Ya...hoooo

I'm still not quite sure about Twenty20 cricket. Like most spectator sports it's great fun if you are winning, but over the next few days England must face the first and second favourites (South Africa and India) consecutively and that will probably be the end of it for the flag of St George. But you never know, miracles have happened, we did win the war, Gordon Brown is still Prime Minister.

Twenty20 cricket is a bit different. Test matches tend not to have dancers whirling about every time a boundary is hit, nor do they have their own Facebook pages. As someone who used to boast marketing skills I'm rather out of my depth with the sophisticed sponsorship marketing which comes complete with "jingle" promotion (that's the cry of "Ya...hooooo" that rings out for every change of batsman or bowler), the use of the scoreboard as a near-perpetual advertising medium, the carefully angled type that creates a 3-D effect out of the slogans imprinted on the hallowed turf.

Technically the new form of the game is demanding, particularly for the bowlers. Field placing also becomes absolutely critical. Although we all delight in great cow shots soaring into (or over) the spectators, there is still enjoyment to be had from watching Bopara-like run-stealing (one or two from just about every ball apart from those that reach the boundary).

I'm still waiting for a golden over (the single over 'eliminator' used to determine a result in the event of tied scores after the twenty overs), or for an umpire to impose a 5-run penalty for time-wasting. With a restriction that an incoming batsman has to be at the crease and ready to face a ball within ninety seconds of the fall of the previous wicket I'm sure that if I was to play in a Twenty20 match then with my slow, perambulating gait I would be the first incoming batsman ever to be fined penalty five runs for failure to reach the crease in time.