an open letter
Jan. 14th, 2006 12:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
boodieDear respected and esteemed members of the ICC,
In light of last nights embarrassing and highly unentertaining One Day International between Australia and Sri Lanka, I have been pondering with much thought what could be done, and the answer is this, you split the One Day teams into two tiers, two teams of five, Tier A and Tier B, with only member of Tier A playing each other, and the Tier B teams would only play amongst themselves, at the end of the cricketing season, the lowest team in Tier A, plays agaisnt the highest Team in Tier B, if the the Tier B team wins they get a place in Tier A, and the losing Tier A team gets relegated to Tier B for the next season.
This way teams that are more evenly matched get a chance to play regularly agaisnt like skilled teams, and a chance to improve their skills, which does not happen when say a team like Bangladesh plays someone like Australia, all that happens is that their lack of talent and skills is highlighted in a most embarrassing way, (and yes I know Bangladesh defeated Australia once, but that was an aberration and hasnt been repeated since).
This is the current list of ODI rankings taken from your website,
Matches Points Rating
1 Australia 31 4200 135
2 South Africa 27 3197 118
3 Pakistan 34 3955 116
4 New Zealand 32 3590 112
5 India 40 4348 109
6 England 27 2920 108
7 Sri Lanka 33 3473 105
8 West Indies 22 1980 90
9 Zimbabwe 23 1012 44
10 Bangladesh 23 322 14
I would however swap England for India, as you can see India played far more games than England and still only managed to be one point in the ratings above England, this is due to Indias' habit of playing many many more matches agaisnt the bottom three teams than anyone else, thus inflating their rankings with 'easy' victories.
So therefore Tier A would consist of
Australia
South Africa
Pakistan
New Zealand
England
Tier B
India
Sri Lanka
West Indies
Zimbabwe
Bangladesh
Now in light of this, I know that certain countries would be losing revenue since they would no longer have the draw card of hosting the top teams in their countries, but they would all have a well defined goal to work towards, making their way OUT of tier B, and those in Tier A would also have an extra goal, that of not being relegated.
And that brings me nicely to the same sort of Tiering system for Test Cricket, no one wants to see a Five series whitewash of Australia playing Zimbabwe again, so once again we split it into two Tiers
Tier A
Australia
India
Pakistan
England
New Zealand
Tier B
South Africa
Sri Lanka
West Indies
Zimbabwe
Bangladesh
Given that ranking, you can bet that the test series to decide the winner between New Zealand and South Africa, would be an absolute doozy and a sold out one at that, with what would be at stake, the public would see the cricket it deserves, with the excitment that is so often lacking in the current lot of mismatched one sided ODIs and Tests that we are lumbered with.
Yours Sincerely,
A Cricket Fan.
In light of last nights embarrassing and highly unentertaining One Day International between Australia and Sri Lanka, I have been pondering with much thought what could be done, and the answer is this, you split the One Day teams into two tiers, two teams of five, Tier A and Tier B, with only member of Tier A playing each other, and the Tier B teams would only play amongst themselves, at the end of the cricketing season, the lowest team in Tier A, plays agaisnt the highest Team in Tier B, if the the Tier B team wins they get a place in Tier A, and the losing Tier A team gets relegated to Tier B for the next season.
This way teams that are more evenly matched get a chance to play regularly agaisnt like skilled teams, and a chance to improve their skills, which does not happen when say a team like Bangladesh plays someone like Australia, all that happens is that their lack of talent and skills is highlighted in a most embarrassing way, (and yes I know Bangladesh defeated Australia once, but that was an aberration and hasnt been repeated since).
This is the current list of ODI rankings taken from your website,
Matches Points Rating
1 Australia 31 4200 135
2 South Africa 27 3197 118
3 Pakistan 34 3955 116
4 New Zealand 32 3590 112
5 India 40 4348 109
6 England 27 2920 108
7 Sri Lanka 33 3473 105
8 West Indies 22 1980 90
9 Zimbabwe 23 1012 44
10 Bangladesh 23 322 14
I would however swap England for India, as you can see India played far more games than England and still only managed to be one point in the ratings above England, this is due to Indias' habit of playing many many more matches agaisnt the bottom three teams than anyone else, thus inflating their rankings with 'easy' victories.
So therefore Tier A would consist of
Australia
South Africa
Pakistan
New Zealand
England
Tier B
India
Sri Lanka
West Indies
Zimbabwe
Bangladesh
Now in light of this, I know that certain countries would be losing revenue since they would no longer have the draw card of hosting the top teams in their countries, but they would all have a well defined goal to work towards, making their way OUT of tier B, and those in Tier A would also have an extra goal, that of not being relegated.
And that brings me nicely to the same sort of Tiering system for Test Cricket, no one wants to see a Five series whitewash of Australia playing Zimbabwe again, so once again we split it into two Tiers
Tier A
Australia
India
Pakistan
England
New Zealand
Tier B
South Africa
Sri Lanka
West Indies
Zimbabwe
Bangladesh
Given that ranking, you can bet that the test series to decide the winner between New Zealand and South Africa, would be an absolute doozy and a sold out one at that, with what would be at stake, the public would see the cricket it deserves, with the excitment that is so often lacking in the current lot of mismatched one sided ODIs and Tests that we are lumbered with.
Yours Sincerely,
A Cricket Fan.
