Arrogance is Mutual, but Different...

And Milestones Matter - because history is measured by them

Spend an hour in the stands at the Oval and do a lap of the concourse around the stadium and you might understand what motivates proponents of two-division Test cricket. England against India used to be the second biggest deal in the game behind the Ashes. Measured in crowd terms.

But India’s last visit to Australia for the Border-Gavaskar Trophy smashed the attendance record because the MCG alone hosted over 370,000 spectators, the most ever for a cricket Test. South Africa, when they actually host any Test cricket, would need between three and four years to see as many fans through the turnstiles.

This isn’t just elite sport, it is income generation on steroids. Four soporific pitches had delivered all 60 scheduled sessions before the fifth match which is a sell-out anyway, even the fifth and final day, with reduced prices.

India doesn’t sell out its stadia for the visits of England and Australia but they do pretty well – but it doesn’t matter because the income from broadcast rights is so high. So, the ‘Big Three’ have a monopoly on the successful commercialisation of Test cricket – why not just cut the chaff and include only three other teams in the top division to fill the (small) calendar gaps between the ‘big series’? Makes financial sense.

Cricket at the highest level is refining its ability to see the cost of everything and the value of nothing. Other sports still value the participation of ‘lesser’ teams and individuals for the element of jeopardy they offer. Professional tennis wouldn’t have been much fun if the four Majors had just invited Federer, Nadal, Djokovic and Murray along with four other high-ranking players and started with quarter finals.

Test cricket may wither and die in the Caribbean inside two years anyway but, without top-level competition against the bigger nations in the WTC, the same Test fate awaits in Pakistan and Bangladesh, too. At which point the second division will cease to exist and South Africa will become immune from relegation into it. It’s current ‘exhibition’ status in Zimbabwe, Afghanistan and Ireland will dissolve.

*History is decoratively littered with examples of the mutually accepted pursuit of individual milestones and team records, a fact that makes England’s churlish reaction to India’s handshake-refusal at Old Trafford even stranger. Most professional cricketers know very little about the history of the game until their careers are almost over.

Dennis Amiss’ 100^th century is a delightful example. Amiss had come close to retiring when he was 41 but team manager, David Brown, had convinced him to play on because he could still ‘add value’ as a mentor to the younger players and because Warwickshire, the Club, wanted him to reach a century of centuries. For the Club, not just him. He had 86 at that stage and, without being disrespectful, they were a little more attainable in those days with 30 rounds of matches.

Warwickshire played Lancashire in late July 1986. Amiss reached 92* in the final moments of a game which had been going nowhere for a day. It was dark. The umpires offered the teams an exit for bad light. Amiss demurred. Lancashire captain, Clive Lloyd, declined and asked the umpires not to make the offer again. He introduced a part-time bowler while muttering, loudly, “Come on Dennis, you bloody deserve it.” Tell me you can’t see the sheepishness in his grin. But for generations of future Warwickshire players, the details were irrelevant. Dennis Amiss. A hundred hundreds. Bloody hell.

*Cricketing ‘arrogance’ is an interesting thing. When Joe Root and Zak Crawley headed straight to the crestfallen number 11, Mohammad Siraj, moments after securing the dramatic 22-run victory at Lord’s, it was empathy which came to mind. It is far easier to be gracious in victory than defeat. But it shouldn’t be so difficult to find grace in a draw, especially such a hard-fought one.

There is an ingrained arrogance in English teams which used to come from a colonial superiority syndrome – even with players from working class backgrounds – but which now comes, I suspect, partly from the reality that 25,000+ people pay ridiculous ticket prices to watch them play, regardless of how well they do or whether they give a toss about how much cricket they actually play. If they’re good or terrible, win or lose, care or don’t care, the people will come.

Same In India. The difference being the quality of facilities and the price. You pay a vast amount of money to watch a Test match in England and are rewarded with the opportunity to pay equally great sums for food and drink. And pristine toilets which are awash by 4:00pm. In India, it doesn’t matter. It’s all just basic, uncaring and unkempt. Everyone shows up anyway. The toilets are terrible and you can’t even take your own bottle of water into the ground. The ‘stewards’ hate you. In England they just begrudge you.

There’s some ‘show-pony’ in both teams. Personality and performance play a huge role, but so does the preciousness generated by a guaranteed sell-out audience. However you perform. Both teams are arrogant, but there is a common thread sown from very different backgrounds.