Ricky Ponting's appeal to Australians to watch the current national team's Test series against the West Indies rather than continuing to watch the Indian Premier League (IPL) highlights the fault lines forming across the cricketing world.

The IPL is a money-spinning machine that could finish off the Test format once and for all. That Ponting, captain of arguably the best side in world cricket, feels he has to appeal to nationalistic sentiments to draw viewers away from the IPL speaks volumes for the threat that the new, shorter form of the game holds for more traditional forms of cricket.

The key difference between one-day or Test cricket on one hand and the IPL on the other is that while the former involves players taking the field out of pride and the honour of playing for their country, the latter is unashamedly about money.

Discarding Test cricket for a commercialised format of the sport, where skill is less important than brand value, would be a mistake.

Test cricket is a game that requires tremendous application and is the most elegant form of cricket. Ponting is right to ask Australian viewers to support the national team through their Test series against the West Indies.

It is silly to believe that nationalism has no place in sport anymore. People might choose to follow the exploits of, say, Manchester United or the New York Yankees from their couches but it is nothing compared to the depth of feelings involved when one's nation goes to bat.

To paraphrase George Orwell, sport is war without the bullets. It provides an outlet for nationalistic feelings without getting people killed in the process.

India-Pakistan cricket matches are an example. With the tense history of relations between the two countries, it is no surprise that these matches are intensely contested.

But they also lead to people in both countries treating cricket players from the other nation as heroes. The element that makes sport so exciting will be taken out if the IPL format comes to dominate world cricket.

Real cricket will stop mattering to people and sport will be the poorer for it.