One thing is for sure, watching cricket has never been more fun than it is now. The batting especially, is worth going miles to see. Over the last fortnight, we have seen some of the most exciting and thrilling batting in international cricket. There is nothing that today’s batters can’t do and once they get the green signal, the acceleration in motoring parlance is revving from 0 to 100 in just a few seconds. It’s just a feast for the eyes. What we have seen in Kanpur, then in Delhi, has been mind-blowing . Across the border too, the way England pummelled the Pakistani bowling to rattle up more than 800 runs in treble quick time was simply sensational.

TV-driven age

What’s even more exciting is that the guys scoring at this frenetic pace are all in their early twenties and so have at least a decade, if not more, to entertain batting lovers. Those last two words have been used advisedly because those in the bowling fraternity will be screaming from the rooftops, not so much only about flat batting pitches, but about the reduction in boundary sizes all over the world. Yes, we are aware that the game has been TV-driven for quite some time now and so advertising support is most essential on TV as well as on the ground. That said, unless the LED boards are pushed right back on the perimeter fence, the boundary size is not going to increase. The authorities need to develop advertising boards  with foam padding at the bottom half of the board so that when players attempt the sliding stop and then slide over the rope, the foam padding will save them from injury.