Two-tier Test cricket

Test cricket is the longest form of the sport of cricket and is considered its highest standard. As determined by the International Cricket Council (ICC), Test matches are played between national representative teams with Test status. The first officially recognized Test match began on 15 March 1877, between England and Australia at the MCG, Melbourne where Australia won by 45 runs.^[1]

Test status

Test matches are the highest level of cricket although, statistically, their data forms part of first-class cricket. Matches are played between national representative teams with Test status, as determined by the ICC. As of August 2016, there are ten national teams have Test status. Bangladesh was the most recent promotion, in November, 2000.

In January 2014, during the historic ICC meeting in Dubai, the pathway for new potential Test nations was laid out with the winners of the next round of the ICC Intercontinental Cup playing a five-day match against the bottom ranked Test nation as per the ICC Test Rankings. If the Associate team defeats the Test nation, then they could be added as the new Test nation and be given full membership for a period of four years.

Two-tier system

With the advent of the shortest form of the game, people have started losing interest in the five-day format. in order to bring more crowds and generate more revenue, ICC is contemplating a Two-tier system in Test match cricket. In many countries, it is being observed that the crowd turn up is negligible in Test cricket when compared with the Limited Over versions of the game. Besides Australia, England, India and Bangladesh there is hardly any country where stands are decently full in a Test match. In May 2016, during its annual conference in Edinburgh, Scotland, ICC announced that it is evaluating the idea of two Test divisions amid major overhaul.^[2] ICC hopes that this will help them draw more crowd and generate more revenue from the matches played between top tier teams. As per the new idea, top seven Test playing nations will fall under Tier-1 and will play two bilateral series, (one home and one away), with each other during a period of four years. Tier-2 will have teams ranked eighth (West indies), ninth (Bangladesh), tenth (Zimbabwe) plus two more teams. Promotion and relegation could be introduced into Test cricket as early as 2019, if ICC chief executive David Richardson has his way. Potentially, this will result in more countries like Afghanistan and Ireland getting an opportunity to play Test cricket.

Different Test playing nations had different point of view about this structural change in the way Test Cricket has been played. Bangladesh was the voice one to voice its concern in opposing this.^[3] "We do not support this system," Mahbubul Anam, Vice President, Bangladesh Cricket Board said. "We believe that more we play against competitive sides, the better we will get. If we didn't play against better standard sides in ODIs, we wouldn't have come this far. We were the king of the jungle from where we achieved the Test status. We were given a reality check when we were promoted to the highest level. I feel that if we go backwards, our cricket will regress." Should this happen, Bangladesh, who are ranked ninth, are likely to slip into Division Two and settle for lesser Tests against top cricketing nations.

10 days later, Sri Lanka Cricket also outlined its strong opposition to the proposed two-tier Test system, claiming that it "can't see any benefit for Sri Lankan cricket, the game, or the players". SLC president T.Sumathipala also voiced concerns over the financial ramifications of a potential tiered system, and believed the current path towards full membership and Test status for Associate sides was adequate.^[4]

In mid July, New Zealand Cricket's chief executive David White has said his board fully supports the proposed two-tier system in Tests. Such a move, White believed, would add context to the game, but he also underlined the need for ICC to ensure that teams pushed down to the second division don't suffer financially.^[5] This move of ICC was also welcomed by Cricket Board of Australia

BCCI president Anurag Thakur has said his board will oppose the proposed two-tier Test system to "protect the interests" of smaller member nations. As the head of the powerful BCCI, Thakur's statement lends heft to the criticism of the proposal by Sri Lanka Cricket and the Bangladesh Cricket Board, even as the boards of Australian and New Zealand have welcomed the move.^[6] Soon after BCCI opposed the proposed changes to the structure of international cricket, James Sutherland, chief executive - Cricket Australia, stressed ICC big picture on international cricket. However, Sutherland said nothing under the new proposal would prevent top teams such as India playing against the lower-ranked sides in bilateral contests, and the overall raft of proposed changes would add greater context to international cricket.^[7] On 5 September 2016, BCCI re-affirmed that it is not in the favour of Two-tier Test cricket.^[8][9]

In September 2016, Afghanistan Cricket Board CEO Shafiq Stanikzai presented an argument in favor of the proposal for two-tier Test cricket. He said that Afghanistan deserves the opportunity to play Tests and supported the proposed system.^[10] Players of few countries also urged ICC to adopt two-tier cricket. They warned of a massed exodus to Twenty20 leagues if nothing is done. Almost three-quarters of international cricketers were favouring separate windows for domestic Twenty20 competitions being played in different parts of the world.^[11]

On 7 September 2016, the ICC withdrew the proposal for a two-tier system.^[12]

In October 2016, ICC started contemplating a different kind of Two-Tier system for Test match cricket. This structure will be similar to Baseball-style structure, where there will be two conferences of six teams each. Each team will play against all teams in their conference over a period of two years, with a Test Championship play-off between the toppers of both conferences at the end of the defined period. This structure will remove the non-equity that was a drawback of the initially proposed Two-tier system.^[13]

References

External links

• Benefits and drawbacks of a two-tier system