The first Test between England and Sri Lanka was over inside three days and former England captain Michael Vaughan believes the ICC should be deeply concerned.
Too many lacklustre Test matches are being played according to Vaughan who cited the Australia-West Indies series in the summer as a prime example.
“I don’t think anyone watched that. It was garbage,” Vaughan said on BBC radio.
“You knew exactly what the result was going to be because it was a complete mismatch.”
Vaughan believes three divisions of four teams need to be created with a promotion and relegation system in place. Under his revised schedule each team would play each other four times with two home and two away tests.
“The iconic series of England-Australia and Pakistan-India aren’t in the same league, you’ve still got scope for that because England sometimes play 17-Test matches a year so 12 Tests would be guaranteed and then you have promotion-relegation.”
Currently, the England and Sri Lanka series is trialling a points system that was first introduced to women’s cricket. It gives different point values for an entire tour with Tests, one-dayers, and Twenty20 matches included to decide an overall winner. Vaughan isn’t convinced that it’s the right way forward.
“Yeah, the points system’s been brought in, four points for a (Test) win, I mean I didn’t hear at the end of the Test match at Headingley that England had gone four points up in the series. It was England are 1-0 up in the series.”
Disco Stu
Guest
This is a very interesting idea if they could make it work. One of the strangest aspects of cricket, particularly if one was an outsider looking in, is that there is a seemingly pointless rotation of matches. One country plays another, then they move on. Sure there are the perpetual trophies like the Ashes and the Border - Gavaskar trophy etc, but most sports have some sort of annual pinnacle, like a premiership or a world title. I love test cricket and I could happily sit and watch all 5 days, but I'll be honest I wouldn't spend any time watching two other countries play. However, if the international cricket 'season' was approaching completion and we needed, for example, England to lose to India for Australia to make the grand final it would make that match far more interesting for an Aussie.