Test Cricket must have two tiers.

[Norman]

Enough of these borefests. 

 

There are only 4 "good" test teams currently. India , Australia , New Zealand and England are the only ones who can be challenging in any conditions. Pakistan/South Africa ,if they get their **** together can turn out to be good teams as well. The rest are pathetic (yes I know Sri Lanka recently won in SA but that's down to a once in a lifetime knock by Kusal Perera rather than the team effort). Teams like Ban and WI don't even seem to care about Tests. This can all change if you put a 2 tier promotion/relegation system in place. 

 

First tier should have only five teams with each team playing every other team home and away for a 2 year cycle. No.1 wins the championship (NO FINAL) and no.5 gets relegated to tier 2. 

 

Second tier has 7 teams (Scot/Neth given the test status or get Zimbabwe back ) with each team playing 3 home and 3 away series against the rest over the same period. (NO.1 gets promoted to tier 1 ). 

 

I know, this is very very unlikely but I just want to know what you guys think. 

[Stan AF]

It's all about the money.

 

 

[Jimmy Cliff]

There are not enough teams to have 2 Tiers. 

[Norman]

8 minutes ago, Stan AF said:

It's all about the money.

 

 

I'm pretty sure an extra series with Australia/England would generate more revenue for BCCI than playing with Ban/WI home or away. 

[Norman]

3 minutes ago, Jimmy Cliff said:

There are not enough teams to have 2 Tiers. 

Not a problem really. 

 

We're talking about 5 day cricket. Playing multiple home and away games against 4/5 teams will still be enough Test cricket for 2 years. 

[Stan AF]

21 minutes ago, Jimmy Cliff said:

There are not enough teams to have 2 Tiers. 

Word. 

[Zero_Unit]

33 minutes ago, Jimmy Cliff said:

There are not enough teams to have 2 Tiers. 

sad, isn't it? Test cricket needs a serious overhall or we will keep on getting these one sided match. Even for BD standard, this is beyond garbage performance. 

[rageaddict]

But Bangaldesh can win Tests against England,  Australia and NZ in Bangaldesh.

[Norman]

1 hour ago, rageaddict said:

But Bangaldesh can win Tests against England,  Australia and NZ in Bangaldesh.

Even Afghanistan can win a one off test against these teams in the SC if they unleash their spinners on a 5th day wicket. That's not the point. 

 

Those teams atleast compete in the subcontinent against Ban, Pak, SL etc. New Zealand and England recently won series' in UAE and Sri Lanka respectively. But when these second tier teams play away , they get annihilated. 

 

[Gollum]

Thankfully other teams didn't think along these lines when we were minnows. 10 countries out there, how much more do we want to reduce? 

[Gollum]

WI won an epic series at home against Poms recently, BD drew a couple of series against Aus/Eng at home. Lanka did something India has failed to do since 92. RSA was #2 not too long ago with emphatic series wins against Ind and Aus at home, till 2016 Pak was undefeated in UAE and they did well in a couple of overseas assignments. Probably all those teams have done better in Eng compared to India this decade...FYI we are 2-11 since the 2011 tour..managing just a single draw. Not right to be cocky, never hear far more dominant teams (in sports with few teams) like All Blacks or Dutch hockey teams moan about lack of competition. We have been garbage in test format for majority of our history, least we can do is have some humility....our overall W/L ratio hasn't even become 1 and here we are patronizing other teams because of our home record.

 

We must play the weaker teams as well regularly, give them a taste of what it is like facing the #1 test team, help them improve, encourage them. Do we want to go back to the early 20th century with 3-4 teams? When all other sports are expanding......

 

Another thing is don't judge other teams based on how they do in India, more than them being inept this Indian team right now is probably among the top 2-3 home test sides in the 100+ years history of cricket, maybe even #1 after the next cycle. Damn well sure this team will humiliate many other legendary teams of the past, we must appreciate the greatness of our test team. Why not enjoy their domination? When they lose we whine, when they win some of us call it boring and still whine....attitude has to change. 

Edited November 16, 2019 by Gollum

[Gollum]

This Lankan is a troll but his stats are correct. 

Applying OP's logic retrospectively how many years should we have languished in tier-II? Australia is the greatest cricket nation on the planet, even they were never this condescending towards lesser teams. 

 

Tell you what, if India stays at #1 for the next 10 years inflicting whitewashes every time home and overseas plus winning all ICC trophies till 2027 WC undefeated....then we can talk. Not based on underachieving and being so low (historically) in a sport with limited competition, despite 1.3 billion population with huge middle class pop, BCCI $$$,  improving infra/coaching, largest talent pool for any sport and for all practical purposes still a one sport country. 

Edited November 16, 2019 by Gollum

[Stan AF]

Curious, among those 155 wins how many must have come at home???.

Edited November 16, 2019 by Stan AF

[Gollum]

16 minutes ago, Stan AF said:

Curious, among those 155 wins how many must have come at home???.

104 wins in India, total 121 in SC, another 3 in Zim. 

 

P: W/L/D

 

in India 271: 104/52/113...1 tied test

in Pak/BD/Lanka 58: 17/14/27

in SENA 153: 22/81/50

in WI 51: 9/16/26

in Zim 6: 3/2/1

 

LINK

[Norman]

@Gollum

 

I know that we too were a minnow once. I'm not boasting or gloating about our performances or rankings. I'm just suggesting a way of keeping Tests alive. The amount of one sided games are just resulting in poor viewerships which in turn are leading to boards (like pakistan, New Zealand etc) opting to play as lesser tests as possible. 

 

When we were minnows, there were like 5 test teams. So, there was no scope for a 2 tier system. Now that we can easily have 12 test playing nations, it's completely plausible. Teams can still develop while playing in tier 2. They would also have the extra motivation to play for promotion to tier 1. 

[Gollum]

28 minutes ago, Norman said:

@Gollum

 

I know that we too were a minnow once. I'm not boasting or gloating about our performances or rankings. I'm just suggesting a way of keeping Tests alive. The amount of one sided games are just resulting in poor viewerships which in turn are leading to boards (like pakistan, New Zealand etc) opting to play as lesser tests as possible. 

Fair enough. I wasn't targeting anyone in particular, just that we get a lot of similar talk these days. I think it will be too simplistic to attribute reason of one sided tests for poor viewership and subsequently lesser tests. That probably will need a separate thread. For instance attendance is good in Aus and Eng even in one sided tests while in RSA/NZ I see poor crowds when test is finely balanced. Tests have to be kept alive for health of cricket no doubt but simply reducing number of teams via 5-5 wallah tier system won't work. At some point fans will get bored of seeing same contests again and again, we need variety. 

Quote

When we were minnows, there were like 5 test teams.

All teams right now are competent at home, incl Bangladesh, no one is an outright minnow at home. Away performance is the problem, but if you look at it that way we were minnows in the 1986-2002 period....even in 2011 and '12 seasons we were minnow level. We must empathize with and help out the weaker teams for the sake of the sport. They won't improve if they don't play teams like India and Australia. 

Quote

So, there was no scope for a 2 tier system. Now that we can easily have 12 test playing nations, it's completely plausible. Teams can still develop while playing in tier 2. They would also have the extra motivation to play for promotion to tier 1. 

Tier system might be ok if we have 8 teams in tier 1, not as less as 4-5. Closer enough to current system as well, how often do we play Afg, Zim anyway? Put 7th/8th ranked teams on notice that way.

 

Edited November 16, 2019 by Gollum

[Khota]

India playing BD proves nothing. It inflates batsman averages and makes bowlers look good. Test players should be kept fresh for Australia and England only.

[Norman]

See this is what I'm talking about. 

 

Teams like Pakistan, Bangladesh, Windies etc are just not good enough to even compete the top teams. Playing with these teams is only making fans go away from test cricket. 

 

Avg attendances for the pak vs Aus series has been 13,000 at venues with 40k+ capacity.   

Future of test cricket is in real danger if this goes on like this. 

[javier26]

2 hours ago, Norman said:

See this is what I'm talking about. 

 

Teams like Pakistan, Bangladesh, Windies etc are just not good enough to even compete the top teams. Playing with these teams is only making fans go away from test cricket. 

 

Avg attendances for the pak vs Aus series has been 13,000 at venues with 40k+ capacity.   

Future of test cricket is in real danger if this goes on like this. 

Pakistan will whitewash Australia at home/UAE so they deserve to play Tests. 

[putrevus]

On 11/16/2019 at 12:19 AM, Norman said:

Enough of these borefests. 

 

There are only 4 "good" test teams currently. India , Australia , New Zealand and England are the only ones who can be challenging in any conditions. Pakistan/South Africa ,if they get their **** together can turn out to be good teams as well. The rest are pathetic (yes I know Sri Lanka recently won in SA but that's down to a once in a lifetime knock by Kusal Perera rather than the team effort). Teams like Ban and WI don't even seem to care about Tests. This can all change if you put a 2 tier promotion/relegation system in place. 

 

First tier should have only five teams with each team playing every other team home and away for a 2 year cycle. No.1 wins the championship (NO FINAL) and no.5 gets relegated to tier 2. 

 

Second tier has 7 teams (Scot/Neth given the test status or get Zimbabwe back ) with each team playing 3 home and 3 away series against the rest over the same period. (NO.1 gets promoted to tier 1 ). 

 

I know, this is very very unlikely but I just want to know what you guys think. 

What happens if Australia , England  are in different tiers, will they play Ashes.What about India series with those teams.

How will you view those stats.We all saw , Pakistani batsmen becoming Bradmans by playing hapless Zimbabwe