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Is Test cricket on its death bed, or just sleeping?

Is the colour, glitz and glamour of T20 cricket consigning Test cricket to a long, slow death? (AP Photo/Aijaz Rahi)
Expert
5th August, 2016
13

I had a dream. By dream I do not mean an aspiration, I had an actual dream! Well, more of a nightmare.

Not the nightmare of Australia losing 8-35 in the Galle Test on Friday – my hat’s off to Sri Lankan hat-trick spinner Rangana Herath.

My nightmare involved going back to the future.

I was in Mumbai, where I watched my first of many Tests until the 1970s. But it was the year 2030, and an IPL match was being played, with over 50,000 cheering their heroes.

I asked someone on my left when the Test matches would commence, and he asked, “What’s a Test? You mean school exams?”

An old timer replied, “Oh, you mean those boring five-day marathons? Gone, gone, my new friend, and no one happier.”

I was disgusted. So I flew to Sri Lanka, the West Indies, South Africa and New Zealand (because in dreams, you don’t have to buy plane tickets or worry about passports and visas).

And the response from those attending ODIs and T20s was the same.

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The general response was the same: “Test cricket, what do you mean, testing new rules of cricket to have ten-over games, Ten10s, with multicoloured balls?”

Only one man, in his 80s, said: “Test cricket? Oh, it is still going on in England and Australia. They call them Ashes, I reckon. Don’t know why.”

I woke up with a start, relieved that this was only a bad dream.

I think the reason behind this dream was watching too many Tests the last few weeks, late at night and early in the morning.

The Tests between England and Pakistan at Lord’s, Manchester and Birmingham were well attended. Also, the Tests I have watched in Australia over many years had packed stands.

But the Tests between Australia and Sri Lanka in Kandy and Galle, as also between India and the West Indies in Antigua and Kingston, attracted barely 1000 spectators per day.

Was this dream a bad omen for the future? Will only Australia and England host Test matches as other countries exclusively embrace limited-overs carnivals?

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