Twenty 20 approach to batting in ODI
One of the reasons for one day internationals becoming boring is the fact that batsman have often adopted the same approach and have never tried to improve especially while chasing big targets. If the tea, batting second has to score 300 runs to win the match, and if they find themselves at 120 for 2 after 30 overs, the chasing team accept the fact that they cannot win the match and just play out the overs the minimize the margin of defeat. The spectators too lose interest and leave the stadium, while viewers glued to their television sets switch on to other channels The spectators and viewers often feel cheated that they have wasted their time and money by watching a inconsequential match
One of the reason for birth and growth of T20 cricket has been the predicatability of one dayers and yet one way of making one day internationsl more interesting is by adopting a Twenty 20 approach of batting in one dayers as and when the situation demands. Sometimes it so happens that chasing a target of 300 plus, a couple of batsmen in an effort to give a solid foundation for the team tend to get bogged down in the processing of preserving their wickets leaving the rest of the batsman to score 160 plus in 20 overs. Hence the intelligence of the batsmen to follow counts , more so if they are good strikers of the ball. The batsman should mentally think that they are playing a Twenty 20 match and chasing a target of 160 plus is no big deal in a Twenty over match.
Benefits of adopting a Twenty 20 approach:-
Matches would become interesting as there is a sincere effort from the batsman to win a match. One is bound to see big hits and that is what one wants to see in a cricket match. The bowlers too benefit because they have a chance of getting wickets when batsmen go for the kill. When the fielding team sees that batsman are going for the kill, and even if they achieve partial success in an effort to score runs, there is intensity on the part of bowlers, fielders and captains of the fielding team. What more can we expect of a cricket match. Whether the batsman successfully chase or not, what the paying public and viewers want is excitement. Whether it is the players, spectators or viewers they would not mind losing their team making a match of the contest and losing by a narrow margin of 10 runs, instead of being thrashed by 100 odd runs.
In the second one day match played between Australia and India in the ongoing one day series, once India scored 354 it was a foregone conclusion that Australians had lost the game. Had the Aussies approached the game differently we could have had a exciting match even though India were the clear favorites.
When Test Cricket which is more than a century old has survived, one day internationals too can last the distance.
Regards
Satish
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