Legendary player Javed Miandad, said that the game of cricket is losing its charm for over a decade because of commercialisation of the game and the T20 cricket boom.
"When we played cricket, the bowlers used to have great firepower because the laws and the pitches didn't restricted them then. Now the pitches are flat and laws, like a bowler can't bowl more than one bouncer in an over, helps batsmen greatly. These are due to commercialisation of cricket in order to promote cricket, full of boundaries, which is actually not cricket," Miandad said.
The former star who has scored 8,832 Test and 7381 ODI runs, pointed out that now a team could score around 200 runs in only 20 overs and the same could also get bundled out for 150 runs in unlimited overs (Test) matches. "T20 will destroy Test cricket as players are inclining towards T20s since they get easy money out of it. But cricket is a temperamental game and the players should be tuned to excel in Test and ODIs as well," he added. "Anybody could play T20 matches. You only need to hit the ball," he said. He said that the interest of general fan follow of cricket is gradually diminishing because there is little charm left in the game.
"People cherished a cover drive from a certain batsman and some other shot from other player. But now the game only left to hit hard without any beauty. Today such a player, who could not even properly stop a bowl, becomes a star. Cricket was a game of gentleman, not a game of only hitting the ball harder," he added. He added that the game needs attention and the people running the affairs of the game should look into the matter and make it interesting as it had been in the past.