For me, Test cricket will always be the pinnacle. For me, Test cricket will always be the pinnacle. Test cricket will always be the pinnacle for me. The more you say it, the more true it becomes. Here’s how it works. Try it yourself. For me, Test cricket will always be the pinnacle. For me, Windows XP will always be the operating system of choice. For me, Ukraine’s territorial status will always be “unoccupied”. For me, the mullet will always be in fashion.
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After all, this is a safe space: a shrinking and encircled space, but a safe space nonetheless. Here you can whisper your wishes to the seashell and get nothing but likes, warm approvals and sage nods in return. Reality never needs to affect your perfect vision. You will never be challenged, asked to show off your work, or asked to explain exactly how you will preserve the primacy of a long-running and commercially crippled sports format in the jaws of a greedy and lucrative alternative. If you get bogged down in the details, you can say “gamemasters need to do more” and still no one will seriously disagree with you.
Test cricket will always be at its peak. Everyone says it all the time, until it becomes a form of wish fulfillment in itself: empty prayer disguised as meaningful activism. You see this in Cricket South Africa’s surreal ridiculous trolling claiming that “CSA has the utmost respect for the Test format as the pinnacle of the game”, a statement explaining why it sent a third-tier side to play. Test series in New Zealand. But you see it most clearly after a great Test match that concluded on Sunday in Brisbane and Hyderabad.
These days still occur frequently: days of vindication and hope, days of tension and unimaginable fun, days when destinies align and the feeling that everything will be okay for a few sunny hours. After his match-winning, injury-defying seven-wicket haul against Australia, the remarkable Shamar Joseph declared that he would always be ready to play for the West Indies, regardless of the salary on offer, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief. Even the defeated captain, Pat Cummins, says – with magnanimity that borders on sacrilege – that “as a Test match cricket fan, there is a part of me that is happy.”
And of course, these moments need to be treasured, valued and celebrated. The West Indies’ eight-run win was their first on Australian soil since 1997; it was a performance of skill, character and courage under pressure that belied their relative inexperience in the format. But there must also be a certain anger here, a certain dismay that such success has become so improbable. This team had to overcome such tough challenges in the first place: the absence of key players, a hurried series of two-Test series, a financial model designed to keep them tied to major franchise leagues and boards. to them.
It will certainly be difficult for Kraigg Brathwaite and his side to build momentum in the short term, given their next assignment (and their only three-game series in the current World Championship cycle) won’t be until Lord’s in July. Meanwhile, most of their best players will only play short-form cricket – including Joseph, who is heading to Dubai Capitals in the International T20 League before joining Peshawar Zalmi in the Pakistan Super League. Different skills, different dressing rooms, different type of fitness and conditioning. Test cricket is at its peak, though, so none of this will probably matter much.
Of course, this is just the workings of cricket’s market economy; A point often overlooked by many pundits and observers, whose treatment of teams like the West Indies oscillates between ridicule and disdain. Their missing players are always described as mercenaries who lack the pride or passion to represent their country. The players who take the field are belittled as incompetents who are not worthy of the jersey. When the West Indies last visited Australia, former Test batsman Rob Quiney thought they “didn’t try hard enough” and “looked a bit comfortable”. And to be fair, Quiney did look like he was trying hard as he scored nine Test runs in three innings.
When they win, on the other hand, they are pelted with bromine and smacked on the head: Their success is repackaged as a victory for the sport itself, not as a victory for one team over the terrible injustice of that sport. You wonder if this is partly because those in charge of cricket are happy to celebrate these moments as a one-off, feel-good exception; This is a wonderful exception that somehow keeps the rule. Of course, this is much easier than challenging Cricket Australia, for example, when they say they haven’t bothered to play a Test match in the Caribbean since 2015.
Decades of administrative negligence will only disappear after decades. Creating an economy that works for everyone will require careful advocacy from fans and the media, organized pressure on national boards and franchise owners, supporting the game’s smaller nations rather than piling on each other as they roll with each inning. Alternatively, we can continue to tell ourselves that Test cricket is the pinnacle. Test cricket will always be at its peak. The problem goes away over time; The more you repeat something, the more ridiculous it becomes.