Cricket Embracing Mediocrity?

Cricket, that exquisite game which was ruled by sheer mechanics and skill, alas seems no longer in existence. The lure of test cricket, which was actually the only form in which the game was played has been lost to the more exciting version of it—the T20.

Unorthodoxy is appreciated more nowadays in players; especially batsmen and the occasional bowler in place of technique and alarmingly, even such unorthodoxy, devoid of any prospects of being developed into a sound weapon is mistaken for ingenuity.

Power training and tough fitness regimes mean that a ball that strikes not quite the middle of the bat will still find its way over the boundary, giving the fielders no chance.

Clearing the ground has become a simpler option nowadays compared to finding the gap. The lone, but normally mundane square drive, or the rare straight drive is applauded as legendary. Tags like "Class," and "Greatness" are attached to almost everyone around. Perhaps these tags are all correct, since you could always say its always the opinion of the masses that decides "greatness", and perhaps add later that "class" too has been added to that list of things decided by popular opinion. Perhaps objectivity is dead.

Tracks are made lifeless letting the men wielding the club humiliate those throwing the leathery orb at them. One wonders how much one has to wait to see the next Wasim Akram or Glenn McGrath, or given the way the game is embracing speed and excitement: whether the concept of existence of such people will have any significance at all, in the future.

It may be said that sports and arts exist for the sake of the society. They should take the responsibility of nudging society to greater heights of human virtue and endeavour, which does not seem to be the normal and spontaneous way of the majority in the society and what with people given equal weightage, there is always the risk of society being guided that way rather than the right way; the perception of which has again been condemned to subjectivity, perhaps rightly or perhaps not—every man has his own honourable view of the right and wrong.

It seems the art and sport of cricket is following the majority. The tendencies get averaged out and what is left is "Mediocrity." The spontaneous tendencies are found to bring money and "Fame," though fame among the mediocre is hardly a thing to rejoice for and these are followed faithfully in an attempt to satisfy the hunger for the spicy rather than nurture a need for the nutritious.

Perhaps the Don will himself take a hard look at things!