CHENNAI: 32 matches. 683 fours. 357 sixes. A total of 4,874 out of the 8,867 runs that were scored. A hit over or across the boundary in nearly every seventh ball. All that was witnessed during last year’s Tamil Nadu Premier League (TNPL), which happened in July and August.
Fast forward to January. 19 matches. 542 fours. 80 sixes. A total of 2,168 from the 6,217 runs that were scored. A boundary after nearly every two-and-a-half overs. The event this time is the VA Parthasarathy Memorial tournament.
Go forward a few more days. The event changes to the Vijay Hazare Trophy, one that defending champions Tamil Nadu have crashed out of, with only one win to show. Five matches. 86 fours. 15 sixes. 434 out of a total of 1,199 runs. Again, a boundary after nearly every two-and-a-half overs.
The evident subtext of the aforementioned statistics? Despite a league designed to winnow out power-hitters, batsmen’s ability to hit the NOS button seems to fade away during a league that has earned praise for its robust structure and disappears when the time comes for them to step up in the 50-over format. “Over the past few years, Tamil Nadu seems to be missing out on impact players in Vijay Hazare, barring Dinesh Karthik,” remarked former India all-rounder Sridharan Sriram, who has also seen his fair share of league-level outings with the Globe Trotters.
“Our Andhra match (which TN lost by 29 runs, and no double-digit scorer apart from Jagatheesan Kousik had a strike-rate of more than 100) was an example. A power-hitter might have tilted the match in our favour.”
There’s no disputing the fact that Chennai’s cricketing league has earned accolades, courtesy the way it has functioned over the years, parsing talent onto the domestic stage for Tamil Nadu. One argument that might connect this problem could be that there is perhaps a palpable emphasis that the latter places on the longer format, be it either in terms of match-time or performance assessment. The likes of Abhinav Mukund and Baba Aparajith have often been Tamil Nadu’s vanguards in the Ranji Trophy. But that purple patch seems to desert their side the moment the number of days goes down to one.
Countering that notion, though, Sriram believes that time is perhaps the only band-aid. “The local league has all the bases covered format-wise. There are guys like (Narayan) Jagadeesan, and they need more experience to mature into power-hitters..”
rahulravi@newindianexpress.com