- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
This week’s Roar and Against debate is Australia’s ongoing struggles in Twenty20 cricket. While Australia has marginally improved from eighth to sixth on the ICC rankings the side failed to make it out of round stage at the recent World Cup.
Each week two writers will go head-to-head, and will only have 250 words to get their point across on one of the big sporting issues of the week.
It will be up to you, in the comments section, to decide the winner. That winner will stay on and take on a new challenger and new topic. That challenger can be anyone, including any commenters who throw their hat in the ring.
For winning in week two on the NRL bunker topic, Roar guru Scott Pryde stays on and will take on Roar editor Patrick Effeney, who has been frothing from the sideline to try and have a crack.
Our hot topic this week?
Australia will never be a powerhouse in men’s T20 cricket
AGREE
Patrick Effeney (Roar Editor)
I don’t just agree with the topic, but will go as far to say that I don’t want Australia to ever be a powerhouse in men’s Twenty20 cricket.
To start with, it’s impossible for anyone to be a T20 powerhouse, and that’s all about the nature of T20 cricket.
The West Indies just won the ICC World Twenty20 – a fantastic achievement that I take nothing away from. However, it’s inconceivable that they could ever win a Test cricket tournament with their current line-up, should one ever exist. They don’t have good enough players to do good enough things consistently enough to win – their bowlers will stray from their line and lengths and be punished. Their batsmen will lose concentration and be punished.
Cricket is simple maths when it comes to determining the better team – the more balls there are, the more chances there are for a good team to show how good they are. That’s why Test cricket is the ultimate form of the game. More balls, more time, more chances. The team who does the most right over that time will win, and that’s why upsets are hard to achieve.
One day cricket has less balls, so it evens the playing field between good and bad teams. Twenty20 cricket does this even more. So I don’t believe anyone – even less so Australia with our blase attitude towards the shortest format – will be a Twenty20 powerhouse. It’s just too random.
And finally, and I think I’ll take a lot of Roarers with me here, I don’t want them to focus on being a T20 powerhouse. James Sutherland and co. would be doing a swell job by me if they keep us up the top of the Test and ODI rankings.
DISAGREE
Scott Pryde(Roar Guru)
How is it possible to say something will never happen? It just isn’t. Regardless, Australia have been the best both Test and One Day cricket at one time or another and that won’t change with T20 cricket.
While Australia have been accused of everything that relates to taking T20 cricket far too casually during the 10 or so years of its existence, saying they will never be a powerhouse is taking things too far.
As a player who only came out of juniors a few years ago, and someone who continues to umpire at a local junior level I have seen the transformation of the junior game first hand, and the way batting and indeed bowling has changed at a grassroots level.
Sure, there are still plenty of players going around who want to show the proper technique, but it’s aggressiveness in juniors that is one day going to relate to the Australian national team. As a test advocate myself, it is difficult to witness and realise the way cricket is going but there is no other alternative.
Look at the biggest cricket tournament in the world, the IPL. Players are making multi-million dollars in two months. That appeals to juniors who are going to form the basis of the Aussie team moving forward.
Furthermore, in this day and age people don’t have time for the longer forms of the game. Players want excitement and entertainment, and that is what T20 cricket delivers. If that is the way moving forward, then everyone is going to want to be the best.
Australia will improve. Mark my words.
So what about it Roarers? Who wins your vote for best-made argument this week?
Let us know in the comments section below and they’ll be our carryover champ for next week. Also let us know if you want to take part, and we can make that happen.
Build your own fantasy cricket team and put it to the test with Draftstars daily fantasy competitions. Pick your match, pick your team and watch the points roll in to take out cash prizes on each match. What are you really gambling with? Set a deposit limit.