakistani fielders would have been quick enough to save the boundaries on the short, straight field that the South Africans did.

Arthur recognises the advantage. "Some of the teams of the subcontinent and England are playing far too a conservative game," he said. An Indian player echoed the sentiments. "The one-day is running away from us," he said. "If we don't step up a gear, we'll be left behind."

One team from the subcontinent seems to have learnt its lesson quickly. Sri Lanka have not abandoned their natural game. They are still wristy, they still rely on timing and touch. But they are fitter, they run quickly between the wickets, they save runs, and they have bowlers who hunt for wickets. They look contemporary. It's no surprise that Sri Lanka have made it to their second World Cup final.