T20 World Cup schedule is a bit of a googly

3 months ago | 35 Views

The T20 World Cup is here but the Indian cricket fan need not fret because unlike 2022, this time all India matches have an 8pm start. Things get a little complicated though if you want to bookmark the potential non-India thrillers. Australia-England is at 10:30 in the night, Bangladesh-Sri Lanka at six in the morning, and Afghanistan-New Zealand at an even more agonizing 5am. Australians probably have it worse, being forced to watch their team play defending champions England at an ungodly three in the morning.

There’s more. Assuming local connect was one of the planks the International Cricket Council (ICC) wanted to get right, there’s no way you can sense it from the scheduling that has the hosts West Indies play newcomers Papua New Guinea and Uganda on Sundays but the far stronger New Zealand and Afghanistan on weekdays. And if an American wants to educate himself on the difference between cricket and baseball, he has to take a day off because of the overwhelming number of morning (10:30 am local time) starts in New York, Miami and Texas.

Broadcasters having a major say in the scheduling of an ICC tournament is a given these days but this time the ICC has really left no stone unturned. And while it may assure grand TRP points and even grander advertisement revenue, it remains to be seen how teams cope with this change. Like India who last played a day T20 World Cup match in, no points for guessing, the West Indies in the 2010 edition. They started with a win against Afghanistan and South Africa, but were ousted from the semi-final race after losses to Australia, West Indies and Sri Lanka.

Knocked out in the league stage in 2007, finishing last in the Super 8 three years later, the Caribbean anyway has been the proverbial graveyard of India’s World Cup dreams. And even though there isn’t any direct evidence, the commonality of playing day games runs high among probable causes that could have derailed what in that time was a well-oiled white-ball team.

Several aspects of the game demand a hard reset, including staying alert to the chance of being dismissed by the moving ball in morning starts—something most top-tier nations are just not used to. The toss thus becomes a factor if the mornings aren’t clear. And India don’t always defend well, as was evident in the way they were swept aside by England in a 10-wicket semi-final defeat in 2022. Add to this the incessant travel India always seem to be subjected to in ICC events.

That said, the tournament has already been planned in such a way India just need a win to go through to the Super Eight. This ease of passage again traces back to 2007 when India couldn’t qualify for the next stage after losing two out of three games, to Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. That ODI World Cup earned quite a bit of flak since Pakistan too were ousted early but in fairness, it was probably one of the better formatted ICC events where each of the 16 teams had a good chance of going through from four groups. It was just that Bangladesh and Ireland completely changed the equations by spoiling India and Pakistan’s parties to qualify for the Super 8s. It was a challenging World Cup, but fair nevertheless.

That template hasn’t changed in 17 years but with the expansion of the T20 World Cup hitting the 20-team mark, making the Super 8 cut has become ridiculously easier for the top-tier nations. While it may undercut any chance of a mishap of 2007 proportions, the formatting doesn’t really do justice to the paying public seeking a sense of thrill in the overall competition. Brevity anyway doesn’t live up to the overall theme of the tournament where the more competitive stage actually begins after completion of 40 league matches.

It’s the biggest reason 2007 remains so fresh in our minds as a glaring reminder of what not to do. It was too long, and ultimately too boring without the biggest stakeholders of the game. That World Cup will also be remembered for the colossal mismanagement on the ICC’s part that banned live music from the stands and made the tickets so expensive that the locals chose to stay away from the party that cricket organically brings to that part of the world.

It’s those anomalies that Cricket West Indies (CWI) and T20 World Cup CEO Johnny Grave claimed to make amends for in an interview to ESPNCricinfo earlier this year. “The biggest thing that people feel went wrong in 2007 was that it didn't embrace the local communities and local fans enough,” he said. “The main thing in terms of the 2007 lesson is to make sure we are loyal to our fans and consistent in the way that we allow fans to attend, and make it affordable and make sure when they do turn up, it's an environment that they are used to and how they want to watch their cricket.” But the scheduling and the format indicates that the bigger point has probably been given a miss, again.