Pink Balls Thread

[abhi_jacko]

Is there a thread for the Day-night tests discussion ? It looks like its headed for disaster !!

I am fairly excited about the concept, but the players who have done playtests with it seem to hate it - batsmen cant pick it up after a while, have trouble picking up the seam orientation, fielders have the same issues. Almost sounds like its too dangerous to play with.

I dont understand: if we have to tinker with traditional test match cricket then why can't we simply keep the white balls and use colored jerseys ?

Ofcourse, the players could be overreacting as people usually tend to be averse to change

 

[MattW]

Is there a thread for the Day-night tests discussion ? It looks like its headed for disaster !!

I went and saw the evening session of one of the Sheffield Shield matches that was played last week as a day-night match using the pink ball.

The players were certainly having trouble picking the ball up - and in the dusk with a 60 over old ball I was having a lot of trouble seeing the ball from the crowd. It looked great on the TV screens at the ground, but for keeping a test standard of cricket, no way.

It was also very weird leaving at 9:30 at night with the match in the middle of an innings - it's not something that feels right as a fan in person.

 

[grkrama]

wouldn't it be better to just use two balls one for the day and another for the night.

The only reason i want this to work well is because it has the chance of increasing the Test broadcast viewership in turn more money for tests.

 

[MattW]

wouldn't it be better to just use two balls one for the day and another for the night.

Spraying the red ball pink at 6pm...

Changing the playing conditions that significantly would never be fair on both teams, and take a lot of the uniqueness of test cricket away by essentially getting rid of old ball bowling.

If test cricket isn't the most profitable venture in the world, why does that matter? If you have to gut everything that makes it unique, then there's no point. If you could get the pink ball to work such that it genuinely is just a red ball that you can see under artificial light, then there's no problem.

 

[grkrama]

Spraying the red ball pink at 6pm...

Changing the playing conditions that significantly would never be fair on both teams, and take a lot of the uniqueness of test cricket away by essentially getting rid of old ball bowling .

If test cricket isn't the most profitable venture in the world, why does that matter? If you have to gut everything that makes it unique, then there's no point. If you could get the pink ball to work such that it genuinely is just a red ball that you can see under artificial light, then there's no problem.

I was thinking more along the lines of the redball for day and white ball for night, the white ball often has a habit of getting old quickly under lights so spinners would still get a decent bowl out of it say 20 overs into the night, it certainly is going to throw a whole new set of challenges at the batsman.

Like you are going to face two new balls in a day one at the start other at eve.

Spin/reverse swing will still come in late in the day as the white ball gets scuffed and the following day with the old redball will keep the batsman on the toes a lot of times.



It does alter the game settings of a test quite a bit but it has to be an adaptable format, as if we are playing to the night i dont think the same test experience can be recreated.

If test cricket isn't the most profitable venture in the world, why does that matter?

Prob is when something doesn't make enough money the suits will reduce it to a novelty, we can already see the effects of this around the world, cricketers are no longer exactly the test standard players they used to be, aus is struggling to put together a middle order batsman who average just over 40s in FC.. i remember the days when bench warmers in aus squad use to have FC averages in 50s. WI tests cricket is literally bare same with SL, Ind the same the quality of spin bowlers has reduced. SA is the only team that has a decent setup.

The thing is this isnt something that's going to happen in say the next 10-20 yrs but if we don't find a way to keep it in the highlight over time to the next generation this beautiful format of test may not exist.

 

[MattW]

Prob is when something doesn't make enough money the suits will reduce it to a novelty, we can already see the effects of this around the world, cricketers are no longer exactly the test standard players they used to be, aus is struggling to put together a middle order batsman who average just over 40s in FC.. i remember the days when bench warmers in aus squad use to have FC averages in 50s. WI tests cricket is literally bare same with SL, Ind the same the quality of spin bowlers has reduced. SA is the only team that has a decent setup.

The ability to use Australia as an example disproves your point - there's no television viewership problem for Test cricket in Australia - every new cricket television rights deal is bigger than the last, and that is primarily on the back of test cricket. Being on at night doesn't always make ODIs rate higher than test matches.

The Australian team not being up to the standard of the fluke occurrence of the 90s and early 00s teams doesn't prove anything, much less that it is all down to the slight increase in viewership that you might get playing part of the match at night. They can get the same impact in Australia by playing every match in Perth - instead because of how strong Test cricket is in Australia, they dropped the WACA from the fixtures because it doesn't seat enough people for all the demand there is from the public for test cricket here.

If you can take test cricket as a whole and only change the colour of the ball to play at night, and still have the same experience - then do it. Indeed play all matches with the pink ball so they never have to go off for light on a field with light towers all around. But if you can't - and all signs right now suggest they haven't - then don't.

 

[Perfect Square]

If you can take test cricket as a whole and only change the colour of the ball to play at night, and still have the same experience - then do it. Indeed play all matches with the pink ball so they never have to go off for light on a field with light towers all around. But if you can't - and all signs right now suggest they haven't - then don't.

I think that Test Cricket should not be played at Night, because in my point of view Test Cricket is the Only Cricket Left.If you are trying to make changing in few things so that Test matches can be played at Night is just like making it a T-20 Format.In my view if the Test matches will be played at Night the Cricket will destroy.

 

[PokerAce]

On the D/N tests, can't they just play with the white ball and colored clothes? I know the traditionalists will say Test cricket means whites, but then again in playing D/N tests, tradition has already been broken, so why not just go for the practical instead of finding ways to keep some tradition alive and going for an 'experiment'?

However personally I don't feel D/N cricket tests will be the same. There is just something about the first days play early morning on a windy day, with the sun still to kill the grass on the wicket that won't be the same in the afternoon. Its not the same is it? Is it me or does the ball not swing as much in the afternoon as it does in the morning.

Its like taking (what would have been) the first and almost the second session out of the a normal test match, and starting around Tea. Somehow I feel batsmen would be quite thrilled to not playing the new ball early in the morning and starting int he middle of the afternoon. The advantage of winning the toss and bowling first will not quite be the same.

 

[grkrama]

Its not going to be the same, it will be more like a new format the moment Day night tests are made, but still its worth a shot if it will keep long form game going for the better.

 

[MattW]

On the D/N tests, can't they just play with the white ball and colored clothes? I know the traditionalists will say Test cricket means whites, but then again in playing D/N tests, tradition has already been broken, so why not just go for the practical instead of finding ways to keep some tradition alive and going for an 'experiment'?

The white ball has the same problem - it doesn't age well enough to stay visible at night while old. There's a big difference between 50 and 80+ overs.

 

[IceAgeComing]

They may as well try it and see what happens: I don't know whether Australia was the best place to give it a go though. It isn't going to ruin Test Cricket or anything, its just another experiment that they are doing similar to others done in the past that worked. If its dangerous then you stop immediately: but I dunno whether it would be that bad

There's a big difference between 50 and 80+ overs.

There's an even bigger difference between 25 and 80 overs - remember that they use a new ball from each end in ODI cricket and have done similar things for years because players complained that they couldn't see the ball 35/40 overs in

 

[MattW]

There's an even bigger difference between 25 and 80 overs - remember that they use a new ball from each end in ODI cricket and have done similar things for years because players complained that they couldn't see the ball 35/40 overs in

I was going to write 25, but assumed someone would go on about how it was fine for a full 50 overs for most of the time of white ball ODIs.

 

[War]

Matt & Poker makes some good points. Reading all players comments etc - I am on the fence until I see how things play out in Adelaide. As Matt rightfully said AUS & probably ENG and to an extent S Africa don't need day/night tests.

So in a lot of ways the adelaide test is just a commercial risk.

A place like UAE for Pakistan in which crowds just don't come to tests, playing under lights could be very useful their long term especially if PAK for obvious reasons can't hosts tests at home.

 

[angryangy]

They may as well try it and see what happens: I don't know whether Australia was the best place to give it a go though. It isn't going to ruin Test Cricket or anything, its just another experiment that they are doing similar to others done in the past that worked. If its dangerous then you stop immediately: but I dunno whether it would be that bad

I think doing it at Adelaide means they can claim it a success either way. They'll easily get fans in through the gates.

 

[Pace]

I went and saw the evening session of one of the Sheffield Shield matches that was played last week as a day-night match using the pink ball.

The players were certainly having trouble picking the ball up - and in the dusk with a 60 over old ball I was having a lot of trouble seeing the ball from the crowd. It looked great on the TV screens at the ground, but for keeping a test standard of cricket, no way.

It was also very weird leaving at 9:30 at night with the match in the middle of an innings - it's not something that feels right as a fan in person.

That pretty much sums it up, pink balls are simply not the answer to a day & night match.