The new beast: The beginning of the end?

By Duncan Keal

The news that Mathew Hayden will be wielding a new weapon in this year’s Indian Premier League (IPL) came as little surprise. While the shape of cricket bats has remained constant over hundreds of years, technology has seen the modern bat have greater hitting power, a bigger sweet spot and a lighter pick-up. It was inevitable that at some stage there would be a leap away from the norm, as there was with attempts at metal bat designs in the late 1970’s, and a new generation bat would appear. However, I fear that the emergence of this new beast is a step in the wrong direction.

Some may call me a conservative, but the intrigue of test cricket has long been my preferred format. I view 20/20 as a necessary evil, something for the uncultured masses — with few real benefits to the game — aside from the massive financial one. With the rise of limited-over cricket and the more recent development of 20/20 cricket the game has become increasingly batsman friendly. Flat wickets, fielding restrictions, limits on the line and length of deliveries not to mention the vast improvements in bats has led to bowling becoming a rather un-enticing career path. Spectators are entertained by big hits and high scoring run chases, thus the move to a batsman friendly game in limited over cricket was inevitable.

The introduction of the new paddle shaped bat will have nothing but a negative impact on the game as a whole. The bat is said to increase hitting power by 20% through having a longer handle (increased bat speed), and a fatter blade. The most interesting development however is the lack of a splice, the joining piece between the handle and blade of the bat, essentially meaning the bat will have no ‘dead’ spots. In short the cricket bat is fast becoming a baseball bat. The introduction of such hitting power is taking the game further away from the bowlers, while one has to wonder what the implications of such a bat may have on the development of young cricketers already dreaming of rock star fame in the IPL. Furthermore, the introduction of bats with no splices will presumably spread to test cricket where, once again, batsman will get too great a value for shots and the fair contest between bat and ball will be compromised.

The new design is within the International Cricket Council’s bat regulations, as the aluminium bat was when Dennis Lillee hurled it off the field in 1979, and so for the foreseeable future it will be sanctioned. My suggestion is to make it a prerequisite that cricket bats have a splice, thus keeping with the traditional design and also limiting the power of weapons which have the ability to destroy the game.

I fear we are heading for a time where every second ball is smashed for a homerun, sorry, boundary, and crowds are wooed by a spectacle of slogging and little batsmanship. What are your feelings?

Currently pretending to teach English in the land of the rising sun and being surrounded by ignorant baseball lovers spends much time coming up with brilliant thoughts on various sports, in particular his true loves cricket and rugby.