Jao, khelo aur maaro: Virender Sehwag sees snappy 90-minute T10 as cricket's passport to Olympics

“Jao, khelo aur maaro (go out there and hit).” That’s what Virender Sehwag and his boys are getting ready to do. The setting: the Sharjah Cricket Stadium, immortalised by the ‘Desert Storm’ conjured up by a certain Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar nearly two decades back. The occasion: a T10 cricket league. Yes, you heard it right. T20 is passe, T10 is the new flavour of the season, and might as well be so, given that it is a day and age in which entertainment has to be instant to be of any use to a generation hard pressed for time. It is indeed a restless generation running the rat race, and it simply hates to wait. This has resulted in institutions having to undergo re-invention and cricket has not been immune either. [caption id=“attachment_4236587” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Virender Sehwag (L) and Sohail Khan during the launch of Maratha Arabians T10 team. PTI[/caption] The first disruptive change came about in the form of T20s-a snappy, lean, blink-and-you-miss-it, action-packed version that shook up the polite story-telling that Tests and ODIs entailed. In came T20s with all the crash, bang, wallop and now it seeks to go a notch higher, halving itself in terms of duration, while promising double the thrill and excitement. Welcome to cricket’s new avatar: T10, which is essentially T20 on steroids and when you have a mascot like Sehwag, the prospects don’t look bad at all. Sehwag was in Mumbai on Thursday to promote the T10 league, which is to take place at the iconic venue from 14-17 December, and also his team, the Maratha Arabians. He would be leading a squad that boasts of names like Kumar Sangakkara, Mohammed Amir, Lendl Simmons and Rilee Rousouw among others. There are five other teams in the fray and in action would be world cricket’s current A-listers like Sarfraz Ahmed, Eoin Morgan, Shoaib Malik, Shakib Al Hasan, Kieron Pollard, Dinesh Chandimal, Angelo Mathews, Hasan Ali, Sunil Narine and many others. It would also include retired superstars like Shahid Afridi and Misbah-ul-Haq. Wasim Akram would be present in a coaching role. The tournament would be under the Emirates Cricket Board’s aegis and has the approval of the International Cricket Council (ICC). “I think cricket is the same, it doesn’t matter whether you get 20 overs, 10 overs or 50 overs, because at the end of the day, you have to play those number of overs and try to score as many runs as you can, and I am sure after this first year of league you will get know whether this format is liked by people or not,” Sehwag said when asked what difference would T10 be offering to the already popular and fast-paced T20, and if he saw the concept of T10 catching on in a big way in the near future. “I am sure you will see the Sharjah stadium being full with people and they will come and watch this game. I still remember Sachin Tendulkar’s innings in Sharjah. I am hoping that people will come and watch me there also because the last time I played there I scored 135 runs. So hopefully, out of 10 overs if I face five-six overs I will be able to score 30-40 runs,” the Maratha Arabians captain sounded upbeat.

Watch @virendersehwag on #T10League format, recalling #DesertStorm by @sachin_rt in #Sharjah and more.. at the @MarathaArabians Jersey Launch. #AalaReAala #MarathaArabians @SohailKhan @parvezkhan35 @alitumbi @ChairmanMulk @T10LeagueTweets pic.twitter.com/BwaaCCLdLX

— Maratha Arabians Fan Club (@Maratharabians) November 30, 2017

UAE-based businessman Shaji-ul-Mulk, the inspiration behind the league, said that the idea was to come up with a format in cricket that could be completed in 90 minutes. Now that’s what you would call a well-packaged and crisply-delivered commodity. There can be no denying that Shaji has had his fingers right on the pulse of the market. “You look at world sports today, whether it is football, volleyball, whatever… the big sports of the world are for 90 minutes. So why can’t cricket be for 90 minutes? And once you decide on 90 minutes, all you get is 10 overs. That was the thought,” said ul-Mulk. He recounted how it was a challenge to turn his thought into reality. “It was a challenge to get the ICC to actually approve and get the top international players like Viru (Sehwag) and the rest of the world to believe in the game and say, ’let’s take this seriously, yeh koi galli ka cricket nahi hai (it’s no street cricket), and I am going to be out there competing with the best players of the world and show my skills’. “Then the biggest challenge was (convincing) national cricket boards themselves. There was talk of ‘if my player goes and plays T10, what about his technique? T20 has already spoilt the technique (of players) in the 50 overs format’. So we faced many, many challenges. The biggest break came from the Sri Lankan board. They said, ‘we so believe in this, we are going to send you a national level team, a champion team named Sri Lankan Cricket to play the T10 league’. So that started the journey of an actual international accreditation.” He hoped that Sehwag playing for the league would be a “great breakthrough” as far as bringing the Indian players on board was concerned. Notably, the former Delhi dasher is the only player from India in the league. “They (Indian players) are all playing the IPL (Indian Premier League), they are not retired, and that is why they are not getting permission (from the Board of Control for Cricket in India), but I am sure next year you will see a lot of Indian players participating in this league as well. Next year a lot of cricketers will retire from international and domestic cricket and they can play this T10 league. I am hoping my friends would join me in this T10 league because it doesn’t matter whether you are 36 or 40 or 49, you can play this format and contribute for your team,” Sehwag noted, before quipping, “Hopefully, (Ashish) Nehraji can be brought in through the backdoor.” He, however, gave perhaps the single most compelling explanation on why T10 should be taken seriously at the very highest level. “We are talking about (the fact) that cricket should be a part of the Olympics. I think T10 is the right format because it gets over in 90 minutes like a football match and a result will come. So I think this is the right format if the ICC is thinking about talking to the Olympic Association (International Olympic Committee), Sehwag said. “More nations can play T10 and one batsman or one bowler can win you the game. So every country… can win T10 matches. If they do that, we will all love it because we all want to play a game of cricket, the format doesn’t matter. It is a good concept. Now the ICC has to think if they want to take this to the Olympic Association (IOC) or not. All the nations, who are smaller nations, who are playing four-day (games), Test matches, one-day (matches) or T20, they can play T10 and cricket can be part of Olympics as well,” the former India opener added. However, despite his wholehearted endorsement of the micro form of cricket, Sehwag reiterated that Test cricket remaines the toughest. When asked by Maratha Arabians co-owner Sohail Khan, Sehwag said, “Test cricket is a difficult and the toughest format and we need more fitness for that rather than in one-dayers and T20s.”