So the English County Championship shivers into existence once again today and hoorah for that, but with the Indian Premier League also due to start on Friday and now casting a long and increasingly looming shadow, this could very well be the end of the current game as we know it.
Not that that is necessarily a bad thing. While we may have given the impression in the past that we considered the IPL a massive threat to the game with headlines like The Indian Premier League ...of Evil and satiric slogans such as 'one in the nuts for cricket', our primary spurting concern was more for the hallowed sanctity of the Test arena, which all must acknowledge as the ultimate form of the game.
We also predicted money would eventually talk and it seems it has, with both the ECB and England skipper Michael Vaughan bowing to what seems like the inevitable and conceding that England players will eventually play in the IPL. However the IPL chairman, IS Bindra, to his credit, has made an attempt at rapprochement and it seems a compromise in the grand tradition is on the cards.
Twenty20 is certainly the future, in terms of crowds, revenue, convenience for TV and it has to be said sheer excitement, but boards, players and cricket lovers (arguably the true custodians of the game) around the world just have to ensure that 'TwennyTwenny' and Test cricket can co-exist without the former ever damaging the integrity of the latter.
That could lead to the brightest future of all.
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