A Complete Overview of T20 Cricket

Don’t you think life is quite boring after the Indian Premier League (IPL) came to an end this summer? The boredom was exaggerated as we saw the Indian cricket team losing its World Test Championship final against Australia, in a one-sided defeat.

But let’s be honest, who among us sat in front of our screens to watch overs and overs of bowling getting defended for no runs by batsmen? We just checked the score once in a while on our phones and posted those exaggerated posts about the match on social media. No one has the time to sit and watch a full match of five days in this ever-growing world. Whereas the Indian Premier League (IPL) showed a completely different scenario with viewership reaching crores.

What is the reason for this discrepancy? You get it right, the T20 match is packed with more thrilling entertainment in a limited amount of time as compared to a five-day test match, which the audience of today’s era wants.

We all get curious about how this new format of the game suddenly got such high popularity around the world. For those curious inside you, we thought of bringing a complete overview of this shorter format of T20 cricket.

Starting with the origin of the T20 match format to the ultimate World Cup of T20 cricket, we have tried our best to cover everything in one blog.

Without wasting any further time, let’s look  into the origin of T20 cricket.

The Origin of T20 Cricket 

The first international T20 cricket match was played in August of 2004, but the origin of the T20 format of cricket lies far before 2004. To understand the origin of T20 cricket, first, we need to understand why the need for a shorter format developed.

The Decline of Cricket Viewership:

The early twenty-first century started with a decline in the viewership of cricket all over the world. It was turning out to be just another game mainly because the amount of time people can manage to give to leisure activities drastically dropped due to the globalisation of industries all over the world. This resulted in people backing off from slow games with less entertainment. As the viewership started declining, it started getting tough to find sponsors for different cricketing events and teams. The need for new shorter formats of the game was peaking to keep the game alive worldwide..

The Idea 

Martin Crowe, a New Zealand cricketer, was the person who invented the idea of playing a shorter format of the game with 20 overs for both teams for bowling and batting, but the idea wasn’t adored by large cricket boards till 2001. The England cricket board was the first board that took the idea seriously in order to regain the declining viewership and sponsorship. The marketing team of the England cricket board proposed the idea of Martin Crowe to the board members, which the board adopted later in the county cricket games of 2002. The county T20 cup of England in 2002 gained immediate attention of cricket lovers, and the season was a success.

Business in Making 

The news of a new format played in England spread like a wildfire, and within a few years, all the cricket boards in the world adopted the format in their local county matches and leagues. With the game gaining popularity with its fast-paced nature and nail-biting thrilling matches, it gained the attention of billionaires who suspected the possibility of making a business out of the sport with leagues of their own. Between 2002 and 2007, almost all the cricket boards of the world, with some billionaires, started their own national leagues, which led to enormous popularity of the game all over the world. ICC started to think about organising a World Cup tournament in the T20 match format, and as a result, the first-ever T20 World Cup was played in 2007.

Match Format and Rules 

 A T20 match is played between two teams in which both the teams get twenty overs to bowl and twenty overs to bat. The basic rules of the game are the same as a typical One-Day International or Test match, but due to its shorter nature, it has some unique rules which are confined to T20 cricket only. We have covered the rules of cricket in our previous blog post from the basics. Today, we are limiting our discussion to this newer version with rules made just for the T20 cricket era. Without wasting any further time, let’s just get into the T20 rules.

Rules 

The format of the game as we have discussed above comprises 120 balls for batting for both the teams with the team scoring more runs declared as winner.

Now due to the limited overs format, some new rules were made according to the format. They are:

Powerplay Restrictions 

The batting powerplay was restricted to initial overs and the last four overs  as compared to initial 10 overs and last 10 overs in one-day internationals.

In powerplay the bowling team can place only two fielders outside the 30-yard circle.The remaining nine players all should field from the inside of the 30-yard circle.

Even after the powerplay,a maximum of 5 players can be placed outside the 30-yard circle to field.

As the batting team has advantage in the powerplay, the team tries to gain as many runs as possible and hence the viewers get the chance to see spectacular shots.

Read More: ODI World Cup 2023 Schedule: Excitement Builds as ICC Reveals Fixtures

Over-time Rule

There is another rule known as the overtime rule. The fielding team is restricted to start off their last over before 75 minutes since the start of the innings. If they failed to do so then 6 runs per over for each over bowled after 75 minutes is awarded to the batting side.

Sometimes the batsman from the batting team kills some of these 75 minutes in their milestone celebration or over the dismissal and the umpire has the right to take decision on whether the bowling team needs to be fined or not even after 75 minutes.

The 90 Second Rule 

Why should all time-limiting rules apply to the bowling side only?

Here is one rule for the batting side.

When the next batsman after the dismissal of an in-field batsman is unable to come inside the field within 90 seconds then they are dismissed without even playing for the team.

T20 Leagues 

Discussion of T20 matches is incomplete without discussing the Indian Premier League in it.

Not just the Indian Premier league we have gathered leagues from all around the world that are played with enormous amounts of following.

Let’s see some of the most popular T20 match leagues in the world

Indian Premier League [IPL]

Number one on the list unmatchable by any other league in the world is our Indian Premier league.

It is the largest T20 cricket league in the world with players from all over the world and followers uncountable.

History

After the successful completion of ICC World Cup in 2007 with the first ever title going into the hands of the Indian cricket team, BCCI saw huge potential in the T20 cricket format as fans were going crazy by the suspenseful drama of the 2007 T20 world Cup win.

An earlier attempt for creating a league in T20 format was made by the Zee entertainment of which the BCCI was not very fond of and the BCCI imposed a ban for a lifetime on players participating in this T20 cricket league.

But the irony is that within one year in September  2007 BCCI announced the first ever Indian Premier league event with a format similar to the British English premier league.

First season of which started in April 2008 with a huge amount of money put into it.

At the opening ceremony Lalit Modi the then vice president of BCCI announced the rules, the prize money for the winning teams and the compositions of each team.

Read More: Ashes ENG VS AUS: The Battle For Supremacy

IPL the Brand 

From the 40 crores bid from 2008 to 335 crores in 2023 clearly the brand value of IPL has outshone any other cricketing league of the world.

And this is not all, broadcasting networks are giving hundreds of billions of rupees to gain broadcasting rights for this T20 league because of its enormous popularity.

Teams 

Total of 16 seasons has been played till 2023 of this T20 league. Mostly the teams playing different seasons remain the same but sometimes some of these get defunctioned and in place of them new teams come. 

Currently the teams played in 2023 are :

1.Chennai super kings

2.Mumbai Indians

3.Royal Challengers Bangalore

4.Gujrat Titans 

5.Sunrisers Hyderabad

6.Punjab super kings

7.Kolkata knight riders 

8.Delhi capitals

Some of the Defunctioned teams are :

1.Deccan Chargers 

2.Kochi Tuskers 

3.Pune Warriors India 

4.Rising Pune Supergiant

5.Gujrat Lions

Prize money

Winner – 20 crore rupees

Runner ups – 13 crore rupees

Emerging player – 20 lakhs 

Most valuable player – 12 lakh 

Power player of the season – 15 lakh 

Purple cap holder – 10 lakh

Orange cap holder – 10 lakh

Catch of the season – 10 lakh 

Most boundaries in the season- 10 lakh

Longest six – 10 lakh

Striker of the season – 10 lakh

Season’s young emerging player – 10 lakh 

Winning Teams 

Winning Teams
2008	Rajasthan Royals
2009	Deccan Chargers
2010	Chennai Super Kings
2011	Chennai Super Kings
2012	Kolkata Knight Riders
2013	Mumbai Indians
2014	Kolkata Knight Riders
2015	Mumbai Indians
2016	Sunrisers Hyderabad
2017	Mumbai Indians
2018	Chennai Super Kings
2019	Mumbai Indians
2020	Mumbai Indians
2021	Chennai Super Kings
2022	Gujrat Titans
2023	Chennai Super Kings

Big Bash League 

History

The big bash league was started in 2011 by the cricket board of Australia. It was started as a replacement of the previously played league namely big bash T20.

The main difference between the two leagues was that earlier in the big bash T20 teams were made according to the states whereas in big bash league teams were made on the names of major cities of Australia.

Expansion Proposal

When the big bash T20 was going on sports authority thought of expanding the tournament with more number of teams participating in the game.

The proposal was first made in 2012 but due to poor hosting capabilities of home grounds of the newly added cities were not up to the mark, which led to the rejection of the proposal.

Later in the January 2017 head of the Big bash league added eight extra matches in the game as a soft step towards expansion.

Women’s BBL

As the popularity of women cricket grew all over the world. The Australian cricket board thought of inventing a women T20 cricket series .

Belinda Clarke one of the members of the board announced that the first ever Women’s Big bash league was going to be played in the upcoming season of 2015-16 season. The teams were going to remain the same as the men’s teams with the same jersey

The first match of WBBL was won by Sydney Thunder against the Sydney sixers. While the current season winners are the Adelaide Strikers.

Teams

Adelaide Strikers-   (1 time winner) 

Brisbane heat  – (1 time winner)

Melbourne Stars-  (No win) 

Perth scorchers- (5 times winner)

Sydney Thunder-  (1 time winner) 

Sydney sixers- (1 time winner)

Hobart hurricanes-  (No win)

Melbourne Renegades- (1 time winner)

Prize Money

Winners – 450,000 dollars 

Runner up – 260,000 dollars 

Losing semi finalists – 80,000 dollars 

Fifth position – 20,000 dollars 

Winning Teams 

SEASONS	WINNERS
2011-12	Sydney sixers
2012-13	Brisbane Heat
1013-14	Perth Scorchers
2014-15	Perth Scorchers
2015-16	Sydney Thunder
2016-17	Perth Scorchers
2017-18	Adelaide Strikers
2018-19	Melbourne Renegades
2019-20	Sydney Sixers
2020-21	Sydney Sixers
2021-22	Perth Scorchers
2022-23	Perth Scorchers

Caribbean Premier League

Another big name in the list of T20 leagues around the world is that of the Caribbean Premier league.

History

Allan Stanford, a billionaire, was interested in organising a private cricket league with players from all around the world. He chose the Caribbean for organising the event as we have seen in all parts of the world this event was also a success. He named it Stanford 20/20 but things went out of hand after completion of three seasons when he was arrested with the charge of fraud in June 2009.

Read More: Mahendra Singh Dhoni: The Journey of Captain Cool 

The West Indies Cricket board needed another T20 league to replace the Stanford 20-20 series that’s when they made their first T20 match tournament namely Caribbean Twenty20 which later on developed as the Caribbean Premier league.

Format 

The format of CPL is a little different from IPL or any other premier league. Instead of eight teams, six teams play in this T20 tournament.

Each of the teams played 10 matches in the group stage of the tournament. The whole tournament is divided into two sessions one is the group stage ,other the payoffs. Unlike from the IPL the venue of the matches remains the same for 5 continuous matches for all the six teams.

In this way all the teams get the chance to play 3 matches in hometown and the other 7 in different cities.

Teams

1.Barbados Royals

2.St Kitts and Nevis Patriots 

3.Saint Lucia Kings

4.Trinbango Knight riders 

5.Guyana Amazon Warriors

6.Jamaica Tallawahs

Price money 

Champions  – 1 million dollars 

Runner-ups  – 660,000 dollars 

3rd Place  – 250,000 dollars 

4th Place  -100,000 dollars 

Players Prize Money -150,000 dollars 

Cash Prizes (Longest Six) -5,000 dollars 

Winning Teams

SEASONS	WINNERS
2013	Jamaica Tallawahs
2014	Barbados Tridents
2015	Trinidad and Tobago
2016	Jamaica Tallawahs
2017	Trinbago Knight Riders
2018	Trinbago Knight Riders
2019	Barbados Tridents
2020	Trinbago Knight Riders
2021	St Kitts and Nevis Patriots
2022	Jamaica Tallawahs

Other T20 leagues

Some other T20 leagues played all over the world are :

LEAGUES	ORIGIN COUNTRY
Pakistan Premier League	Pakistan
Afghanistan Premier League	Afghanistan
Bangladesh Premier League	Bangladesh
Super Smash	New Zealand
International league T20	United Arab Emirates
T20 Blast	England
Hong Kong T20 Blitz	Hong Kong