A far better contest

Hello and welcome back to my blog

Lords and Ladies the time has come for me to draw you away from a non-contest in England and provide you with a far better battle of wills. Here today it is my intention to begin a back and forth between two keen cricketing minds over a simple question:

"Why do people keep saying that the IPL will destroy Indian cricket?"

To provide some context, I was discussing the current test match between England and India with a good friend of mine online and rather randomly he produced this little gem of a statement (he mean it solely as a question) and before I got to drunk on excitement in the wee hours of a working night I decided to transport the discussion to this forum, to set up a discussion that can play out in public on this blog - an experiment I have wanted to run here for some time. You humble reader will find that the two of us will agree on many things but the early exchanges suggested that there is enough of a difference between us, as well as a broad enough canvas to work with, to produce a fine conversation about the sport we all love and cherish.

Between us you will have the opinions of students in accounting, commercial law, law and psychology as well as a cricket blogger and a fine bowler for clubs in two countries.

I will set up some basic ground rules to guide, but hopefully not hinder, the debate:

• After one of us posts their thoughts the other has the right of reply thus creating a string of back and forth. Neither of us shall double-up on posts without prior negotiation
• Posts must remain under 1000 words (although this can be removed if necessary)

Now this will, with any luck, not be finished either quickly or easily and with both of us leading busy lives (he in particular will be travelling around Europe during our spring) the posts will not be daily or even necessarily weekly. The idea will be to produce a drawn out contest of opinions and thoughts that I expect will go well beyond the initial question and hopefully encapsulate many corners of this great sport of ours

Right well enough of my twaddle - let the games begin!

Well sir to start things off I thought I would take the position of avocatus diaboli and put some simple answers to you. I won't say I agree with the points I intend to make but they are worth having here to get things moving. Now I make the assumption that your question/statement is meant in a sarcastic manner - if not please don't hesitate to correct me - in an effort to poke fun at people in ivory towers that look down on the IPL as destructive to normal cricket (by which I mean traditional cricket). No doubt you also sense the creeping tone of mild racism or at best old colonialism behind their words. Well I have no intention of repeating those stupid points but there appears to be some evidence to support a more genuine concern for Indian cricket.

First and foremost, the IPL rewards mediocrity and rewards it obscenely well. A player who might never be good enough for test cricket and its challenges to the mind and body can earn 10,000s or even 100,000s of dollars for slogging essentially. With that in place, how is a country supposed to develop the talent necessary to remain competitive in international cricket?

Further reasons stem from this basic one really, for instance what is the incentive for a player to aim for test cricket when a fortune can be made for half the skill and with half the time invested in nets etc? The tradition and high standing of traditional cricket may still exist now but what about in ten years when the IPL could well still exist and would be an institution by then. First class cricket will die first in that case and the international team soon after (if not before).

To focus briefly on the timing of the criticism of the IPL and its influence, the death of good batting technique has perhaps been on show already in this test series with players like Raina and Yuvraj Singh looking helpless in the face of quality short-pitched bowling. Now obviously this has always been the enemy of touring sub-continent teams and will continue to be for the foreseeable future but never before have international batsmen appeared to show such cowardice towards it and even disdain towards having anything to do with it. Why bother with this stuff when I can go back home and pay for my retirement on flat wickets against hapless bowlers?

These points I have made before again and again and therefore I would charge you (and latter myself) with dealing with the truths and falsehoods that lie within.

Your move.