Is Test Cricket Dying?

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Interesting thoughts but Zimbabwe and Pakistan are hardly good examples. Both countries are struggling, Zimbabwe was stood down as a test nation for a spell with the issues surrounding the team and the countries political problems while Pakistan suffer without real home games. The current tour schedule needs to be looked at in the context of the 2015 world cup also. All countries are now beginning to focus on their preparations toward next summer especially Australia that would sell their soul to the devil to win at home.

I would have thought a better barometer would be the crowds at games this year. Look at the test numbers and consider them against the BBL or ODI crowds.

Venue Test BBL/ODI
Brisbane 122910 4 Days 32 696 best, this is equal to the third day crowd of the test
Adelaide 153000 4 days 26 506 this could only out do the last day crowd
Perth 83 760 4 days 18 718 again about the third day crowd
MCG 271 411 4 days 38 066 This was an ODI and did not beat a single day of the test remember 91 112 on the first day
SCG 131 713 3 days 23 848 about half of any test day and it was only a 3 day test

I think with some research you would find this is similar in many other test playing countries except India where they pack it out for every game of cricket. Having said that there were some slowish crowds there this year for the IPL. I would say that the real interest in cricket has swung back to test cricket in the last decade from where it was in the 80's when we had packed stadiums chanting 'Lillie' during the World Series Cup.

If there truly is change needed i see it in the way the ICC organises the world game. There should be three tiers of cricket and use them to develop and create incentive. You could have a Test league with the top 6 ranked teams in, then a premier league with six other and an associate league for the rest. Run it with a promotion and demotion system like davis cup and many other comps. By doing this you keep the elite level very tough and allow development to be accessible for other teams. After all you can not tell me that being thrashed by Australia in test cricket can be good for Zimbabwe.


http://www.austadiums.com/sport/crowds.php
 
I see articles like this all the time, but I simply can't see where journalists/bloggers get these crazy ideas from. Interest in the format has never been higher - despite regular attempts by the ICC and various national bodies to undermine it.

If anything is under threat is is ODI's.
 
nairbe said:
Interesting thoughts but Zimbabwe and Pakistan are hardly good examples. Both countries are struggling, Zimbabwe was stood down as a test nation for a spell with the issues surrounding the team and the countries political problems while Pakistan suffer without real home games. The current tour schedule needs to be looked at in the context of the 2015 world cup also. All countries are now beginning to focus on their preparations toward next summer especially Australia that would sell their soul to the devil to win at home.

I would have thought a better barometer would be the crowds at games this year. Look at the test numbers and consider them against the BBL or ODI crowds.

Venue Test BBL/ODI
Brisbane 122910 4 Days 32 696 best, this is equal to the third day crowd of the test
Adelaide 153000 4 days 26 506 this could only out do the last day crowd
Perth 83 760 4 days 18 718 again about the third day crowd
MCG 271 411 4 days 38 066 This was an ODI and did not beat a single day of the test remember 91 112 on the first day
SCG 131 713 3 days 23 848 about half of any test day and it was only a 3 day test

I think with some research you would find this is similar in many other test playing countries except India where they pack it out for every game of cricket. Having said that there were some slowish crowds there this year for the IPL. I would say that the real interest in cricket has swung back to test cricket in the last decade from where it was in the 80's when we had packed stadiums chanting 'Lillie' during the World Series Cup.

If there truly is change needed i see it in the way the ICC organises the world game. There should be three tiers of cricket and use them to develop and create incentive. You could have a Test league with the top 6 ranked teams in, then a premier league with six other and an associate league for the rest. Run it with a promotion and demotion system like davis cup and many other comps. By doing this you keep the elite level very tough and allow development to be accessible for other teams. After all you can not tell me that being thrashed by Australia in test cricket can be good for Zimbabwe.


http://www.austadiums.com/sport/crowds.php
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multiple tiers of test cricket is the way to go with 8 teams in a tier (makes 14 series per team). Once you get down to the 3rd tier or 4th tier, you could reduce it to a 1 innings game played over 200 overs in 2 days to make it easier for amateurs to take part. Promotion and relegation between divisions every 5 years.


wrt limited overs cricket, I honestly think that every country that wants to enter can enter, and everyone starts from a level playing field. The Test playing nations have to qualify for the world cup same as everyone else. This would expose associate and affiliate nations to more serious and intense high quality cricket and quickly improve their quality, as well as bringing in revenue.

I'd love to see England have to go win a T20 in Afghanistan or somewhere in order to qualify for the world cup, or India to have to come to Scotland on a cold day in May. It would be fascinating.
 
SLA said:
I see articles like this all the time, but I simply can't see where journalists/bloggers get these crazy ideas from.
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I see the blogs and comments, yes, but this has now become an independently-sourced news article. It's not 100% official until it's straight from the ICC, but it's a step up.

Basically, I'm just annoyed that one of my two supergraphics that I'm currently working on has effectively just become redundant.

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...and my proposed rejig of the FTP:
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Anyway, the bottom line is that I don't trust the ICC. It's been reported that they're mulling a two-Tier system, and we can thoughtfully and logically draw up reasonable theories as to what that might entail, but then the official announcement is viable to be... not that. (Who saw the 'replenish both DRS reviews after 80 overs' rule coming? Absolutely nobody. The ICC is seemingly detached from the real world.) I'm just going to wait.
 
SLA said:
I'd love to see England have to go win a T20 in Afghanistan or somewhere in order to qualify for the world cup, or India to have to come to Scotland on a cold day in May. It would be fascinating.
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There's probably far more chance of Nathan Lyon scoring a Test century one day than something like that happening ever. Heck they even changed the format of the ODI World Cup back to quarter finals after the financial fallout from them being knocked out early by minnows along with Pakistan in the 2007 tournament.
 
Kram81 said:
There's probably far more chance of Nathan Lyon scoring a Test century one day than something like that happening ever. Heck they even changed the format of the ODI World Cup back to quarter finals after the financial fallout from them being knocked out early by minnows along with Pakistan in the 2007 tournament.
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Which is exactly the problem. Cricket is run exclusively by shortsighted, money grubbing idiots with no sense of integrity or ability to see the bigger picture.

Can you imagine a football world cup without England? Oh wait, it happened in 1994, and the world didn't end. As corrupt as FIFA are, at least they're smart enough to realise that an obviously fixed competition in which the popular teams are simply given byes to the final stages is utterly meaningless and will soon lose the interest of fans and seriously undermine the credibility of sport as a whole in the long run.

If the cricket world cup had been run as a serious world event these past 30 years instead of as a boring in-house fundraising effort it would be many, many times larger in terms of fans and revenue than it currently is and cricket as a whole would be in a much healthier situation.
 
I agree with SLA on this, due to cricket tours historically being on an invitation basis the culture is "who do we want to play" not "how do we ensure we play everyone". The "who do we want to play" ethos has been taken over by $ where the more powerful countries by and large can dictate where and when they will play (if they choose to) and how many games which means the remaining sides have to find ways to make up for the shortfall in revenues (i.e. more short format games).

The ICC if it had any power would dictate that all tours need to be 3 T20s, 3 ODIs and 3 Tests at a minimum and all sides must adhere to a FTP with home and away fixtures (neutral venues where external factors prevent play). The test rankings would then get the relevance that they were originally intended to have and no series will go into overkill (another SL ODI series anyone?). No doubt people will ask "where will the money come from?", well sponsors don't dictate playing schedules to other sports so why should cricket do the same? The other thing that always comes up is "they're not good enough to play us!" well Man Utd still has to play the likes of Hull City and no one seems to be complaining.
 
Test cricket is going well. It's a very different product from t20 or ODIs. The thing is, with games taking 5 days and tours months, we're limited on how many different countries we can play. Nonetheless, the ICC needs to be growing the game. Ireland, the Dutch, Afghanistan et al should all be playing test cricket. If not against India, England, Australia and SA then amongst themselves and Zim, Ban and WI. (who, with performances over the last 18 years have lost the status of a being a marquee test nation). There should be a component in the FTP that relates to having the play those sides adjacent to you on the test ladder. Create an incentive to work up that list. Or create a tier system modeled somewhat from the David Cup system. Create prescriptive requirements about play X sides from tier 3 and X from tier 2 per rotation, but allow flexibility for the traditional bilateral series.
 
Hosting even a short bilateral series costs money, and Zimbabwe Cricket have shown time and time again what happens when that money is mismanaged. It's easy for us observers to say who should be playing who and how often, but what does a Board (ZC) do when they can't even host a team who have volunteered to pay for their own logistics (Afghanistan)? For teams like Pakistan, who suffer a lot not being able to play at home, I get why some series are so limited-overs-heavy.

Relating back to the issue of tiered Tests, what would happen to capable but low-ranked like the West Indies and New Zealand if they are tiered with Bangladesh, Zimbabwe, Ireland, Afghanistan, and even the remaining Intercontinental Cup teams? A comment on the Cricinfo article made a point that the WICB and NZC rely on high-ranking touring teams to generate interest and profits for the hosts. Sadly, as is the state of our meritocratic world, interest and profit won't be the same for the lower-ranked teams. Think about it: we effectively already have a tiered system with the ten Full Members and the next eight in the Intercontinental Cup -- it just isn't working properly. A re-tiered system has to be planned very carefully to ensure that there is occasional cross-promotion, so that WI and NZ continue to challenge -- and beat -- the higher-ranked Sri Lankas, Englands, and Australias.
 
SLA said:
Which is exactly the problem. Cricket is run exclusively by shortsighted, money grubbing idiots with no sense of integrity or ability to see the bigger picture.

Can you imagine a football world cup without England? Oh wait, it happened in 1994, and the world didn't end. As corrupt as FIFA are, at least they're smart enough to realise that an obviously fixed competition in which the popular teams are simply given byes to the final stages is utterly meaningless and will soon lose the interest of fans and seriously undermine the credibility of sport as a whole in the long run.

If the cricket world cup had been run as a serious world event these past 30 years instead of as a boring in-house fundraising effort it would be many, many times larger in terms of fans and revenue than it currently is and cricket as a whole would be in a much healthier situation.
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Have to agree on the whole but i do say never allow you morals to overcome a profit. harsh i know but someone has to pay for the game and soccer (football) is not a good example as FIFA are surely corrupt and there is a massive world majority totally hooked on the game.
Having 6 teams to a tier for long form game cricket rather than 8 would keep the tiers more competitive and the movements of teams more unsure. Simply if it is just not a chance that Australia or England could drop from the top tier then the system fails.
I agree that all teams must have play offs for the world cup finals, but T20 should become a purely franchise game only and have a clearly defined season in each country.
 
nairbe said:
Have to agree on the whole but i do say never allow you morals to overcome a profit. harsh i know but someone has to pay for the game and soccer (football) is not a good example as FIFA are surely corrupt and there is a massive world majority totally hooked on the game.
Having 6 teams to a tier for long form game cricket rather than 8 would keep the tiers more competitive and the movements of teams more unsure. Simply if it is just not a chance that Australia or England could drop from the top tier then the system fails.
I agree that all teams must have play offs for the world cup finals, but T20 should become a purely franchise game only and have a clearly defined season in each country.
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Yes, but why sacrifice huge long term increased profits in favour of marginally greater profits in the short term. Even from a purely profit-maximising point of view its stupid. By running cricket as a closed shop for so long, the ICC has killed off any serious chance of it growing into a world sport up their with soccer. Think of all the revenues they have lost! However, it is not too late to get their act together and reverse things.

IMO, there should be no more friendly games of cricket at all. There should be scheduled test tours as part of the 5 year test championship, qualifiers for the 50 over world cup followed by a 4 week finals, and qualifiers for the 20 over world cup followed by a 4 week finals.

The only problem with having a 6 teams in the top tier is that the teams that miss out will suffer a serious loss of revenue and traditional fixtures might be lost. You might not see an Aussie-NZ test series, an England-WI test series, or a India-Bangladesh test series for decades. Presumably the top 6 would be Aus, Eng, SA, Ind, Pak, SL, then the 2nd set would be NZ, WI, Ban, Zim, Ire, ?

I think 8 or even 9 would be better so that NZ WI and possibly Bang aren't unfairly excluded; after all the idea is to expand the game, not contract it. Bangladesh has a big enough population and cricketing tradition that there is not reason they could not improve quickly with investment in coaching and infrastructure.
 
SLA said:
Yes, but why sacrifice huge long term increased profits in favour of marginally greater profits in the short term. Even from a purely profit-maximising point of view its stupid. By running cricket as a closed shop for so long, the ICC has killed off any serious chance of it growing into a world sport up their with soccer. Think of all the revenues they have lost! However, it is not too late to get their act together and reverse things.

IMO, there should be no more friendly games of cricket at all. There should be scheduled test tours as part of the 5 year test championship, qualifiers for the 50 over world cup followed by a 4 week finals, and qualifiers for the 20 over world cup followed by a 4 week finals.

The only problem with having a 6 teams in the top tier is that the teams that miss out will suffer a serious loss of revenue and traditional fixtures might be lost. You might not see an Aussie-NZ test series, an England-WI test series, or a India-Bangladesh test series for decades. Presumably the top 6 would be Aus, Eng, SA, Ind, Pak, SL, then the 2nd set would be NZ, WI, Ban, Zim, Ire, ?

I think 8 or even 9 would be better so that NZ WI and possibly Bang aren't unfairly excluded; after all the idea is to expand the game, not contract it. Bangladesh has a big enough population and cricketing tradition that there is not reason they could not improve quickly with investment in coaching and infrastructure.
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Yes good points but, short term profit and power are always more important to these people than the real best interests of the game. You only need look at the behaviour of the BCCI to realise this. I do not support the position but rather recognise it's existence.

The idea with 6 teams is that over a set period teams play each other then the bottom team or even two go down and the top teams from the next division go up allowing for improvement. There is no certainty that say WI may not end up even lower if they don't perform. It also allows teams like Ireland the incentive to develop with the carrot of top test level there to work at. If each team played three series per year then every two years rotations could be made.
 
I take it all back, the ICC today announced they will dismantle the FTP with immediate effect and after a period of straight back to back increasingly surreal Ashes series, test cricket will be discontinued.
 
SLA said:
the ICC today announced they will dismantle the FTP with immediate effect...
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woah woah woah. The signs aren't good, but this hasn't actually happened yet -- everything that has been reported in the last 18 hours has been in draft reports not yet approved or implemented by anyone. The next scheduled ICC meetings are on January 28 and 29, where everyone is hoping sanity will prevail.
 
troll3y said:
woah woah woah. The signs aren't good, but this hasn't actually happened yet -- everything that has been reported in the last 18 hours has been in draft reports not yet approved or implemented by anyone. The next scheduled ICC meetings are on January 28 and 29, where everyone is hoping sanity will prevail.
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well put it like this, if it hadn't been for the leak it would have happened 100%. If we all create enough fuss between now and Jan 28th, there is only a 95% chance that they will destroy cricket forever.

I suggest we all start practising our baseball pitching, because cricket will soon be no more.
 
NZC has voiced its support for the proposal, only CSA has come out against it.

I guess in NZ baseball will come in sooner rather than later.
 
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