The Myth of Five Day Cricket

I play basketball Tuesday day nights in what is loosely termed a social league, which is to say that there aren’t any clubs or coaches or training involved, but it’s still a competitive undertaking. Towards the end of last season I mentioned to my good friend and teammate that we were right on the borderline of making the finals. “Who gives a shit about finals,” he replied, “I just want to play a game."

I spent most of last Sunday with this idea rolling around in my head as I watched seemingly lacklustre Australian and Sri Lankan Test sides produce a seemingly lacklustre day of Test cricket. I was aware that I was watching the live contest unfolding in front of me but I was also projecting forward to future contests – who should bowl the next over, who should be dropped for the next game, who should be trialled for the next series and so on. But to what end?

The Test cricket calendar rolls on relentlessly with no championship to play for and no World Cup every four years, just a vaguely statistical concession of who, at any given point, is rated as the world’s best test cricket team.

The recent Australia vs South African series highlighted why this is problematic as well as intriguing; whoever won the series gained the number one title and yet, barely two weeks later, the Australian team needed every bit of five days to defeat the lowly 6th ranked Sri Lanka. If the Ashes started tomorrow the Aussies would go in as rank underdogs. And this is pretty much where we end up; The Ashes as the only “meaningful” series in Test cricket, and even then, it’s more about mythology and the history of colonization than cricket.

Every summer I loosely follow the AFL off-season; the draft, the trades, pre-season progress, players returning from injury etc. The purpose of these activities is clear; they are all rungs of the same ladder, perched up against the premiership window. Still, this structure only holds as much meaning as we're willing to give it, and even then, it's currency only hold value for 12 months.

Every winter I have no idea what international cricket team is next touring Australia and I cannot recall who toured last. And yet, this does not in any way diminish my enjoyment of watching the contest. I look forward to long days on the couch, deeply ensconced in the rhythm of a game that has no off-season, a match that lasts for five days and an etiquette that requires players to ask umpires to do their job. I know there is no greater context for the game than what is immediately in front of me and that’s part of what makes it so interesting; it is almost contest purely for the sake of contest, and it is this lack of framework that allows us see and marvel at the masterful feats of concentration (Faf Du Plessis), stamina (Peter Siddle) and occasionally transcendence (Michael Clarke).

During the above mentioned “lacklustre” day’s play, that same friend and teammate glanced at the TV scoreboard and then at me on the couch, “That must suck,” he said, “bowling all day and not getting a wicket.”

I wasn’t sure if he meant for the players or for me, both probably, but it didn’t matter. Walk to the top of your mark, turn, run in and put the ball on the spot.