Here's why the IPL makes you miss Test cricket

And they thought that one dayers and Twenty20 would kill Test cricket. Rather, as the T20 carnival called the Indian Premier League rolls on into another day of scheduled mayhem, the reasons why I love Test cricket are becoming even more apparent.

The preparation… the build-up

Teams spend months, sometimes even years trying to get their preparation for a series spot on. Australia have been preparing for the upcoming Ashes series for a long time – players have been rested, veterans recalled with a solitary goal in mind: winning the Ashes. Players do the same. Remember when Sourav Ganguly took the trip to Australia to train with Greg Chappell in preparation of the 2003 tour – he just wanted to get it right. Remember stories of the Indian batsmen training with wet tennis balls to get ready for the bouncy tracks in South Africa. Remember Sachin Tendulkar going down to MRF and training like a maniac ahead of Australia tours. The England team flying down to Dubai to get acclimatized, the tour matches. Australian teams stopping by at a war memorial on their way to England, looking for inspiration. The IPL has nothing on this… not a patch… just a one-month camp… even less time with all the key players and then they’re in the thick of it. Even the teams are an experiment… with line-ups being changed almost every match and captains being dumped after a few games.

The challenge

The weather conditions, the crowd, the weak links to exploit. Okay, Virat Kohli got booed in Mumbai and he reacted angrily. But no one boos Mahendra Singh Dhoni or Sachin Tendulkar or Virender Sehwag. The biggest challenge in the IPL is not the cricket itself – it’s the non-stop travelling. By the end of the tournament, the teams are drained not so much because of the cricket as they are because of the travel. As Rahul Dravid said the other day: “The cricket is so-so… its four hours… but the travel that’s really taxing. It’s like a grind.”

The pitch

Sunil Gavaskar tries his hand at trying to match Navjot Singh Sidhu during the pre-game show on television. He sings, recites poems and bad jokes, but there was this one time he was dead serious. The former India skipper was asked about the decision of one of the skippers to bat first and he replied: “It doesn’t matter.” And he is right. It’s a 40-over game, the pitch isn’t going to change, much like maidan or gully cricket. The only reason the toss matters is if the heat is too much or the conditions are overcast.

But isn’t the best part of Test cricket – the pitch itself? Have you heard Dhoni asking for a turner in the IPL? Have you heard of any skipper resting himself because of a green track? Have you heard the pacy tales of Perth or Jamaica? Taking the pitch out of the equation is like taking one of the great talking points out of the equation. One of the great joys of Test cricket is what the pitch looks like before start of play on Day 1, with T20 the pitch doesn’t matter enough. That can’t be good. Ever.

The bowlers

Dale Steyn runs in and bowls one absurdly good over. He mixes in a bouncer, a slower ball, a yorker, a slower bouncer, a ball that comes in sharply and ends it with a perfect outswinger. He doesn’t get a wicket but it leaves us wanting for more. Another bowlers comes in from the other end but we are still focussed on Steyn and the promise of his next over. That’s when the captain decides he wants to rotate his bowlers and save Steyn for later; for the death overs.

Who does that… one may ask. Well, everyone in the IPL and that sure is a dampener. There is no wanting the ball here; there is no good spell that tempts the captain to give that one extra; there is no laying of the trap; there is no bigger picture. There is just the moment… in a cocoon and sometimes, that just isn’t enough.

The batsmen

It’s a spectacle no doubt. Watching Chris Gayle hammer that 175 is probably something that is going to stay in our memories forever but that memory is tarnished by the fact that he never faced the opposition’s best bowlers for a decent duration – one or two overs from a top bowler certainly isn’t a spell. It was the fastest century in the history of the game but who cares… it was the IPL, it was T20 – power hitting, edges going for fours and sixes, batsmen with the license to throw their bat at anything, anyone and in any way. In Test cricket, an edge represents a chance; an opportunity. In the IPL, it’s runs. In a sense, it’s unfair to the batsman – most of them are capable of so much more. Dhoni comes in and finishes matches off with sublime ease, but it’s just as entertaining and perhaps even more satisfying to see him score 99 against England in the fourth Test at Nagpur or the 224 he hammered against Australia in the first Test. Sachin Tendulkar’s 76 at the Eden Gardens against England was satisfying for entirely different reasons. IPL can make lesser batsmen look great. In Test cricket, on the other hand, mediocrity is not an option; you have to work towards greatness; greatness that isn’t build on a single innings.

So even while administrators and players will speak about the Indian Premier League may already be the sole goal for many young cricketer, in my eyes, the league is still a distant second to Test cricket.