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Right from the day the tactical timeout has been introduced, it has been riddled with controversy. Rightly so, as pure money making opportunisms have led to teams getting an extra 7 and a half minutes to think about the game after 10 overs.
Whenever commerce has tried to meddle with the arts, it is the art which bears the brunt. The tactical timeout has changed the dynamic of the twenty20 game, with teams either bowling or batting themselves out of the game during overs 11 to 14. This is a cause of concern, as the continuity of cricket as well as a batsman’s right to benefit from his concentration are adversely compromised. Even a player of the calibre of Sachin Tendulkar has spoken up against this playing condition.
It seems that the only people who love it are the cricinfo text commentators. Good for you, guys. The timeout has been bagged by every cricketing expert, be it an expert worth his pinch of salt or an expert worth his weight in gold.
Lalit Modi is a very shrewd person, blah blah. Sir, you have gone wrong here. The people have accepted this as an aberration in a perfect television package, not a welcome break to attend to nature’s call or a little quickie.
Little Quickie…the double use of similar words reminds me of the way Mr. Modi has shrewdly manipulated the rule and today, he comes up with a proposed modification. He believes that if people do not like the 450 second timeout, why not give them two timeouts of 150 seconds each, totalling 300 seconds, and in turn squeezing in 75 extra advertisement seconds in each of the mini-timeouts. Smart? Stupid! Whatever. People will still take it as what it is, just this time the monster would grow an extra head.
by Ankit Mishra
