County cricket is a better proving ground than the IPL
Asian cricketers have a long tradition of playing county cricket
Tariq Engineer
25-Feb-2013
Asian cricketers have a long tradition of playing county cricket. Sachin Tendulkar was Yorkshire’s first overseas player. Farokh Engineer gave Lancashire his best years. Javed Miandad turned out for Glamorgan and Sussex. But these days fewer and fewer of them can be seen plying their trade on English soil. In the Guardian’s Sports Blog, Dileep Premachandran bemoans this trend and says Asian cricketers would be better served by eschewing the IPL in favour of the country game.
Forget the quality of the opposition. Forget the paltry crowds. Think instead of a variety of venues, and an itinerary that puts the emphasis on match fitness rather than looking like a Manpower model. One week, you could be batting on a placid pitch where boredom is the biggest threat, and the next week will find you struggling to put wood on leather as the ball swings and seams prodigiously in overcast conditions.
As a slow bowler, you could revel one week on a dry surface and then get belted the next as the ball moves little off the straight. It adds up to the kind of well-rounded education that every young professional needs.
Tariq Engineer is a former senior sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo