The Problem Of Dead Matches

One hopes that the thrill and the carnival spirit that invariably pull people towards Twenty20 and are making the World T20 in England a success, don’t camouflage some of the curious flaws in the format chosen by the ICC. South African cricketer Jacques Kallis > has already mentioned one of those, and there might be more players and fans who might now be thinking on the same lines. This is because three of the last four first round games turned out to be ‘dead matches’.

Ireland vs India, West Indies vs Sri Lanka and New Zealand vs South Africa were all games involving already qualified teams, and had absolutely nothing at stake. The groups that these teams were going to be slotted in for the second round had already been decided, since they were determined not by first round performances but by pre-tournament seedings. What we saw, as a result, were matches lacking that extra zing and players gamely willing to accept their fates at the end of the day, win or lose. That fine competitive edge was all but gone and there was more than just the odd smile. The constant reward-threat equation that defines the pressure and the challenge of the biggest stage in any sport was ridiculed. What organizational crime could be worse?

A world cup, whatever the sport, is meant to be an occasion that represents the highest possible level of challenge for the teams involved. At every stage, obstacles must be overcome and barriers must be broken for eventual success. The pressure is relentless and it is meant to be that way. That is what brings out heroes. Yet, if you have a system where two teams going ahead are actually playing a game, the outcome of which has no meaning, it might as well be a charity match. Or a dead rubber in a bilateral series.

The problem at the bottom of it all is that the ICC has, willingly or thoughtlessly, mis-understood the whole idea of a seeding system. > Seeds are either given to ensure that certain top players/teams don’t clash with each other in the early stages of an out-and-out knockout tournament (like a grand slam in tennis), or that the top teams are kept apart in the first round of a round robin format. They can’t be carried all the way through at the expense of first round or group stage performances. That is absurd because as we are seeing now, teams don’t need to be concerned whether they finish first or second in the group, as long as they qualify. Dead matches inevitably follow. Ironical, though, that one should be talking of dead matches in a tournament that is at the pinnacle of a game buzzing with life.

After the not so small matter of Australia being knocked out of a ‘group of death’ and Ireland making it to the super-eight after tussling it out with lowly Bangladesh, the administrators of the game have a lot to correct for the next edition of the T20 world cup. Whether they will, however, is something that no one will really want to lay a prediction on. The ICC has been stubborn and illogical about too many things in the past to inspire much confidence now.