What Cricket Can Learn From Tennis?

So the Australian Open finished off with the results I had predicted in this post. Masha, aka, Maria Sharapova sailed through to the trophy. As I said, nobody in the tournament weiled the kind of power she did, and on the men’s side, Djoker, aka, Novak Djokovic, got the better of suprise finalist Tsonga. We had been pretty much hooked to the tournament, so much so that we missed out on a lot of cricket. With the Commenwealth Bank Series on, we’re back to bats and balls.

Anyway, lots of things happened during the Border-Gavaskar Series, and some of it wasn’t pleasant. And it lead me to compare a few aspects of our favorite game to tennis. There are quite a few things ICC, the various local cricket authorities, and the players can learn from racquets and balls.

* Off-season: We’re a big fan of this one. There was next to no tennis in November and December. This time of the year is off-season for the game. After the US Open, the number of tournaments declines sharply and by the time it’s November, the tennis world is alreading on vocation. The tennis season, after this temporary halt, unofficially kicks off in January with the tournaments building up to the Australian Open. The players and viewers get back to the game with revived enthusiasm. Cricket is played all the year round with no break in between. There are obvious downsides to this, but they deserve a post of their own.

*Mutual Respect: Respect for opponents is something that has been missing in the game recently. Everyone saw what happened between Harbhajan Singh and Andrew Symonds, how Ricky Ponting and other players on the Australian side took to swords. That was the on-field story, but the trend of psychological war of words off the field is worth a mention, too. There is nothing seriously wrong with trying to bring down the morale of the opponent, but look at the tennis players. At pre-match conferences, they’re not telling us why their opponents suck or why they have an edge over them, but why that opponent will be difficult to win over. There’s a sense of respect for the opponents, both on and off the court.

* Women are powerful: Tennis’s popularity today is largely due to the women’s tennis. What if women’s cricket was given equal importance as the men’s cricket? First off, it would encourage women to take it up as a career, and second, it would help the game get female readership. You can’t match the glamour of miniskirts and spaghetti tops with trousers and half-sleeved tee-shirts, but women’s cricket is worth giving a try. The most popular and rich sports have all progressive women’s circuits as well– golf and football being two examples.

* Integrative training: Cricket is both physically and mentally exhausting. Shaun Tait proves that. Besides the usual training, there should be some yoga, pilates, etc. Ingtegrative training is big in tennis. Maria Sharapova spends two hours after every match with her trainer who does acupressure and allied stuff.

Obviously, there are lots of things tennis can learn from cricket, but that’s outside the scope of this talk.

Fan Question: What other sports do you think cricket can learn from?