Define tradition. If you go by tradition then 21st century cricket is not traditional cricket. Even cricket played during the Don's era was not tradition. In traditional cricket played during the 19th century there were no field restrictions, bowling restriction, bat size restrictions, and certainly no 5 day limits. There was only one form of cricket keep playing until both sides are bowled out.
Evolution in the game occurred as time changed and it is only a natural thing. Underarm bowling was perfectly legal in cricket. A bowler can bowl the entire day using underarm and there was nothing the umpire could do about it. The NZ-Aus controversy changed that rule. One-day cricket used to last 60 overs until 1987 WC. Today 50 overs is the standard and you have T20 as well. These are not "traditional" cricket so to speak but they are played and respected.
Test cricket is not dead and tweaked in India's favor. I don't know hpw Pakistan selects their players but in India the sole criteria is test cricket. The Indian players you see at IPL be it 32 years old or a 16 year old kid ALL have to graduate playing test cricket. There are no exceptions.
All these lies about ICC being India controlled is bullsh1t spread by losers like these bangladeshis who for some reason think the world should treat them like champions. You think a champion side like Australia will accept changes in the game that favor India? If the rules favor India then why are teams like SA, Australia considered the better test teams?
Victory and defeat are part of the game. Deal with it. There is no shadowy conspiracy going on in ICC.
Sure, traditional cricket might not be the real term for it, and the game will undoubtedly evolve. But that doesn't mean it has to be changed so rapidly, changes that took decades all happening as knee-jerk reactions to public demand for cheap and simple entertainment. The changing of rules to suit the new formats in favour of dumping the older formats is all but said, done in practise.
T20 need not be bad, but you could do without the cheap entertainment factor, the unnecessary restrictions of some players and certain aspects, and the relentless monetization of every aspect of the game. Take a look at the American sports around, every watched a game of NFL? How they fill the time with adverts. This is the model T20 leagues, especially the IPL are pursuing. And they're evolving the game faster than ever, paying no respect at all to the rules of the game as they were. At least in football for example, European leagues are built off of hundreds of millions of dollars, but the game rules don't change much at all, the integrity of the game is in tact, there are no silly restrictions and exploits added to make teams score more goals or for some idiots to have their third rate entertainment.
And sorry if you don't see it, these sort of things undoubtedly affect ODI and test.
It will divert funds, attention and talent away from other formats. Tell me, if you're a 20-21 year old new kid on the block, lots of potential, you get an offer to play T20, a few hours a day, quick and easy, and huge sums of money, will you give that up for days and days worth of test cricket, being paid pittance and slaving away for hours in the nets, getting bruised and hurt? Of course you wouldn't.
A few years from now, if there were to be some statistics on how much T20 leagues and T20 tournaments earn compared to test series, the disparity will be huge.
The old formats of the game aren't evolving as you're suggesting, they will be dying out, that's a whole other problem.
Ask some of these kids that watch IPL, T20 and some ODI, some rules of test cricket, ask them what a follow-on is, they won't know.
Killing old formats is not the same evolving them, and evolving the game is not the same changing it without compromising it's integrity in some aspects.
Also, I didn't say Indians control the ICC, but the Indian market certainly has and will have the greatest say, money does the talking and most crowds prefer to see a few quick overs of senseless hitting and cheerleaders as opposed other formats or a more refined T20 game. And undoubtedly, that's where the money is too. It is no surprise then, that rules are being made in favour of batsman and being implemented faster and more audacious than ever.
