How can cricket nurture more competitive teams?
Ireland team after the England game
Can we move ahead to ‘slightly’ bigger problems in cricket that the usual once like is Test cricket is dying or why can’t Sub-continent teams play abroad, or why the Champions trophy wad dropped, or when would Sachin Tendulkar retire?
Test cricket has only eight top teams. The other two teams just play Tests to give batting practice to other eight.
Whereas, almost all other sports have more than 10 teams, Cricket cuts a sorry figure. We don’t need 10 or 12 teams; we need 15-17 or may be 20 competitive teams.
So, what should ICC do now? After 100 years of Test cricket, how will they find more teams?
The question are tough but the answers are super-tough.
However, there are few simple ways available to move in that direction. Not sure how much they can help, or how many teams they can produce, but it would certainly help improve the overall standard.
There are 3 kinds of teams – top 8, middle 2 (Bangladesh and Zimbabwe), and few lowers – vastly known as minnows. We can try upgrading the minnows to compete with tops in 2 possible ways.
Give minnow more big games
So, from where can we start?
Easiest way suggested by all – we can start by giving the minnows more matches, the big-matches. Every 8 lower team should get at-least 5 games against the top 8. ICC should include such fixtures in FTP itself. From opposite side, make every top 8 play at least 5 games against the lower 8 compulsorily. This way we will have teams from No. 11 to 18 playing 5 games against first 8.
Moreover, make Bangladesh and Zimbabwe each play at-least 2 series against lower 8.
This can be achieved by putting at least one extra game to the tour, like what Australia and England did before their ODI series. Both played an extra game against Ireland and Scotland. We can always invite a couple of teams from close by geographical areas to play a single game before the actual series starts. Like while touring England, Ireland or Scotland can be called, or while touring South Africa, Kenya can be called, or while touring sub-continent, Afghanistan (or even Nepal!) can be called.
Play minnows in domestics
Other possibility, which is not much talked about is, play the minnows in domestic cricket. Nations like India, Australia, England and SA have great domestic structures, which can help the minnows a lot. These also can be achieved in two ways. Either allow the smaller teams to play as an individual team or have 1-2 minnow team players in each domestic side.
Let’s take Indian domestic structure as an example, India has 27 teams divided in 3 groups based on their performances. India can easily accommodate 3 more teams. They can have Bangladesh (yes, they also needs to reach the top level yet!) in top group, Afghanistan in mid level group and UAE or Nepal in lower group.
This way all 3 teams can compete with their level for a whole season, and get guidance from the best of the players in the circuit. This will be even more helpful than what they are doing right now – playing against other for whole year.
Alternatively, for example, each domestic team has to have one minnow player in their team. Then we can accommodate 27 such emerging players. Just think, Mohammad Nabi playing alongside Harbhajan Singh in Punjab team, how much he will learn from the big buy’s experience?
A ton!
This way we can help to grow the players of minnows to almost the equal level of what we have in India. Though it will produce only 27 players and not 200 players which India will produce in the season, but that should be enough to start with.
Indian structure won’t get hurt by giving either kind of chance, but will only help the minnows to grow. Indian players may also learn a thing or two from these guys as well. Also, it may expand TV viewing and thus generating extra revenue for India as well.
By both of these ways, allowing minnows to play at the higher level, we can give them opportunity to learn, grow, and excel. They will lose most of their battles to the big guns, but then only they will learn from their mistakes. They will learn how the great teams work for a win, and they will learn almost every ingredient that is needed for a win. And maybe very soon, we will see more teams competing at the top level.
With more teams coming in the fold finally, cricket might emerge as a World Sport!