Cricket is said to be the batsman’s game from the very beginning itself mainly emphasized by Gavaskar and Shivramakrishnan . But to some extent the balance was initially created by Windies giant pacers Walsh,marshall and ambrose ….
Photo credit – IBN7
But it also resulted in the West Indies dominance for almost a decade.
Then came the 175 of Kapil Dev in 1983 WC which is said to be one of the best ODI innings of all time (First ODI hundred by an individual) which gave the players at that time the hope and the way how to score a hundred in ODI .And this began the competition in World cricket breaking the Ultra-dominance of Windies which was there for about 10 years from then.(Unfortunately we cann’t watch its highlights because this match was not broadcasted ).
Middle era
Sir Viv Richards was terribly elegant hitter but he also was not th 98 first one to achieve this feat. Then came the phase of Pakistani cricket producing such fine bowlers having the talent of swinging the ball at 145 clicks, which balanced the batting and bowling scenario for many years.
Sachin era
And then arrives the GOD who told that pace and swing can be dealt if you go by the book,who holded the shape of cricket by not making the cricket Bipolar (Australia and Pakistan) as Pakistan doesn’t usually played bilateral with Australia and keeping India in play for almost 15 years.(till 2000) .Then came the era of Australia where it showed complete dominance by both bat and ball.
But in 2000s India and South Africa both were in competition but not for the first place but for the second place in cricketing dominance.So this phase was one of the dull phase where we can only see Australia at the top spots.This phase ended in about 2008-09 when greats of Australia started to getting unstable and contemporary in India there came the Yuvi and Dhoni phase were they chased every target posted by the opponents and which started the turbulent phase in the cricket where many teams came out bubbling in the race of the best (mainly India,SA,SL,Aus ) and according to me this was one the most exciting phases in World cricket and class was at its dominance and highly respected, but there was the smell of upcoming unorthodoxy which was introduced by MSD in the world cricket .
Modern Era
Then came the era when the modern DON Brad entered the world cricket-Virat Kohli who told that you can be consistent in every format of the game by just having a solid mindset and adapting in the given condition. Side by side there was a spring of unorthodoxical cricketers emerging out. From 2011 the period came of high competition for top spot but this competition was different from the competition of previous 5-6 years as every team from 2011 onwards can defeat any team but only at home(talking about top 4-5 sides).
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And one of the most disheartening thing which worried me and forced me to write this article is that the appreciation of the class has been highly overshadowed the performance at home .Talking about the Rahane’s(One of the most classical batsman I have ever seen) exclusion from the ODI side of india just because of some failures (Just cannt see another Laxman in making). These things might bring high competition but this competition will not be the positive one. I’m not saying that unorthodxy or innovativeness is bad but disrespecting class is and the exclusion of players like Rahane,Alex by typecasting will only deteriorate the class of the most beautiful game in the world as these players are the one who can perform anywhere.This typecasting reached the peak when we saw Hasim Amla gone unsold in IPL auction.
Concluding Remarks
From time to time when there was the phase of dominance by any team then it was encountered by the rise of one or many players from other part of the world but the competition which we are witnessing is not good for future as it will lead to the hunger of the teams to play at home especially of the teams with powerful boards like BCCI and CA and it will decrease the chances of teams like WI and SL to come in the race who doesn’t have much power at the center and this only will lead to more and more typecasting of players like Rahane .So it is high time when ICC should take control over such boards which will make the teams to play in every part of the world, which will surely make us to appreciate the class and this might bring more and more triangular series on the table which are always treat to watch .
