shashivardhan
Active Member
starts 24 th july
India In Zimbabwe
- Thread starter shashivardhan
- Start date
troll3y
Active Member
Very relieved that this tour is going ahead, but equally frustrated and annoyed that there are only ODIs. The trilateral series in the West Indies was riding off the back of the Champions Trophy for extra broadcasting revenue -- I understand that -- but why keep it going? With the exception of The Ashes, why is everyone insisting on playing series with only 50-over games? More importantly, why continue to starve Zimbabwe of top-quality opponents in the longer format of the game? Even two Tests would have sufficed! That would have been two more Tests than the paltry two that Zimbabwe are scheduled to play for the entire year.
To answer your question in the other thread, though: yes, India can win this series, and they're in the box seat to do so with Zimbabwe's imbalanced squad.
To answer your question in the other thread, though: yes, India can win this series, and they're in the box seat to do so with Zimbabwe's imbalanced squad.
futureblackcap
Well-Known Member
Agreed. It's because India don't seem to care about Test cricket anymore (unless it's the top four nations) and they normally don't care about the Associate nations or minor full members either. But at least Zimbabwe gets some different competition for a change.
Hoping Zimbabwe will give them a real shock.
Hoping Zimbabwe will give them a real shock.
shashivardhan
Active Member
I hope they do so.just 3 days left.hope zim wins atleast a match in the series
It's less to do with India's lack of interest in test cricket and more to do with Zimbabwe being a virtual cricket minnow. In reality there's not a lot of motivation for India and the BCCI to play Zimbabwe in a series of reasonable length mainly due to the fact that Zimbabwe will be uncompetitive and the coverage and earning potential for India is low.
It's the same for the other major nations. Australia, England, South Africa, New Zealand barely play against Zimbabwe or Bangladesh. It's been a long time since Australia took on Zimbabwe or Bangladesh in a test series.
futureblackcap
Well-Known Member
You may be right. But...if they are full member nations which they are, then they should be playing teams like Australia/South Africa/England/India on a semi regular basis otherwise, how are they supposed to improve?
You improve when you verse teams that are better than you or at a similar level. Bangladesh play Zimbabwe all the time but that's not going to get them up to the standard of the rest of the full member sides.
futureblackcap
Well-Known Member
In the first ODI, Zimbabwe bat first and made a modest 228 for 7. I don't know what the track is like but that shouldn't be much of a problem for a relatively unchanged Indian batting line-up. Good work by young Raza though, making 82.
That's how it should work but it doesn't. Like I said before, how often do you see the top ranked countries play sides such as Zimbabwe and Bangladesh? Australia hasn't played Zimbabwe in a home test series during the summer for about ten years (although that's mostly to do with Zimbabwe's exile from test cricket) and we've never played Bangladesh in our summer here. The simple fact to do with that is that both teams are rubbish and the revenue generated would be well down.
No-one would want to see Australia play Bangladesh in the Boxing Day test and that's why we'll probably never play them during our summer. We'll most likely play both in another "top-end" series again.
In fact I've just looked at the FTP and the next time Australia plays either one of those sides at home is in July 2018 when we host Bangladesh for a "top-end" series. We also play Bangladesh and Zimbabwe away between now and 2020 once each for a two-test series. If the ICC wants a true test championship to occur a program like this won't work.