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The popularity of the shortest form of the game at coral.com is bringing much needed revenue to the sport but is also taking the focus away from test cricket with fans appetites focusing more on shorter games. Take for example England’s up and coming tour of India.

You’d expect that a meeting of these two bastions of cricket at www.coral.co.uk would provide five or, at the very lease, three test matches but when the itinerary was announced on Monday it included just three with seven one day internationals.

Now this may just be an anomaly in fixture planning but this could represent a worrying trend.

Also its seems that making Coral money in the lucrative Indian Premier League is overtaking playing for your country. Sri Lanka’s top players are likely to be released to play in the IPL instead of touring England next summer. Meanwhile Pakistan could find themselves subject of a player revolt as they have refused to let their cricketers player in the league as they tour Australia.

In years to come we may be looking back at 2008 as the year test cricket started to die.

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The South Africans have shown, this summer, why they are the second best test-playing nation as their batsmen have adapted their style to each as required. Graeme Smith’s side batter for almost two days to save the first test at Lords and then put on a similar master class of patience and shot selection to put themselves in a winning position at Headingley and with sportingbet.

In the end it was 10 wicket victory but had Stuart Broad not shown maturity beyond his years with a 67 not out it would have been an innings defeat for England and this would be felt at sportingbet.com. The fact was England seem to have lost the knack of playing proper test cricket whereas South Africa thrive on it. This time it was AB De Villiers who showed how it is done with a batting performance that yielded 174 runs from 381 balls, which killed off England’s chances.

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The England selectors have to ask themselves some hard questions too after a bizarre decision to pick the previously uncapped Darren Pattinson when more experienced bowlers were available. Captain Michael Vaughan has even gone so far as to describe the choice as ‘confused’.

Well whoever is picked in the next match they will have to work hard to beat this very good test playing nation.

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Rather surprisingly the Australian Institute of Sportingbet Centre are yet to win the event which started in 2005 but the competition has provided a decent platform for those hoping to make it into the Worlds best international side – and a few prospects have already shown off their skills.

The AIS team, lead by New South Welshman Moises Henriques opened the tournamet with a Twenty20 win over New Zealand and the captain lead by example with an impressive innings hitting 57 from only 35 deliveries and taking two wickets showing his prowess as an all-rounder.

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Henriques was impressive but the stand-out player so far has been wicketkeeper and batsman Matthew Wade. The left-hander, originally from Tasmania, scored an eycathcing 115 runs from just 93 balls with the Victorian smashing a 17 boundaries including nine sixes against AIS’s Indian counterparts in a 50 over contest.

Wade looks to be a ready made replacement for current first team wicketkeeper Adam Gilchrist news that will have the rest of the criketing word ducking for cover.

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With this fast and exciting form of the game has come a window of opportunity for the world’s top stars to make some money. The new lucrative Indian Premier League has tapped into this and the rest of the cricketing world is desperately trying not to get left behind at coral.com.

The England and Wales cricket board have made some steps towards that but seems to be tripping up too often as it tries to run before it can even crawl. The first example of this is the hastily arranged Champions league of Twenty20.

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The idea of the best teams in the world coming together for a money spinning tournament, in it’s essence, is a good one but one major problem developed just days after the unveiling of the plan.

The Indian Premier league is unhappy that several of the players in English county cricket took part in the rival ICL. Subsequently they have banned teams with those players in form competing in the new tournament, which left only a handful that could take part.

All a bit messy. The other factor the Champions League brings is greed. Just this week Yorkshire is under investigation for fielding an eligible player with their quarter final opponents, Durham, demanding they are thrown out.

Would this have happened when Twenty20 first started as a fun distraction with no financial rewards? Not Likely.

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Australia has made cricket their game and over the years have produced the best players in the world. So I guess it’s best to go with a couple of givens.

Don Bradman is widely and pretty much without argument regarded as the best batsman of all time. When he retired in 1948 his batting average was an incredible 99.94, which to this day is considered to be statistically the greatest achievement in any major sport.

He captained the Aussies on their1948 tour of England and in what would be his last test series guided them to an unprecedented unbeaten victory. Bradman still holds many batting records today, which why his place at Australian’s cricket top table is in no doubt.

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Joining ‘The Don’ and probably sitting next to him is Shane Warne. The charismatic leg spinner has won the hearts of both home and rival fans through his, for the want of a better word, charm and cricketing ability.

His truly remarkable deliveries have out foxed batsman for over a decade and he became a star when he bowled the ‘Ball of the Century’ that span violently to skittle the wicket of Mike Gatting during the 1993 ashes.

He’ll never really be the choice of the old boys elite of cricket because of several off field scandals but ‘Wisden’, the bible of cricket, voted him one of the ‘players of the century’ which is a just choice.

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Deccan Chargers won the toss and elected to bat first. The opening was really wobbly as both the openers were dismissed for meager runs – Adam Gilchrist (5 runs) and Herschelle Gibbs (8 runs). Shahid Afridi was dismissed for 1 run. Venugopal Rao (46 runs) and Ravi Teja (40 runs) played a decent Innings which helped their team to post decent figures in the score board. At the end of 20 overs, the Deccan Chargers scored 147 runs for the fall of 8 wickets.

Chasing the modest total of 148 runs, the Chennai Super Kings started their Innings thru their openers Patel and Fleming who fell out for 20 and 14 runs respectively. The team’s skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni played a knock of 37 runs off 25 balls (4 boundaries and 1 sixer). Suresh Raina stood unbeaten for an excellent knock of 54 runs off 43 balls (5 boundaries and 2 sixers). In 19.2 overs the Chennai Super Kings reached their target score and won the match by 7 wickets. Suresh Raina was announced as the Man of the Match.

Rajasthan Royals won the toss and elected to field first. Mumbai Indians started their Innings thru their openers – Jayasuriya and Tendulkar. Jayasuriya scored 38 runs off 37 balls and Tendulkar played a knock of 30 runs off 34 balls. Sohail Tanvir claimed 4 wickets in his 4 overs spell. Takawale (24 runs n.o.) was the only batsmen to score sixer in Mumbai Indians team. At the end of 20 overs, the Mumbai Indians posted a modest total of 145 runs for the fall of 7 wickets.

Chasing the target score of 146 runs the Rajasthan Royals started their Innings thru Kamran Akmal and Asnodkar who scored 18 and 17 runs respectively. Jadeja and Patel stood unbeaten and made sure their team wins this match. The last over was really crucial when the Rajasthan Royals required 15 runs to win in 6 balls. Adding more excitement to this was the last ball in which they required 3 runs to win. The last ball bowled by Fernando turned out to be a wide ball resulting in 1 extra run and an extra delivery. Niraj Patel scored two runs in the last ball and Rajasthan Royals won the match by 5 wickets. Sohail Tanvir was declared the Man of the Match.

Rajasthan Royals won the toss and elected to field first. Mumbai Indians started their Innings thru their openers – Jayasuriya and Tendulkar. Jayasuriya scored 38 runs off 37 balls and Tendulkar played a knock of 30 runs off 34 balls. Sohail Tanvir claimed 4 wickets in his 4 overs spell. Takawale (24 runs n.o.) was the only batsmen to score sixer in Mumbai Indians team. At the end of 20 overs, the Mumbai Indians posted a modest total of 145 runs for the fall of 7 wickets.

Chasing the target score of 146 runs the Rajasthan Royals started their Innings thru Kamran Akmal and Asnodkar who scored 18 and 17 runs respectively. Jadeja and Patel stood unbeaten and made sure their team wins this match. The last over was really crucial when the Rajasthan Royals required 15 runs to win in 6 balls. Adding more excitement to this was the last ball in which they required 3 runs to win. The last ball bowled by Fernando turned out to be a wide ball resulting in 1 extra run and an extra delivery. Niraj Patel scored two runs in the last ball and Rajasthan Royals won the match by 5 wickets. Sohail Tanvir was declared the Man of the Match.

Kings XI Punjab won the toss and elected to bat first. Shaun Marsh scored 40 runs off 31 deliveries (3 boundaries and 2 sixers). Sangakkara scored 64 runs off 45 balls (7 boundaries and 2 sixers). The team’s skipper Yuvraj Singh scored 27 runs off 18 balls (3 boundaries and 1 sixer). At the end of 20 overs, the Kings XI Punjab scored 174 runs for the fall of 6 wickets. Umar Gul claimed 4 wickets - James Hopes, Sangakkara, Pathan and Chawla.

Chasing the target score of 175 runs, the Kolkatta Knight Riders started their Innings thru their openers – Saurav Ganguly (captain) and Salman Butt. Ganguly played an excellent Innings and stood unbeaten for 86 runs off 53 balls (6 boundaries and 6 sixers). Had he shown this aggressive performance in the previous 2 matches, Kolkatta team might have entered the semi-finals. Umar Gul’s cameo Innings of 24 runs which included 3 sixers and 1 boundary helped his captain in chasing the target score in the last minutes of the game. Kolkatta made 175 runs in 19.4 for the loss of 7 wickets and won the match by 3 wickets. Umar Gul was awarded the Man of the Match.

Kings XI Punjab won the toss and elected to bat first. Shaun Marsh scored 40 runs off 31 deliveries (3 boundaries and 2 sixers). Sangakkara scored 64 runs off 45 balls (7 boundaries and 2 sixers). The team’s skipper Yuvraj Singh scored 27 runs off 18 balls (3 boundaries and 1 sixer). At the end of 20 overs, the Kings XI Punjab scored 174 runs for the fall of 6 wickets. Umar Gul claimed 4 wickets - James Hopes, Sangakkara, Pathan and Chawla.

Chasing the target score of 175 runs, the Kolkatta Knight Riders started their Innings thru their openers – Saurav Ganguly (captain) and Salman Butt. Ganguly played an excellent Innings and stood unbeaten for 86 runs off 53 balls (6 boundaries and 6 sixers). Had he shown this aggressive performance in the previous 2 matches, Kolkatta team might have entered the semi-finals. Umar Gul’s cameo Innings of 24 runs which included 3 sixers and 1 boundary helped his captain in chasing the target score in the last minutes of the game. Kolkatta made 175 runs in 19.4 for the loss of 7 wickets and won the match by 3 wickets. Umar Gul was awarded the Man of the Match.