Playing a Straight Bat - Traditional Batting c Modern Batting b T-20 Live?

 There has always been a riveting talk of traditional batting being blighted by Modern batting. Some whisper the emphatic No, while many bellow the affirmative Yes, or perceptually, it could go the other way. The ongoing craftsmanship vs showmanship game seems to stutter into a draw. But that showmanship of T20 has ignited different avatars of modern batting. And there is also the obvious swap of modern batting for traditional batting in the longer formats of the game.

As an anodyne, the mind connects Viv to T-20 cricket live. You can hold Viv Richards as the archetype of T-20 batting. But that’s the story of a craftsman come crowd-pleaser soaked in traditional batting delight. Viv Richards was ace high on traditional bating display.

Talking of the infectious modern batting, the flip the script moment on the cricket field awaits. White flanneled colts on the cricket field are a pleasing sight. The roving eyes detect the Cardusian field setup - two slips, a gully, a point, a cover, a mid-off, a mid-on, a backward short-leg and a long-leg uttered in Bill Lawry tones.

And then the wrenchingly honest demonstration sticks in the craw. It takes all of two minutes to go from delight to disappointment. Eyes travel along the parabolic path of the ball, and yes, the white-flannelled colt sends the ball to the orbit. Defying the traditional batting logic, straight-back lift mechanics, feet to the line of the ball theory, shoulder and elbow led stroke making manual, the batsman at the crease gives you a taste of white-flannels juxtaposed with the demonic power-aided unconventional modern batting.

It was a sort of gushes of joy tinged with blushes of remorse situation. That a T20 star cloaked in the game’s traditional attire parading modern batting is benumbing. Then finally came the bitter pill to swallow the oxymoronic reality in cricket. Lads of this generation have twigged what it takes to play for the art and what it takes to play for the gallery. And they have unabashedly tickled our fancy on the traditional Test match turf or your County cricket.

And then the eye of the eagle fell on a batsman in a County match. It was at that same County cricket that bread-and-buttered the Gorgeous Graveney, Fiery Fred to the copy-bookish Boycott. Nass, Butch and Athers came together for a commentary team to hook us all with revelations.

Dissection by Masters

They weren’t dissecting a toad in a lab nor they were students. The Masters were on to a spot-on moment when a batsman erred on the side of modern batting. Blimey, they were caught off guard. They were wrong-footed by the batsman who was starting on the off-stump. And why the switch from leg-and-middle to off stump guard?

The slice and dice of that off-stump guard opened up a school of reflections. The batting reel rolled on and those masters picked that play behind the ball. As Nasser Hussain, Atherton, and Butcher plumb the depths, they pick-out the blemish in quick time. As the batsman plays behind the ball with the bat swing across the line of the ball, Mike Atherton’s words of caution rings in the ears. Play beside the ball, not behind the ball. When you play behind the ball, says Ath, your bat comes across the line of the ball.

Then came Butcher robbing our attention with his technical eloquence. And what hit Butcher was that batsman’s eyeline. The batsman’s eyeline was way beyond the off stump even before the ball was delivered. The batsman was by then a dead duck to that in-swinging delivery. The batsman had slighted the traditional batting echelon.  Were modern colts chancing the off-stump guard to let go off balls outside their eyeline?

Butch’s finding is this. Batsman starting on the off stump is going against the fundamentals, to start with, and gifting the bowler with a huge margin of line to bowl at. There aren’t just three stumps to bowl at, for the bowler, there is the additional corridor around the off stump to bowl at that off-stump mounted batsman. Warming up for the verdict, Butch says the off-stump guard provokes to play across and you heard it right, miss out on stroke making opportunities on the off side. What used to be a square cut or a square drive played to a ball outside the off-stump is just an easy leave or at best a defensive stroke for that off-stump rocker.

And as Atherton laments on ‘The Very Orthodox becoming the exception than the rule’, fangs of modern batting are catching up with the modern colts. That’s how they rested their case. Modern batting promises more hues and colors and an expanding canvas of T20 live cricket action.

Play straight or Perish – A misnomer?

This yarn radiates sweet memories. There was this coach observing boys playing in a net session. As he walked to the nets, he parroted the golden words from the coaching manual all the time. The coach admonished his students erring in technique with those ‘Play in the V’, ‘straight back lift’ and ‘pick the line and length’ warnings. Sometimes golden words are repeated to drive home the point. And then you get drilled into playing with a straight bat, or perish early on.

There is a reason. The coach drills in the traditional batting techniques into the Colts to nurture skills needed to wither the complex variants of the game – grassy wicket, new ball, turning deck, swing and seam, cracks in the tracks and much more.

Blame it on fast and free lifestyle, out of the box thinking, modern batting has muddled the traditional batting forte. Indubitably, modern batting has more to do with the ‘changed batting techniques’ to suit the times and taste. Traditional batting, if I may say so, puts emphasis on resilient defence techniques to survive and thrive in any Test match condition, and to build an innings from thereon. Modern batting is all about expressing yourself in your devil-may-care T20 cricket illuminative batting avatar.

What’s playing yourself in, in one form, is a perishable quality in another.

An Inch for the Pinch?

Test cricket is not all of a ball and chain. From witnessing the copybook Boycott and Gavaskar, Test cricket has also showcased swashbuckling, explosive batsmen. And the gear-change of constructing an innings to destructing the opponents had seeped into Test cricket long back. Salim Durani would hit the ball into the stands at the crowd’s roar and request. Kris Srikkanth came down on the Aussie bowlers like a hurricane in Sydney. Ask Bob Holland for a start.

But a gambler is altogether a different stock from a Bohemian. The T-20 Bohemian despises the Test match conventionality for he has to score at his free will. Mind you, he has no time left. The T-20 Bohemian has sparked the modern batting style and thrust the novelty-painted out-of-the-ordinary batting into limelight like the T-20 live star playing the behind-the-body shot or your upper cut. Glen Maxell would vouch for its potential.

This Bohemian has only had his peep into the Test match arena. Just the peep, so far. Remember Rishabh Pant’s eleventh-hour squat-come-sleep sweep to ease the Indian nerves during that Brisbane cliffhanger. Test cricket with T20 cricket live action and modern batting can’t get better.

When instinct took over, Sachin played that upper cut in a Test Match. He was putting the demons of Nitini & Co’s persistent bouncers to rest. Remember Sachin was taught to value his wicket, grounded in solid traditional batting techniques. If you are bounced hard, days past displayed the get on top-of-the-ball approach. Modern batting inspires you to get under the ball and play your upper cut.

Not All is Lost

No flip out for now, for the flip-the-script T20 live game that starred India and Pakistan world-cup encounter sent the traditionalists on raptures. King K played a sublime innings soaked in traditional batting techniques to seal a win. To say he was staring at a take-a-wild-heave-at-every-ball situation is an understatement. The 22-yards and a catch situation did bring out a special moment. Indeed, King K was not going to desert the orthodoxies of the batting art while pelting, hoicking, plastering, hoisting deliveries for the maximum. It was as adrenaline-pumping display as it was classical. The traditional shades of a T-20 live game keep the hopes alive while Tolkien’s quote puts a ring of truth.

All that is gold does not glitter;

Not all who wander are lost.

The old that is strong does not wither.

Deep roots are not reached by the frost.

The Deep Root – Batting ABCs and Patronage

Deep roots had patrons, and they still do. If V-game is the apotheosis of traditional batting, then this Little Master stood as the epitome. Cometh the first hour of a Test match, this Little Master would gift it to the bowlers, and rightly so. The straight drives and the on-drives in the V would be a delight to watch. Then he would play on the tired legs of the bowlers.

The Little Master would run hard for the singles. A push into the gaps, and he would morph into a Jackrabbit. Not without reasons. Running those singles warmed up his legs and then his balletic footwork would take over. Traditional batting techniques at its heights.

‘Beautiful, what control’ uttered Bob Simpson. Not for nothing did Bob glorify Vishy’s batting. Bumped and bounced on the rising tracks of Australia, GRV’s backfoot-defence stood the test of Thommo’s short-pitched deliveries. Vishy could drop the ball at his feet. That was in stark contrast to the Englishmen’s batting display; they were snapped up by the short-legs and the backward short-legs earlier when Thommo was toiling at his frightening bouncer barrage. 

Vishy, 1981, and the Melbourne Test make up for a heady batting concoction. That delightful 114 from Vishy’s blade takes you to the batting paradise.  Lean trot to that magnificent 114 also had an interesting story. It was Sir Gary Sobers’ sing-song about ‘playing in the V’ at the start of an innings. And Vishy stuck to those golden words. When Lillee and Pascoe were breathing fire, GRV went back to the roots. The initial hour was a revelation of fine-grained, classical V-game that put all the demons to rest. Vishy even restrained from playing his fancied square-of-the-wicket play, early on. Gary opened the olden but the golden gate for this little stroke master.

There are yarns stirring vivid memories of traditional batting. Pre-lunch session and an opening batsman stranded on mere six runs. The Sixer Sidhu of the later years was a dodger of stroke play in his formative years. Fish, swish, and the push, and then the dash to steal an occasional single was what Sidhu was up to on that morning of the Chepauk Test match. The debutant, with all his flaws of stingy foot movement was pinning his faith on the traditional batting techniques. He survived.

And you can find patrons among the big hitters. Kapil Dev was a head-steady hitter of the ball, and his swivel to play his famous pull stroke put a ring of traditional batting essence to his showmanship. Eye-in-the-line of-the ball, economic foot movement and his trademark on-the-rise cover drives did reek of traditional batting.

The Verdict

The traditional baton has found safe hands. So far so good.

Cue in the Boost ad campaign, and what you can appreciate is the passing of traditional baton from Sunny Gavaskar to Dravid to Kohli, or from your Boycott to Atherton to Root. The Root is intact. For all the polluted pollens of T-20 live cricket floating in the air, it still can turn out that T-20 live modern batting just taints an apple here and there and not the whole barrel.

On the contrary, T-20 cricket live is gloried by pure stroke-making, apart from the sparkling display of slogs, whips and heaves. SKY is the limit, to take in orthodox batting manual and expand your repertoire. SKY is a shining example, your Suryakumar Yadav, does justice to traditional batting even on the T-20 cricket field.