What's changed on Cricinfo

So what should I say? Welcome to the new Cricinfo? But that will be a misrepresentation. In most ways it is still the site we have all known, and as many of you have pointed out in response to my earlier piece, why do we need a new Cricinfo? Let me repeat a word that I used in the other piece: this is Cricinfo renewed. It's a step, a significant one, forward.
Change is often unsettling. We trust the old ways because there is evidence that they work, and there is no evidence yet that the new ones will. We are already feeling wistful about the old site, so we know how some of you feel. As Nietzsche said, love is more afraid of change than destruction. But to that, let's add this one from the Buddha: Everything changes; without change, nothing remains.
Change for the sake of change is indulgence, but mostly, it is the only thing inevitable in life. Finally, success and failure, happiness and misery, come down to how we manage change. We derive our confidence about this redesign from one central truth: our singular focus throughout this process has been to enhance your experience of the site.
Take a look the homepage. The most important thing about it is that it is a celebration of content. There is more of it, and it is organised better. Earlier, we had all our editorial content stacked up in a single central panel. The structure gave us no other options. As we kept adding new features and sections, they kept piling up, the page grew longer, and there came a point when we could add no more.
The starting point of this redesign was the navigation. In some ways, the left-hand navigation bar was easy for us to manage: we could do pretty much anything with it. All we had to do was to add a new item to the menu whenever we needed to. But it was sub-optimal from the usability point of view; you needed to scroll to see it in its entirety. And, equally importantly, it ate up vital homepage space. By moving it to the top, we have achieved two of our prime objectives. We have given you a cleaner, more logical and intuitive navigation. And we have freed up space to showcase content.
On the face of it, the navigation is smaller. But it packs in much more. The hierarchical design contains a second, and sometimes a third, level that takes you deeper into the site with a single click. For regular users who have their preferred sections, it's a great tool. For example, if you like the My Favourite Cricket Story, point your mouse at Features, go down to The Short Stuff, and then click on My Favourite Cricket story.
To help further, we have added a Quick Links strip, just below the navigation, to highlight the major current events in cricket.
Below it, the content is organised in a richer yet simpler fashion. The big stories of the day take centre stage, in a distinctive panel that also houses the video player. Concerns that the video player might slow the site down are unfounded, because the video starts playing only when you click on the relevant tab. The space vacated by the navigation is taken up by a wider lead photograph, which enhances the visual appeal of the page.