The recently conclude Jat Paints Cup between Australia and
Sri Lanka and the Investec Test series between Pakistan and England have opened
up a much debatable topic… Are Australia or any other team who reach the that
spot in the rankings table, really worth of that?
Cricket
is a challenging game. And of that, Test Cricket is the most challenging. And
to reach the No.1 spot in the ranking table means you have great talent and are
a great force to be reckoned with. That was evident from the Australia of the
late 90s and early 00s. They were a force, batsmen were playing ODI type
batting and bowlers were busy taking wickets and they had 2 stretches of 16
consecutive wins to go with that. But now no team in recent times has been able to
match to that superiority and the dominance they showed in world cricket for
almost a decade.
In the
present day, a stretch of 2-3 home series will give you a chance to rise up in
the table the reverse of that would also give you the reverse. Australia who
came in as the No.1 side and also with the stat that Sri Lanka have beaten Australia
just once in their test career span and crumbled in the Asian tracks and just
gave 3 more wins easily (excluding the 3rd test 1st
innings).
From the start of 2013, out of 33
series between the top 7 teams, (India, Australia, England, Pakistan, Sri
Lanka, New Zealand and South Africa) 6 series have been won by the touring team
and 7 series have ended in a draw. That leaves the rest 20 series which have
been won by the host team. And the 6 winners were like AUS in NZL and RSA, IND
in SL, PAK in SL, like that where the conditions for the touring team was more
or like their home conditions.
Till the last decade or so, there
was enough space in the Future Tour Programme so that each touring team played
2-3 practice games before they took on the Host nation. Now the tour games are
almost not being held with the exception of England and Australia giving teams some
1-2 tour games. The tour games would play great importance in helping the
players to get adopted to the conditions and get knowledge of the pitch
conditions.
Without the tour games, the
visitors feel alien to the conditions and before they adapt to the conditions
the hosts would have clinched the series or gained an upper hand in the series.
With that advantage the hosts win the series to rise up in the table and the
visitors go down.
So this may give the teams an
idea in the future that to maintain the No.1 spot they need to organise more
and more home series instead of playing overseas tours. A Part of that may be
due to the ICC system of rankings and points allocation procedure.
To change this scenario, a slight
modification in the rating allocation can be done as follows:-
+5 points: Away win against HR
side
+4 points: Home win against HR
side
+3 points: Away win against LR
side
+2 points: Draw against HR side (with
3/4 innings completed)
+1 point: Home win against LR side
0 points: Washout or drawn
matches with only 1-2 innings completed
-1 point: Away
loss against HR side
-2 points: Draw against LR side (with
3/4 innings completed)
-3 points: Home loss against HR
side
-4 points: Away loss against LR
side
-5 points: Home loss against LR
side
Bonus:
+1 point: Innings victories against HR side.
+2 points: Series win against HR side.
Penalty:
-1 point: Innings loss against LR side
-2 points: Series loss against LR side
HR: Higher Ranked
LR: Lower Ranked
Rating points to be halved by the
cut-off date...
If the ICC decides and implement
this scenario, the teams would be more concentrated on winning and keeping
their spot even home or away and ICC should intimate all boards to keep tour
games as a mandatory for all the tours. If these can be implemented, then we
can have a great duel on the pitch instead of the boring one-sided encounters.
Stat Source: http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/series/index.html
- Guha Karthikeyan
