By Shailesh Kapoor
Finally, it’s done. The six-week long Cricket World Cup culminated last Sunday, with an imperfect finale from an Indian perspective. Forty-eight games of potentially 100 overs played out over this period. In the age of instant gratification, where “short” is the way to go for most things, cricket administrators seem to have their own unique ideas, some of which seem rooted in another era.
Last night, India played a T20 game against Australia. It’s the first of the five T20s in a low-key bilateral series. Both sides are resting their star players. Yet, the game had a packed crowd at Vizag. It went to the last ball, something that none of the 48 ODI World Cup games can boast of.
Cricket has even made it to the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, on the strength of the T20 format. These are just some of the signs on how the future of the sport lies in this format, and the leagues built around it. Test cricket is there to indulge the connoisseurs. But it’s T20 that will expand the sport, taking it to newer audiences and geographies.
ICC may be reluctant to end the format altogether, but it’s happening organically anyway. Over the next 12 months, the major cricketing nations are playing less than 20 ODIs put together. The number of T20s are at least twice that number, and that’s not counting the T20 World Cup scheduled for early 2024.
The World Cup itself had its share of controversies, mostly administrative in nature, ranging from scheduling to the choice of pitches for the knockout games. The crowds in India, especially outside the major centers, can be very ‘un-sporting’, and this became painfully evident in the final, and the prize distribution ceremony that followed. As long as India is winning, all is good. But when we don’t, the picture looks embarrassing from a sporting perspective. It’s perhaps the nature of the hyper-nationalistic times we live in.
Right out of the World Cup, we jump into the elections season. Next Sunday (Dec 3) is the big counting day for legislative assembly elections in five states, which are a lead-up to the big General Elections next year. Just from a thrills perspective, one hopes there are closer finishes in at least a couple of those, compared to the largely one-sided World Cup we witnessed.
On the theatrical front, there are three big movies lined up in December: Animal, Dunki and Salaar. The year is well-positioned to be the highest-grossing year at the Indian box office ever. But that’s another story for another day.
Shailesh Kapoor is Founder and CEO of Ormax Media. He writes on MxMIndia on Fridays. His views here are personal.