Umran Malik and Rashid Khan have more in common than at first apparent

In general, sport values utility above artistry, and efficiency over creativity so we ought not to b

In general, sport values utility above artistry, and efficiency over creativity so we ought not to be asking if the age of the artist has ended in cricket.

The IPL raised that question afresh, a question that is its own answer (if you have to ask…). There was a cookie-cutter quality to the batting, a sameness to the bowling (the differences being only in degree) that threatens sport with its greatest enemy: homogeneity.

This is not unique to the IPL, but the format does encourage a depressing uniformity. You watch a large number of matches in a short span of time, so the apparently memorable quickly slips into the commonplace, making recall difficult. When you see 1062 sixes packed together in a tournament (as happened this year), the effort can lose some of its allure.

To borrow from what the musician T.M. Krishna said in another context, T20 with its emphasis on continuous excitement lacks a period of necessary inactivity to both understand and appreciate the sport.

Batsmen move their front foot away from the line of the ball and swing for the rafters, then repeat themselves. Repetition is the death of variety. T20 cricket rearranges a fundamental notion of the game: here, winning is everything.

Elegance, style, artistry — elements on which the sport prides itself — are secondary if they exist at all. The odd pull shot by Shubhman Gill, a cover drive by Rohit Sharma, an on-drive by K.L. Rahul all remind us that cricket is a game of great possibilities, and equally, that these possibilities are not always profitable to a team setting a target or chasing one.

It is true that the crude can also be artistic, and beauty in any case is in the eye of the beholder. Still, there is something about a Sourav Ganguly cover drive or the overall batting of a David Gower that elevates sport from mere competition to something artistic in most people’s minds, and there is no reason why sport should not aspire to that state.