Chanderpaul: 20/20 can’t beat Tests

Thursday, November 20th 2008

World cricketer of the year Shivnarine Chanderpaul says players are increasingly eyeing the huge pay cheques offered by Twenty20 cricket but believes the Test format will remain the game’s gold standard.

Chanderpaul, who played Twenty20 for the Bangalore Royal Challengers in the this year, also appeared in the Stanford Super Series in the West Indies for the victorious Stanford Superstars.

Bankrolled by Texan billionaire Allen Stanford, the tournament came in for heavy criticism, with former England and Wales Cricket Board chief Lord McLaurin calling the megabucks final, in which the Superstars walked off with one million US dollars a man and a vanquished England nothing, “obscene” and a “pantomime”.

But left-hander Chanderpaul, a mainstay of the West Indies batting for more than a decade, described it as a “beautiful” event.

Chanderpaul, who has a Test average of just under 50 in his 112-match career, said Test cricket would remain the ultimate challenge for players and the best test of quality.

“Everybody dreams of playing Test cricket,” said Chanderpaul, speaking in Hong Kong where he played in the Hong Kong Cricket Sixes before jetting to Abu Dhabi for the current one-day international series against Pakistan.

“I enjoy Test cricket a lot. I enjoy all of it but Test cricket the most.”

But he admitted that at a time of great turbulence in the world game, he did not know what the future would hold.

“Some of the players will focus mainly on Twenty20 and some will want to play all the games,” said the West Indian.

Chanderpaul’s comments came amid a warning this week from Australia captain Ricky Ponting of the dangers posed by a preoccupation with Twenty20.

Ponting said the amount of money offered by the IPL made it hard for some players to continue to play for their country, according to comments reported in Australia’s The Age newspaper.

“We cannot afford to lose teams such as New Zealand and the West Indies from international cricket, but my fear is that this could happen if the game cannot strike a balance between Tests and one-day internationals and the IPL’s riches,” Ponting wrote.

“Unless such a balance can be achieved, I could see some countries’ cricket teams declining in the way Zimbabwe’s sides have struggled over the past few years.”

The challenge to traditional cricket authorities is shown by the fact that already, 14 frontline Bangladeshi players have deserted the national team to join the rebel Indian Cricket League (ICL), while Sri Lanka’s tour of England next year has been cancelled because of their players’ IPL commitments.

Source: Trinidad Express