Its Only Cricket

3rd Test: Australia wins Sydney Test (scorecard), South Africa won Test Series 2-1.. T20 & ODI series follows.
Current Cricket Series : South Africa vs Australia, West Indies vs New Zealand. Coming Up : India in NZ 2009.

The Scary 6th.

Filed under Cricket

Today I want to mention a few things that are served to us along with cricket... and many times - at the cost of cricket.

There's certainly nothing called as bad publicity. Zee Sprots is a prime example of that. They got famous (because of their tussle with BCCI over television rights) without anyone seeing how capable they are to telecast a cricket match... Finally, today I got the opportunity to really see a match on this channel here's what I was served -

About 4% of the screen is occupied by the channel's logo - "ZeeSports LIVE" and around 2% by a logo which says - Dishtv. Another 4 % by the score.

Apart from the above loss, which we have become habbituated to, only the score seems the absolute nessasity. But don't make your mind as yet, this is what follows -

a) A servo logo attached to every players profile they show, or any other record card and things like that. The logo seems to stick to the screen, even seconds after the record card is gone.

b) A BSNL and cellone logo with every action replay, which occupies good 8-10 percent of the screen. And then we have "Zandu Chyavanprash" Super 4's and 6's, occupying at least 5%, or "Cherry Blosom" or "Minto Fresh" or "Asian Paints" - Don't worry, I am not paid to mention these names on my blog, I am just trying to show you what you see along with cricket, at the cost of cricket.

c) And if this was not all, as we cricket lovers are quite good at concentrating on the game rather than getting impressed by these logos and actually buy them, there comes "Idea" logo. Which not only occupies some precious and limited space on our TV screens, it comes with a irritating sound - Tere te, tere te, tere te.........!!??!!..... No matter how good your concentration is, this sound will soon start to bugg you.. and no, this can't termed as MUSIC.

Cricket is one of the best game to market your product cause it pauses for about 30 seconds in every 6 minutes or so. We audiances seemed to understand that, and surely enjoy certain Advertisments, as they seem to have better thought process then 3 hour movies, but now they want more. They have taken nearly half of the screen, as I have proved with my percent calculations and if they are not stopped, soon we will have no difference between our TVs and computer.. Just the score, and rest the LOGOs. Hope they will keep telling us who us batting!!

There was a time, not too long ago, when I used to watch Westindies play Australia in Australia. Espn used to telecast the match, taking it from channel9 and there used to be nothing on the TV screen but cricket. Only cricket. There were no score as well. Only when a run is scored or at the end of an over, there used to come a small card, at the lower left most part of the screen. Which was also a Translucent card, rarely barring the objects behind it... but may be I have become an old man as far as watching cricket is concerned, and things change. But aren't they supposed to improve as well??

Today,in between this "Chitrahaar" of adds, I managed to watch some cricket as well. Our team played quite good and easy cricket today. But apart from Irfan's matured innings, and Dravid's usual play, I noted a few things that I would like to share with you -

1) Umpiring quality was great. Both the Australian Simon Taufel and Pakistani Nadeeem Ghauri were very much in control of the game, and failed to make a single mistake. To my eyes at least.

2) Talking umpiring, near the end of the day, Ganguly was very quick to ask the umpires that light was not sufficiant, while on the other hand, Youraj seemed in no problem. But then, probably this is what made Ganguly the most successful captain. HIS SMARTNESS. Whats the point in batting in less light, when you can cool your heel in the dressing room and remain not out!!

3) I also noticed that Youraj was not really talking to ganguly. I may be complete wrong here, but this is what I felt. I rarely saw them together in whatever screen they left alone from LOGO's. Even when the day ended, they walked out of the ground together, punched their gloves (something that every batting pair does), but honestly.. I didn't see any chemistry between the two. Ganguly was the one who wanted Youraj to be a opener in test cricket and said one day - If sehwag is great at the top of the order, imagine the fun him hitting the oposition along with Youraj. firing from both the ends.

But then, things change... Now probably he himself is the one who will make Youraj sit in Ahmedabad test. But having said so much in against of the man, he seems to be little scared (which is understandable), but in some good touch. I can anticipate a career saving century coming..

Its Only Cricket

The Scary 6th.

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