Tony Becca

THE IPL, the Indian Premier League, got under way in the Chinnaswami Stadium in Bangalore, India, last night.

After a glittering opening ceremony which included a fireworks display and the cheerleaders of the Washington Redskins football team, there was one question on the lips of all those involved in the game around the world.

The question was this: is the IPL, a Twenty20 version of cricket, good or bad for the game?

According to some, it is bad for the game. It is bad for the game for the simple reason that, based on the amount of money being paid to the players, it could destroy Test cricket - the five-day version of the game which, to many, and especially so those who play the game, is the heart of the game, the real test of one's skill.

With players participating in the IPL being paid up to US$1.5 million to play in a tournament which is scheduled to last for 44 days, and with those playing Test cricket getting, in some cases, US$60,000 for a Test series of five matches and a few other games, there is no question that that is a possibility.

And it is a possibility that the IPL can destroy Test cricket for one simple reason.

Clashes

As things now stand, there will always be clashes between Test cricket and the IPL and between first-class cricket and the IPL. With the IPL talking about a another tournament to make it two in a year, there will be more clashes, and the fact is that, despite some of the players saying they would prefer to play Test cricket because of the challenges it offers, if a choice has to be made, the players, a vast majority of them, would choose to play in the IPL.

There is no question about that.

That, however, does not mean that it should be one or the other. It can be both, and with Test cricket being the pinnacle of the game - the platform on which the best of the game is paraded, and with the IPL providing entertainment and serving as the magnet which attracts spectators. With the IPL offering a substantial amount of money to the players, it should be both, and it can be both.

In order for it to be both, however, the ICC, the International Cricket Council, needs to sit down, to look at what is happening around it and, in the interest of the game, in the interest of the players, it needs to fall in line.

And although it will not be easy, it is something the ICC has to do.

The first thing the ICC needs to do is to look at its Future Tours Programme (FTP) and, as the West Indies had suggested long ago, during the discussion stages and before it became a law, get rid of it.

Although India, with 70 per cent of the world's cricket income and 80 per cent of the world's attendance, has never bothered to burden itself by hosting Bangladesh, the FTP insisted, for example, that strong teams, traditionally strong teams, that is, hosted weak teams. It also insisted that teams play each other at regular intervals, that home teams kept the bulk of receipts a Test series, and while that helped teams like Australia, England, South Africa and India, it hurt the West Indies.

Because of the region's small population, because of the small take at the gate and its limited revenue from television, because of hosting weak and unattractive teams like Bangladesh and Zimbabwe, it destroyed the finances of the West Indies who, because of the FTP, had to host these teams, lost plenty money at home, could no longer bargain with their hosts and therefore got less from tours overseas.

Worthy teams

In looking at the FTP, the ICC should decide which teams are worthy of playing a five-match Test series and which should play only three matches. It should return to its previous system where teams organise matches against each other with visiting teams bargaining for a fee. It should get the Test-playing countries, and especially so the West Indies, to plan their domestic first-class season properly and in a specific time frame, and then it should set a timetable - a time when Test matches and one-day matches would be played, a time when first-class domestic cricket would be played and a time when the IPL or any other Twenty20 tournaments would be played.

Although the ICC is not FIFA, in order to protect professional football, club football, around the world, something like that is done in football and there is no reason why it cannot be done in cricket.

In doing that, however, the ICC should pass a law that a percentage of the fee paid by the IPL to a player should go to the player's Test team, with a percentage of that going to his domestic first-class team, and a percentage of that, however small it may be, going to his club.

Test cricket will never die, but if cricket does not find a window for something like the IPL, if the cricketer who plays in the IPL has to make a choice, if the IPL continues to find so much money to pay the players, instead of being the platform for the best, Test cricket, God forbid, shortly will be nothing but a feeding ground for the IPL.