Cricket is a unique sport as it is as much a game of skill as emotions. With the advent of different T20 leagues all over the world, the game has become that much richer with players taking home millions of dollars which otherwise would have been impossible for a newbie. Despite being a boon for players all over the world, T20 has impacted the purest form of the game ­­– Test cricket.

Test cricket is a different beast to conquer and requires as much mental strength as your skill to negotiate long hours at the crease. With short boundaries and flat tracks, there is every possibility that a batsman gets away in T20 cricket and their technical deficiencies are not exposed. Not so in Test cricket. The quality of batsmanship is no longer as good as it used to be with players playing at balls they should be leaving in Test cricket. The art of leaving in Test cricket is almost as good as a scoring shot and there are hardly any players, except a few off course, who can see off a good spell without going after a bowler who is hitting the right lengths.

A good Test cricketer will be successful in all three forms of the game and not the other way round. With so much of limited overs cricket being played all around the globe, the bowlers as well struggle to hit the right areas in Test matches and forget the basics. Bowlers these days try too many things like the slower bouncer, different slower deliveries, wide yorkers. The great Michael Holding only had two variations. One was a fast and the other was even faster.

You don’t get a McGrath or a Tendulkar by just trading your skills in T20 cricket.

The performance of the national team in any part of the world is determined by the kind of domestic structure they have in place. The stronger the domestic structure, the better will be the talent pool. The advent of different leagues in India will only go on to strengthen the domestic structure, thus ensuring that there is no shortage of talent in any sphere of sports in the country.

 I would strongly put my weight behind the leagues that are operational at the moment in the country.  Simply because, it gives an opportunity to the younger generation to showcase their talent and rub shoulders with some of the greats in the game. Good company can cultivate good qualities and you learn to enhance your skills and understand what is required to succeed at the highest level.

A couple of decades ago, there were not as many leagues, let alone the money that comes with it these days. With such leagues in place, it also gives a sense of financial security to the ones planning to make a career out of sports. Not everyone in the country can be a Sunil Chhetri or a Virat Kohli and the ones who don’t make it as big will not just fizzle away in poverty, thus encouraging more people to seriously think of sports as a career option.

With some of the leagues doing really well, it will get more sponsors, more eyeballs and there will be a sense of buzz around that sport that will do wonders to the popularity of that sport along with more money being pumped in to improve the performance, talent and infrastructure. PKL is a great example.

Rome was not built in a day and therefore we should persist with such leagues and be patient. Results will come.

This is an example post, originally published as part of Blogging University. Enroll in one of our ten programs, and start your blog right.

You’re going to publish a post today. Don’t worry about how your blog looks. Don’t worry if you haven’t given it a name yet, or you’re feeling overwhelmed. Just click the “New Post” button, and tell us why you’re here.

Why do this?

• Because it gives new readers context. What are you about? Why should they read your blog?
• Because it will help you focus you own ideas about your blog and what you’d like to do with it.

The post can be short or long, a personal intro to your life or a bloggy mission statement, a manifesto for the future or a simple outline of your the types of things you hope to publish.

To help you get started, here are a few questions:

• Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?
• What topics do you think you’ll write about?
• Who would you love to connect with via your blog?
• If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?

You’re not locked into any of this; one of the wonderful things about blogs is how they constantly evolve as we learn, grow, and interact with one another — but it’s good to know where and why you started, and articulating your goals may just give you a few other post ideas.

Can’t think how to get started? Just write the first thing that pops into your head. Anne Lamott, author of a book on writing we love, says that you need to give yourself permission to write a “crappy first draft”. Anne makes a great point — just start writing, and worry about editing it later.

When you’re ready to publish, give your post three to five tags that describe your blog’s focus — writing, photography, fiction, parenting, food, cars, movies, sports, whatever. These tags will help others who care about your topics find you in the Reader. Make sure one of the tags is “zerotohero,” so other new bloggers can find you, too.