World T20: What can we expect?

The extravaganza of cricketing excitement has begun in the form of T20 World Cup which got underway last week. The new thing which this edition of the tournament has seen is the addition of one separate leg for associate nations along with Bangladesh and Zimbabwe to battle it out for a position to play in the main league. For the first time Nepal, Hong Kong and UAE are featuring in the tournament. The game of cricket has evolved over time and it has seen many changes in the way it has been played and the format. T20 is surely one of the most exiting changes which has occurred to the game since its inception. Cricket has always been considered to be a time taking game throughout the world and culturally it was a game for the elites. But what this format offers is an opportunity for the game to grow in those parts of the world which it has never been accepted due to this very reason of longer duration. The shorter format also increases the excitement in the game. For cricket to develop and gain popularity among masses globally as football or hockey has, it is imperative that the game has acceptable format which T20 provides and hence it is necessary that this format is given due importance by the International Cricket Council. This was actually the reason of development of T20 and the initial push it got from the ICC forcing test playing nations to play a minimum number of T20 games in a year. And we have seen how effective that move by ICC has been as now most of the nations have a league of their own and the viewership and fan following has surpassed the ODI and test matches in many countries. The T20 World Cup is the biggest tournament in this format which makes it all important as every nation now wants this format to grow in their home country and winning this trophy definitely gives it that push. The biggest example would be India where this game flourished after India won the inaugural edition and it has been same with whichever country who followed. The shorter format also gives a level playing field to all the playing countries where any team can surprise the other on any day. This is hugely beneficial for nations such as West Indies who won the 2012 edition and Pakistan who haven’t been doing particularly well in other formats to keep the excitement in cricket alive and going. Now it would be interesting to see if the countries such as Nepal could pull up a few surprises. Also the tournament would also be a precursor to the World Cup 2015 and the country emerging victorious in T20 WC would be a sure favourite for 2015.