It was an inconsequential match in the context of the tournament and neither team had a massive entourage of traveling fans. Yet, the crowds trickled in to Trent Bridge two hours before the start of the West Indies-Sri Lanka match, which the Lankans eventually won.

At the World Twenty20 championships — despite the lack of publicity, despite tickets being sold at almost-ridiculous rates — the stands have been filling up. About 10 years ago, things weren’t this good in the English game.

Not only was the national team struggling to string together meaningful results (read no Ashes victory in over 16 years at the time), county cricket, the backbone of the sport in the country, was pretty much on life support as far as spectator interest went.

It was then that Stuart Robertson, along with John Carr — both marketing men at the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) — were asked to draw up a proposal to revive the game. After some extensive market research (commissioned at over £200,000) and lots of head-scratching, they came up with Twenty20.

Robertson is acknowledged as the inventor of T20 cricket although he has slipped away from the glaring spotlight the game has been under since 2003 when it made its debut in England. And what was once a solution simply to bring people back to the grounds — and many critics shrugged off as a short-lived gimmick — has turned into what’s being spoken about, not in whispers any more, as the future of the game itself.

... contd.