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Twenty20 is the Future of Cricket: Like it or Not

Twenty20 is going to be the third widely accepted version of Cricket. Upon its getting popularity, many Cricket observers suspect that Twenty20 will destroy the actual excitement of cricket. However, this form of cricket has already got the recognition of ICC, the regulatory organization of World Cricket, and ICC will organize the first Twenty20 World Cup Cricket this year. However, it is said that when today’s popular ODI cricket was first introduced in 1971; many of the then cricket analysts and experts criticized ODI Cricket. Their main accusation was that ODI will destroy Test Cricket. Now, ODI cricket is much more popular than Test cricket.

Sunil Gavaskar, a legendary Indian batsman, said from his own experience that adopting with the ODI cricket in the early days was very hard. Cricket Zone reported:

It was a great challenge for the Indian batsman to take the one-day games seriously during the early days and the attitude of the team changed in the early '80s during the Australia tour while taking part in a triangular tournament, former captain Sunil Gavaskar said.
"When India played its first one-dayers it was a great challenge for the batsman to take the one-day games seriously. There was simply no thought given at that time in one-day cricket."

"Teams would make a mistake if they do not take Twenty20 seriously, it might be the saviour of one-day cricket as the way one-day format was a saviour to Test cricket," he said.

Yes, it is true that adjusting to Twnety20 form of Cricket will be difficult but I am sure that it is the future of Cricket. Time is a big factor. Just after 19 days, World Cup Cricket 2007 will begin. In South Asia, most people would have to stay awake whole night and enjoy the game. For example, according to Bangladesh time, the matches will start at 9 PM and finish at 5 AM. If it was Twenty20 World Cup, the matches would start at 9 PM and finish before 1 AM according to Bangladeshi time.