International Cricket Council (ICC) introduced the World Test Championship to garner interest from the fans back into Test cricket. The World Test Championship, just like other sporting events around the world has been affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.
In order to compensate for the series that could not take place and manage the points system, ICC has been looking at two options. Either the points will be divided for the games that did not take place or only those matches will be considered that are played by the end of March this year and base the percentage of points from them.
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The ICC cricket committee will meet next month to decide a viable option out of these two.
The World Test Championship cycle is due to end in March 2021, and it may well be impossible to schedule all the postponed matches within this time frame. The decision should be taken by December of this year.
Although the World Test Championship has not exactly worked like ICC would have wanted it to, ICC is keen to continue with the format in the upcoming years.
Ever since the start of the World Test Championship, the format of the competition has been a point of discussion among cricket experts and fans all over the world. The format introduced by the ICC had flaws, such as teams do not play the same number of matches and every team does not play against each other.
Splitting the teams seems like a viable option though, as the matches that could not be played will be considered as draws, hence, teams will share the points.
The other option of basing the points on a percentage system will require ICC to implement further changes and as a result, complicate an already complex format.
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Pakistan was supposed to play a two-match test series against Bangladesh, only one match was completed before the Covid-19 pandemic brought the cricketing world to a halt. Pakistan beat Bangladesh convincingly in the first test and was expected to win the second test as well, but if ICC decides to implement splitting off points, then that would surely have an effect on Pakistan’s ranking.
Things like this will have to be kept in mind before ICC reaches a conclusion. The final of the World Test Championship is set to take place at Lord’s next year. Soon after the final, the second World Test Championship cycle will start with India’s tour of England.
