Craddock: T20 cricket may have the cash but not the soul to truly rule cricket
T20 cricket has the big cash and huge names but there is one thing it cannot provide that players crave and its why it will never be cricket’s greatest attraction, writes ROBERT CRADDOCK.
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Cricket’s 50-over World Cup has provided vivid proof why the Twenty20 format can never truly rule the world.
It might dominate it financially, draw the biggest players on the biggest purses and force international schedules to be bent out of shape to fit in it.
But there is still one thing it cannot offer which players crave … global fame.
Former England captain Michael Vaughan was spot on when he said that for all the financial incentives of T20 cricket there are still some things that money cannot buy.
One of them is a very pure sort of fame in your own country and globally that comes with winning events such as the 50-over World Cup, which Australia pocketed in Ahmedabad last weekend.
Players still crave that fame and in most cases it can only be delivered under the shade of a cap provided by your country not your cashed-up club.
Travis Head will go back to Adelaide knowing if he never hit another cricket ball he would always be the man who guided Australia to glory in one of the most challenging 50-over games of all time.
He has fans celebrating the return of the old-fashioned, slightly rough-hewn Australian knockabout element into the game and that sort of affection runs deepest with national sides.
Head’s innings was a historical gold stud. As was Glenn Maxwell’s hurricane double century.
T20 franchise cricket, great as it has been for throwing a net over a new audience and keeping cricket moving with our fast-paced times, lacks these sorts of “live-in-the-memory’’ moments.
Head cannot get that type of fame playing T20 cricket.
For all the big money on offer in the Indian Premier League, the IPL is very much a home-based tournament.
Much as Indian fans think there is global fascination with their tournament, most other nations have little interest in it.
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Originally published as Craddock: T20 cricket may have the cash but not the soul to truly rule cricket
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