by For me, Test cricket will always come first. For me, Test cricket will always come first. Test cricket – for me – will always be at the top. The more you say it, the more true it becomes. That’s how it works. Try it for yourself. For me, Test cricket will always come first. For me, Windows XP is always the operating system of choice. For me, the territorial status of Ukraine will always be “non-invasion”. For me, the mullet will always be in fashion.
This is a safe space, after all: a space that is deteriorating and under siege, but a safe space all the same. Here you can whisper your wishes into the conch, and you’ll get only likes, warming affirmations and sage nods in return. Reality doesn’t have to get in the way of your Immaculate vision. You’ll never be challenged or asked to show your work, or asked to explain exactly how you’re going to prioritize a long-running, commercially stunted sports format in the clutches of a ravenous and profitable alternative. If you are pressed for details, you can simply declare that “the game administrators need to do more”, and again no one seriously disagrees with you.
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Test cricket will always be at the top. Everyone says this, all the time, to the point where it becomes a form of wish fulfillment in itself: empty invocation masquerading as meaningful activism. You see it in the surreal nonsense-trolling of Cricket South Africa in its assertion that “CSA has the greatest respect for the Test format as the pinnacle of the game”, in a statement explaining why it is taking a third-string side to play its Test series in New Zealand. But you see it most prominently after a great Test match, like the ones that ended in Brisbane and Hyderabad on Sunday.
These days come around often: days of relief and hope, days of unimaginable tension and entertainment, days when the fates align and for a few hours in the sunlight it feels like everything will be okay. Super bowler Shamar Joseph insists after taking seven wickets against Australia that he will always be available to play for the West Indies, regardless of the wage ticket available, and will heave a sigh of relief at everyone. Even the batting captain Pat Cummins declares – with magnanimity bordering on sacrilege – “as a Test match cricket fan, there’s a part of me that was happy”.
And of course these moments must be treasured, nurtured and celebrated. The West Indies’ victory was their first on Australian soil since 1997, a display of skill and character and strained nerves that highlighted their relative inexperience in the format. But there should also be a certain anger here, a certain disappointment too, that an achievement like this should have become so unlikely. This team should have overcome such formidable odds in the first place: a lack of key players, a hasty two-Test series, a financial model fundamentally designed to keep them subject to the big league franchises and the tables. that runs. with them.
It will certainly be difficult for Kraigg Brathwaite and his team to build on their momentum in the short term, given that their next assignment – and their only three-match series in the current World Cup cycle – is not at Lord’s in July. Meanwhile many of their best players will be playing short-form cricket only – including Joseph, who now joins Dubai Capitals in the T20 International League before joining Peshawar Zalmi in the Pakistan Super League. Different skills, different dressing rooms, different type of exercise and conditioning. Still, the highlight is Test cricket, so none of that is likely to matter much.
Of course, this is just cricket’s market economy at work, a point often missed by the many commentators and observers whose treatment of teams like the West Indies veer between mockery and condescension. Their absent players are often described as mercenaries who lack the pride or passion to represent their country. The players who take the field are feared as incompetent weights who don’t deserve the shirt. The last time the West Indies toured Australia former Test batsman Rob Quiney thought they were “not trying hard enough” and “looked a bit calm”. And to be fair, Quiney looked like he was trying very hard when he scored his ninth try in three goals.
When they do win, on the other hand, they wear bromides and patches on their heads: their achievement has been repackaged as a victory for the sport itself, rather than for one team rather than the appalling inequity of that sport. In part you wonder if this is because those in charge of cricket are happy to celebrate these moments as one-offs, the glorious exception that somehow proves the rule. It’s certainly a lot easier than – say – challenging Cricket Australia why they’ve had no trouble with a Test match in the Caribbean since 2015.
Years of administrative neglect will only be over the years. Creating an economy that works for everyone will require careful advocacy by fans and the media, organized pressure on national boards and franchise owners, support for the game’s smaller nations rather than a pile-on every time they get gutted. Alternatively, we can continue to tell ourselves that Test cricket is the pinnacle. Test cricket will always be at the top. The trouble is over time, the more you repeat something, the more absurd it starts to sound.
