Portal:India/Today's selected article/April 21, 2006



Cricket is a team sport played between two teams of eleven players each. There are different types and levels of Cricket, but at the international level these are Test cricket, One-day cricket and Twenty20. It is a bat-and-ball game played on a roughly elliptical grass field, in the centre of which is a hard, flat strip of ground 22 yards long pitch. At each end of the pitch stand a set of three wooden stakes called stumps, made from wood of the ash tree, which along with two smaller wooden crosspieces. Cricket has been an established team sport for several centuries. It originated in its modern form in England, and is popular mainly in the present and former members of the Commonwealth. In some countries in South Asia, including India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka, cricket is by far the most popular sport. Cricket is also a major sport in England and Wales, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Zimbabwe and the English-speaking countries of the Caribbean, which are known in cricketing parlance as the West Indies. It is also a prominent minor sport in countries as diverse as the Netherlands, Israel, Nepal, and Argentina. The length of the game can last six or more hours a day for up to five days in one form of the game — the numerous intervals for lunch and tea. For its fans, the sport and the intense rivalries between top cricketing nations provide passionate entertainment and outstanding sporting achievements. (more...)