Why 50-over cricket is like the banking crisis

The World Cup is nearly upon us, and that means we're all going to be watching a lot of 50-over cricket in the next few weeks. Well, not absolutely all of us. There are probably a few purists out there who intend to spend March hiding in caves, deliberately not watching the cricket, maybe keeping warm by burning piles of unwanted cricket equipment catalogues.

But we shouldn't mock the purist. We should applaud the purist. The purist has willpower and stamina. The purist is like a gourmet chef at a family buffet:

"Aren't you eating anything?"

"No, I shall not sully my lips with this mass-produced, processed fare."

"Well, okay, but you should really try the sausage rolls."

"Ghastly. This isn't proper food."

"Come on, have a bit of the smoked ham."

"Has it been aged for two months over juniper brush smoke in a Bavarian cabin?"

"I don't know. It's tasty though."

"No thank you, I'll pass."

"Are you sure? I mean you haven't eaten all day. You look a bit pasty."

"I'll be fine, I just feel a little dizzy."

"Can someone call a doctor, this purist has just fainted!"

But I'm not a purist. I love 50-over cricket. I wasn't so keen on 60-over cricket. Sixty-over cricket always felt like a maths lesson that was over-running. Then there was 55-over cricket: a bit kinky, a bit eccentric, very British. It was what 50-over cricket would be like if we still used imperial measurements.

No, 50-over cricket was the pinnacle of the one-day international and back in 1992, when Australia last held the World Cup, 50-over cricket was a simple pleasure.

Then they introduced the fielding restriction. That took some getting used to. The commentators had to remind us about the fielding restriction. The players had to remind each other about the fielding restriction. Some of the players wrote it on their hands and kept checking it and showing it to each other, and when the umpires came together at the end of each over, they weren't talking about the light, or who had the best panama, they were reminding each other not to forget about the fielding restriction.

Eventually, we got used to it. But the fielding restriction wasn't the end, it was only the beginning. Watching 50-overs cricket these days is like being at a football match where the referee stops the game every ten minutes to move the goalposts and change the ball.

We still have the fielding restrictions, but now they are called Powerplays. This is an uneccessarily dramatic name change for the fielding restriction. The fielding restriction was self-explanatory, it didn't need improving. It's like John Corby announcing that he's rebranding the trouser press as the Hot Power Pants Facilitator, and that from now on, he prefers to be known as Maximillian the Destroyer.

Now we watch 50-over cricket and no one knows what's going on. There are batting Powerplays, bowling Powerplays, new balls, old balls, fielding circles, Duckworth-Lewis algorithms. Listen to the commentators, they haven't got a clue. They are just bluffing. They are winging it. But those in the business know they can get away with it because we haven't got a clue either. It's like the banking crisis all over again.

If you ask me, cricket is not a game in need of further complication. Cricket is a game with the complications already built in. If you ask a non-cricket person, what, in their opinion, would make cricket more appealing, they never say, "You know what, I like cricket, I just wish it was more complicated. Then I could really get into it."

So my plea to the ICC is to return 50-over cricket to its 1992 state: a few wickets early on, a bit of a thrash at the end, and a long boring bit in the middle, which gives everyone a chance to de-flea the cat, cut the lawn, or pull off a really tricky bank heist.