New Delhi: Test cricket - a venerated sage residing in a 'white' sanctum, somewhat re-sanctified with India reaching its zenith. And much like Zorba the Greek, it has given up a bookish life in the last quarter-century, adopted a boisterous approach and kept sailing - unaltered, untouched - amid Tsunamic changes in the game.
It may not keep pace with the following its 'express' offspring enjoy, but 134 years after the first Test match in 1877, the game waits to celebrate the 2000th - having evolved, not changed, with the times.
The first 1000 matches of the game's pristine form were spaced across 107 years but the next 1000 mushroomed in just 27! A phenomenal progress but one which looks miniscule in comparison to a storm of over 2500-odd one-day internationals (ODIs) played during the same timeframe.
Test cricket, more or less, has remained untouched since its dawn, so much so that it took administrators a century to hardbound it into a five-day format. It's a different story that those in the board rooms are now more concerned about managing money than the game that earns it for them – a fact that has its roots in the advent of Twenty20....
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07:48 AM, Feb 13, 2008
