General Cricket Discussion

[blockerdave]

I'd go for 16 teams. 4 groups of 4 teams, top 8 teams seeded. Top two from each group go through to the quarter finals and so on. That's what, 30 odd matches? Not too bad, should get through that relatively quickly, plus we get to see more associates.

It'll never happen though, because the bigger teams would fear being rained out of the first stage.

yep, after 2007 when india and pakistan went out in the first group stage, they have wanted to avoid anything similar.

your format would be inifinitely preferable to this borefest we've got

 

[blockerdave]

is shane warne on drugs? calls great shot to a skier that should have been caught, then says Taylor's looking at his feet near the rope as he looks directly at the ball a full metre inside the rope. wtaf?

 

[Biggs]

Honestly, from what I'm hearing he sounds really tired, possibly jet lagged. Why is Warne commentating a game between Zimbabwe and West Indies? I get a local presence, but why not Slater or someone with a bit more... for lack of a better word, brains?

 

[blockerdave]

when he's on sky uk he's generally much better. on channel 9 for the aus games he gets sucked in to their mindless matey banter and here is just hallucinogenic

 

[MUFC1987]

i don't like that, personally. i'm all for more teams, but i prefer 2 groups of 8, so that the best teams go through. if the associates are good enough, they will make it through to the next round. besides, if they do well in such a hard format, it will become even harder to keep them out.

The problem is there would be so many dead games in that format. Look at this tournament, Australia and New Zealand are both easing through, so the game between in the group stage means very little. A shorter format just means that teams have to play well all the time, rather than being allowed a whole host of failures. You'd get a winner who had lost one game at most all tournament, which I think is a good thing.

 

[Biggs]

A shorter format just means that teams have to play well all the time

Um what?

It's a WORLD CUP. The idea is that the WORLD turns up to play. Not just the colonial era nations. The WORLD. There's not one team in the tournament playing "B Side" against any of the non-test nations. Not one. Afghanistan have pushed all their opponents and were 1 wicket away from a victory against Sri Lanka. Ireland thrashed the West Indies and Zimbabwe had a good stab at chasing down some RIDICULOUS total last night and actually where ahead of the required run-rate and comparison scores at multiple times. The idea that X team doesn't need to "play well all the time" because there's too many teams is the most insane statement I've seen yet.

Every single side, every single one, is picking their best side and putting it on the field. Regardless of opponents or their Test status. If you think Pakistan are a better team than Ireland, Afghanistan or Zimbabwe this tournament, you're nuts. The Australia/NZ game is so INCREDIBLY significant because it will ultimately detirmine things like home quarter and semi-final spots. The idea of a WORLD cup is it features these awesome lesser-funded teams and expose them to a better variety of cricket than they might normally get. The winner of almost every cricket world has played to win (and done so) in every single game they've shown up for. The losers haven't.

I could go on about this forever. The more nations we get involved in a World Cup, the better it is for the sport and less we have to worry about India, England and Australia calling the shots to protect their bags of television money that dictates the sport at the moment.

 

[Ohm]

Um what?

It's a WORLD CUP. The idea is that the WORLD turns up to play. Not just the colonial era nations. The WORLD. There's not one team in the tournament playing "B Side" against any of the non-test nations. Not one. Afghanistan have pushed all their opponents and were 1 wicket away from a victory against Sri Lanka. Ireland thrashed the West Indies and Zimbabwe had a good stab at chasing down some RIDICULOUS total last night and actually where ahead of the required run-rate and comparison scores at multiple times. The idea that X team doesn't need to "play well all the time" because there's too many teams is the most insane statement I've seen yet.

Every single side, every single one, is picking their best side and putting it on the field. Regardless of opponents or their Test status. If you think Pakistan are a better team than Ireland, Afghanistan or Zimbabwe this tournament, you're nuts. The Australia/NZ game is so INCREDIBLY significant because it will ultimately detirmine things like home quarter and semi-final spots. The idea of a WORLD cup is it features these awesome lesser-funded teams and expose them to a better variety of cricket than they might normally get. The winner of almost every cricket world has played to win (and done so) in every single game they've shown up for. The losers haven't.

I could go on about this forever. The more nations we get involved in a World Cup, the better it is for the sport and less we have to worry about India, England and Australia calling the shots to protect their bags of television money that dictates the sport at the moment.

That's one very good post but you should have read what he said earlier:

I'd go for 16 teams. 4 groups of 4 teams, top 8 teams seeded. Top two from each group go through to the quarter finals and so on. That's what, 30 odd matches? Not too bad, should get through that relatively quickly, plus we get to see more associates.

It'll never happen though, because the bigger teams would fear being rained out of the first stage.

The shorter format that produced by least number of games per group and then no super 8 thing to be carried on to extend the no. of days; just jump into the knock-out stages. I'm actually approved by MUFC's opinion. Every team will get to play three games at group stages, in which each of them must put their best efforts . One bad game or an avoidable defeat against an associate would mean the side undergoing it will be troubled and it did happen once back in 2007 WC where India and Pakistan had to pack up by a very little time. What we do get to see in this 7x2 format, a big team face an upset against a team not in top 8s and then they still get to play more games from where they actually earn the chance to progress. Similarly in this world cup, West Indies first lost to Ireland and now suddenly they came on top to crush teams like Zimbabwe and Pakistan, so they produce the much needed run-rate and with that they don't afraid to lose the progression chance despite losing to a lower rated team and in the big games yet to come. In the current form it's not necessarily required to win everything, if you have been defeated twice/thrice, you still have the room to make a comeback which totally indicates the sign of long-term league formats. But the shorter is the format lesser are the opportunities, which can cause the under performers to quit the game early no matter what ranked International side they are.

Taking you to the other sport, just for a while. One just can not see any better example of 1x4 format than the Group D from FIFA world cup 2014. Although it's other sport, it was incredible to see a bottom seeded team Costa Rica finishing at the top and those who were reason to treat group D as 'group of death', finished up early including the Euro runner-ups. It was also that the title defenders were thrown out after first two games they played which must have been a no latest news for you I guess.

One big advantage of playing in 1x4 form is that an associate team does not need to prepare for so many test playing sides. And it is good for them at such a big occasion as they hardly get the chance to play them before.

 

[blockerdave]

Um what?

It's a WORLD CUP. The idea is that the WORLD turns up to play. Not just the colonial era nations. The WORLD. There's not one team in the tournament playing "B Side" against any of the non-test nations. Not one. Afghanistan have pushed all their opponents and were 1 wicket away from a victory against Sri Lanka. Ireland thrashed the West Indies and Zimbabwe had a good stab at chasing down some RIDICULOUS total last night and actually where ahead of the required run-rate and comparison scores at multiple times. The idea that X team doesn't need to "play well all the time" because there's too many teams is the most insane statement I've seen yet.

Every single side, every single one, is picking their best side and putting it on the field. Regardless of opponents or their Test status. If you think Pakistan are a better team than Ireland, Afghanistan or Zimbabwe this tournament, you're nuts. The Australia/NZ game is so INCREDIBLY significant because it will ultimately detirmine things like home quarter and semi-final spots. The idea of a WORLD cup is it features these awesome lesser-funded teams and expose them to a better variety of cricket than they might normally get. The winner of almost every cricket world has played to win (and done so) in every single game they've shown up for. The losers haven't.

I could go on about this forever. The more nations we get involved in a World Cup, the better it is for the sport and less we have to worry about India, England and Australia calling the shots to protect their bags of television money that dictates the sport at the moment.

to be fair, I think you've misunderstood what he said. he was saying the format should be shorter, i.e. 4 groups of 4, so every game matters, not 2 groups of 7 where England can get battered by aus and nz, potentially lose to sri lanka too and still make the quarters. 4 groups of 4 would actually get 2 more associates in, too.

I don't think anyone would argue the current format is bloated and has games that don't really matter in the sense that the teams can lose and it doesn't materially affect their chances of going through.

 

[Biggs]

4 groups of 4 teams is the sweet spot. No idea why it can't happen. It also comes down to scheduling too, because it seems odd to me that we're not playing 2 matches every day. One in NZ and another in Australia, given the time difference there's never going to be any clashes and there's enough grounds with lights you could potentially have 3 matches on some days. It's just been poorly scheduled. There's not any logical reason for NZ and Australia to be in the same group, for example.

I've read an interesting theory online that the Associate Nations are performing as well as they have this tournament because they've all been stuck playing an Irish team at the top of their game for the past 7 or so years so they've all had to raise their own game to compete with them... I'd love to have Ireland tour NZ, or Afghanistan come down for a T20 series. Sure it's not going to sell-out Eden Park but you'd get a pretty packed house in a smaller venue for a 50 Over Tri Series or something...

 

[blockerdave]

One bad game or an avoidable defeat against an associate would mean the side undergoing it will be troubled and it did happen once back in 2007 WC where India and Pakistan had to pack up by a very little time.

this is why we've had the awful bloated formats ever since - over a billion people switched off their TVs 10% into the tournament and the BCCI/ICC shit a brick and contrived to make sure it had zero chance of happening again.

 

[Biggs]

Just fickle "fans" in that part of the world, if it's not their team they don't care. The whole reason the IPL exists is to sell TV ad revenue. It's nothing to do with the sport.

 

[blockerdave]

Ireland have done far more to deserve test status than Zimbabwe or Bangladesh had - almost 10 years of dominating associate cricket and semi-regular defeats of a number of test nations in ODI/T20

although Afghanistan haven't in my opinion done enough yet, the "story" of them getting test status would be so amazing, so uplifting and so positive for cricket it should merit serious consideration

 

[Biggs]

Afghanistan have a fully fledged domestic cricket scene, they're more than ready limited overs-wise. Test match status comes back to funding and paying players, I think they have 2 or 3 full-time professionals playing overseas? I've watched them play so many times live in person and they have just as professional set-up as the Irish and Netherlands do. They're sponsored by Etisalat, a reasonably huge telecommunications company. They're basically set for decades of growth and have a huge passionate fanbase across the UAE, Afghanistan and Pakistan. There's no reason they couldn't be playing a Tri Series with Pakistan and India on a regular basis in the UAE, or even in Pakistan.

The Irish needed Test status 5 years ago. That one lies at the foot of the English Cricket Board as they've been blocking that for some time. I'd make the case for Netherlands to be included as a Test nation as well, they have a crazy professional set-up and really should be playing in this World Cup too, it's just unfortunate they missed out qualification to a slightly-better-on-the-day UAE team.

 

[bigred]

I'm enjoying the matches in New Zealand far more than the ones in Australia. I think there are 3 reasons why

1. Unless Australia or India are playing, the crowds in Australia look like an English County Championship crowd. Even the smaller games played in NZ seem to have a great atmosphere, played in grounds that look relatively full.

2. There's a real contest between bat and ball in the first 10/15 overs, as it really seams to seam and swing in NZ.

3. The matches in NZ start at 10pm GMT, which gives me the chance to watch 30 overs before I go to bed on a school night.

 

[blockerdave]

Afghanistan have a fully fledged domestic cricket scene, they're more than ready limited overs-wise. Test match status comes back to funding and paying players, I think they have 2 or 3 full-time professionals playing overseas? I've watched them play so many times live in person and they have just as professional set-up as the Irish and Netherlands do. They're sponsored by Etisalat, a reasonably huge telecommunications company. They're basically set for decades of growth and have a huge passionate fanbase across the UAE, Afghanistan and Pakistan. There's no reason they couldn't be playing a Tri Series with Pakistan and India on a regular basis in the UAE, or even in Pakistan.

The Irish needed Test status 5 years ago. That one lies at the foot of the English Cricket Board as they've been blocking that for some time. I'd make the case for Netherlands to be included as a Test nation as well, they have a crazy professional set-up and really should be playing in this World Cup too, it's just unfortunate they missed out qualification to a slightly-better-on-the-day UAE team.

Afghanistan play in the asia cup now, right? (odi) - imagine England offering a regular tri series against Ireland and Netherlands!!!