Former Australian skipper Steve Waugh has urged the young batters to play Test cricket if they want to find out how good they are at cricket. Waugh highlighted the art of getting ugly runs in the pristine form of the game is in a endangered territory.
The former Aussie captain said the players are currently preferring T20 cricket because of more money in the shortest format of the game. The game has drastically changed in the last decade and the batters have adopted a more aggressive approach.
“The art of getting through tough situations and working hard to get ugly runs – I think that doesn’t happen very often anymore,” Waugh told The Telegraph. “Obviously T20’s all about hitting fours and sixes.
“Test cricket, sometimes you’ve got to just dig in and be prepared to play three or four maidens and look ugly to get runs. So that goes against the grain, and maybe that’s something that has been lost a bit, and you need to learn how to do that again,” he added.
Waugh added that the players are forced to make a hard choice between choosing career between T20 and Test format.
“Everybody’s got to be aware and concerned. T20 is where the money is, and players make a living. For them, it’s not a hard choice: make a lot of money in a short period of time, or be prepared to expose yourself in Test cricket and not make as much money.
“If you want to find out how good you are at cricket, play Test cricket. If you want to look after your family and make a lot of money, play T20. So I don’t blame anyone for any decision they make, but we’ve got to ensure that Test-match cricket is still played.”
The 1999 World Cup-winning captain wants the same pay bracket for all Test cricketers at the top level, irrespective of their country.
“If you want guys to play Test-match cricket, make it a universal pay packet. So a guy playing a Test in Sri Lanka or Bangladesh gets the same money as an Indian or Australian player playing a Test match.
“You’ve got to create windows for Test-match cricket – that’s not easy to do. That takes a bit of skill to manage,” he concluded.
