A cricket match is a five day seduction. A football game is a one night stand with a meat pie and a cup of Bovril at half time. Cricket allows time for flirtation, foreplay, action and afterglow. Football is instant gratification where the end justifies the means. Cricket conjures up images of languorous afternoons at Trent Bridge, sipping Chablis while stroking the soft, silken thigh of a beautiful woman. Football is a nasty evening at Scunthorpe where it’s pissing down with rain and you lose 1-0.
There are different varieties of cricket. One of which is First Class and Test Cricket. (Purists consider it to be the only reputable sort.) There is always something happening. Pay attention to the way the captain positions his fielders, how the bowlers alter their delivery depending on who’s batting and how they’re batting, how risky the running is, etc. That applies for all the versions.
Test Cricket really isn’t that different from a baseball series in the matter of discovering the result. In a baseball series, there are daily wins but that doesn’t really matter that much on the day, does it? After all, it’s a cumulation of wins that’s needed. Sometimes, as in the World Series, that can take more than a week.
Another version is Limited Overs Cricket, also referred to as One Day International (ODI). The limit is on the number of overs to be bowled. This is designed to have a result in one day, although one match in England stretched over two days–due to the weather, of course. There is some difference in strategy due to the limit being on overs instead of outs and there just being one innings per side.
So, you can look at it this way: ODI = single game of baseball & First Class/Test = baseball series.
