Nelson's Column: The beginning of the end?

Should we be terrified or excited by the IPL which kicks off today when the wonderfully-named Bangalore Royal Challenge collide with the Kolkata Knight Riders?

The money-drenched frenzy of slogging represents the biggest threat to the traditionalists since Kerry Packer's World Series. Mind you, merely changing the carpet colour is a seismic shift for many cricketing establishments.

The IPL will undoubtedly alter the landscape. The ICC's relentless, energy-sapping Future Tours Programme will have to be adapted to accommodate the stars. If this seems like a positive, the thought that Test and ODI cricket could be marginalised as top players seek easy riches rather than tough runs is, quite blatantly, not.

What IPL supremo Lalit Modi does with the absurdly lucrative rewards is another concern. The BCCI is already, in many people's eyes, far too big for its boots. A few billion more rupees could easily turn the monolith into a law unto itself.

However, the new league is undoubtedly an intoxicating prospect; the world's greatest players performing in front of throbbing stands of Indian fans with an insatiable appetite for the quick-fire forms of cricket. It cannot and will not simply go away. The concept has to be embraced to a certain extent, but administrators must forcefully guard against any degradation of Test cricket.

What are your views on the IPL? Will it destroy Test cricket? Is cricket becoming more and more like football? Have you lost faith in the game? Send in your thoughts using the boxes below.

Comments

[mad mitch]

And so the dumbing down of cricket continues - all for money and phoney razzamatazz. No doubt the gravey train will come hurtling off the tracks when the dash for cash leads to match-fixing, betting scandals et al. As the old saying goes, it's just not cricket.

[Bert]

I for one am very worried: cricket sets itself apart from other sports by the fact that people play cricket not for money, but for enjoyment. If things like the IPL start paying cricket players hundreds and hundreds of thousands of pounds to play, how long until players can't be bothered with tests and ODIs? How long before we get prima donnas, like footballers who don't care about the noble game that is cricket? Worrying times, worrying times.

Keep cricket noble: don't start pumping stupid amounts of money into it, I say!