Saving cricket's Tests!

Hey! Anyone watching that?

1 week - 2 test matches and 2 disastrous results! India beat SL in 3 days and won the series 3-0; England best WI in their first test - again within 3 days and in fact by getting WI out twice in a day!

The India-SL series saw pretty much no spectators ; the Eng-WI one had a whole lot of people in the stadium (because it was a day-night affair)! However, looking at the way the first test went, it is unlikely that spectators will buy tickets for the rest of the Eng-WI series! But hey - we are all kicked up about the Ashes, the India-Australia series, the SA-Aus series and maybe the India-England ones too!

It appears that there are 2 kinds of test matches - those that interest viewers (and hence they don't mind following the match in some way) and those that are outright futile (India-SL or Eng-WI for example). But if you look at it seriously, there are some basic problems that Test cricket has:

Let's have more competitive games please!

1. Format - A 5 day game! Who seriously has the time to spend 5 days on a game. That too with each day lasting maybe 7 hours! Even ODIs are under pressure from T20, so , it is natural that people have lesser interest in Tests!

2. Lopsided competition - About 20 or 25 years back, it was almost always the case that the home team would win the test series. Otherwise, they would all play out draws! But, each side used to make an attempt to win (except certain recordbreaking matched like these) . Now, it looks like teams give up after the first days play! WI is not even sending its best team anywhere. Infact, if there is a test series between any two of India, Australia, England and maybe South Africa, there is a chance of a competitive game. 

3. Home advantage and the toss - Other than the home advantage (England takes advantage of swing, India of spin), there is also this whole thing of the toss. Win, the toss, bat first and save yourself from having to bat on the 4th or 5th day to win/save the match! Given that the pitch deteriorates towards the last day of the Test and also considering that the home team knows the conditions best, the visiting team is almost always at a disadvantage with the toss!

4. Remuneration - Test quality players sometimes carry that label and hence miss out on all the money in professional T20 leagues. Also, test matches earn less money for the player (and yet need more commitment). More importantly, a player who is great in Tests, but not in the short format (Cheteshwar Pujara for example) doesn't even seem to get sponsorship opportunities! So, can some players really be blamed for not wanting to play Test cricket?

While there have been some discussions around trying to organize Test matches better and having a sort of Test World Cup that will add more meaning to bilateral series, all these plans have not materialized. Some are talking of doing away with tests altogether and only having T20 - there is this interesting article on the same : 

But Test cricket does have its fans (spectators who actually pay for the ticket) and from a players development perspective, it definitely helps batsmen and bowlers improve their game significantly. But we might need changes in forma and mindset to allow Test cricket to survive :

1. Format - I am borrowing someone else's idea here- why not reduce Test cricket to a 4 day, day-night game? Something that will be played only Thursday to Sunday, so that spectators will atleast turn up on the last 2 days? To ensure teams try and win (and not draw), a test championship and a suitable point structure is needed ; more on that later.

2. The home advantage and toss - 2 ways of looking at this; either let the uncertainties continue (home team leans on the curator to make a suitable pitch etc.) , but allow the visitors the right to decide what they want to do first (no toss) or allow random drop-in pitches to be used (used sometimes in ODIs) and take away the home advantage altogether. The pitch will be something both teams discover only on the morning of the match , so any advantage the home team might have had is gone. Infact, maybe we will have interesting scenarios where there is a pitch suited for spinners in Australia or maybe for fast bowlers in India!

3. Remuneration - This part is tricky! There are more ticket proceeds, there's more sponsorship money and more money for Telecast rights in case of T20s (and also ODIs)! So, how can a test player be paid more money that a T20 player? So, maybe the boards will need to use T20s to cross-subsidize Tests better. More importantly, the cricket boards should take away the temptation of T20 leagues competing with Tests by locking a calendar for T20 contests like IPL, BBL etc. etc. When the leagues are in progress (and 2 or 3 leagues can be operational in parallel), no Tests will be played and vice-versa. Then, it will also make it possible for the cricket boards to make Test participation a pre-condition for T20 league participation by players! So, in short - pay the players better in Tests and allow them T20 opportunities like IPL/BBL etc.

4. Lopsided competition - If point 3 above is taken care of, each country will be more likely to field its best team. In which case the competition is not so lopsided! However, to ensure this is indeed so, a better way might be to have a 2 tiered test structure with relegation/ promotion. This will make each Test match interesting (hopefully).

5. Kill ODIs -  Though there might not be a very strong link here, it is my hypothesis that 3 formats are way too much in cricket. T20 is better that ODIs as a shorter format (more games in the same time, more unpredictability and hence more fun) and Tests score over ODIs as a longer version! So, why have the added complication of one more format? Eliminating ODIs will save up time for more (interesting) T20 matches and Tests. It will also reduce injuries and fatigue among players to some extent!

6. The Test Championship - Finally, having a Test championship might actually keep everyone interested. It will help if there is an actual 'final match/series'between the number 1 and 2 ranked teams. But even without it, it should be fun to see teams having a clear target towards being crowned the Test Champion. It would be even better if teams are penalized for drawing matches (a drawn match makes both teams lose 1 point; an outright win on the other hand will give the winner 3 points and the loser 0). Thus, Test matches will be saved from draws (not there there are too many drawn matches these days). 

My few thoughts as a Test cricket fan. More ideas/ thoughts are welcome.