In a post last month after the disastrous test series Down Under had ended, I had written about some of the issues that needed to be addressed in order to first arrest the decline, and then improve the stock of Indian test cricket. That post was named as Mission 2014 for the reason that India's next overseas tours come about in 2014 (and there are plenty - South Africa, NZ, England, Australia in 15 months followed by the World Cup), and the post talked about the more immediate and short-term measures that can be taken over the next 18 months or so. A lot has happened since that post, none bigger and more relevant than the retirement of one of India's greatest, Rahul Dravid (more about that in a seperate post). So India will need to have a new No. 3 in their next test (thankfully, it is six months away !) and maybe a new No. 5 as well (Laxman has yet to take a call). Thus, it is all the more relevant that those in charge of Indian cricket plan long term and look beyond 2014. These are some of the issues that they need to address:
a. Making domestic cricket relevant: This, of course, is a very generic statement and one that has been debated for many years. Lots of theories and suggestions have been thrown by various people on how the domestic cricket calendar needs to be revamped, the pitches need to be made more sporting etc etc. While most of it is true and makes sense, there are some other aspects of domestic cricket that I feel also needs addressing, some of them being:
- Get the international players to participate: This is one aspect where English and Australian cricket differs vastly from us. In England for example, only a squad of 12 is picked for home tests and on the day before the game, the 12th man is discharged from the squad and sent back to play for his domestic side while the test match is going on (substitute duties are done by a local player). Here on the other hand, we pick a squad of 14 for Tests in India and the remaining three do not have much to do apart from warming the benches. Its time we made it mandatory, to the extent possible, for the test match squad to play a couple of Ranji games every year. Imagine the effect it would have on a, say, Suryakumar Yadav from Mumbai to have a long parternship with Sachin in a Ranji game. If there are some ODI games in India going on along with a round of Ranji games, then I am even willing to have a couple of the regulars miss those ODIs and play a domestic game instead. (This is also the reason why I am a bit disappointed that Dravid will not be playing Ranji. The wisdom that he can impart to young batsmen from Karnataka from across 22 yards would have been priceless).
- Have a proper schedule: Currently, there is a tournament called the Deodhar Trophy going on. It involves the 5 zonal sides playing one semi-final qualifier, 2 semi-finals and the final over the space of 5 days. Quite what purpose this tournament serves is beyond me (and that too, just days after the regional 50 over tournament i.e. the Vijay Hazare trophy was completed !!). Also, the Irani Trophy at the start of the season does not make sense, ideally it should be at the end with the newly-crowned Ranji champs against the persons having the best records that season. And the Duleep Trophy needs to be in a round-robin, and not a knock-out format. Thus, I would have only the following tournaments in the domestic cricket calendar:
NKP Salve Challenger Trophy (round-robin) : October 1 - 15
Duleep Trophy (round-robin) : October 15 - November 20 (hopefully on fresher wickets)
Ranji Trophy group stage - December 1 to January 15
Ranji Trophy knock out stage - January 15 to February 10
Irani Trophy - February 15-20
Vijay Hazare trophy - February 25 - March 15
Indian Premier League - April - May
And surely, the BCCI with it clout can look to ensuring that international committments are in sync with these dates.
b. Where is the Indian U-23 side ? In his biography of Mohammed Azharuddin, Harsha Bhogle talks about the India Under-25 side that toured Zimbabwe in 1984. It was captained by Ravi Shastri (already an established Test cricketer then) and current and future test players like Sidhu, Srikkanth, Azhar and Maninder Singh. Also in those days, every touring side used to play against the U-25 side before the test matches. Sadly, that tradition has been dispensed with. Except for the Emerging Players tournament in Australia, there is hardly any platform for the future Indian test cricketer to perform. This needs to change. An Under-25 or Under-23 side needs to play on a regular basis, either against touring sides or taking seperate tours to England, Australia and the like. Another interesting experiment worth doing is to have an India Under-19 squad play in the Duleep Trophy.
These are just some suggestions that, I think, would help great a strong base for Indian cricket to be succesful, not just in 2014 but also in the years ahead. They only need to look at Australia for inspiration in how to have a sound domestic structure that allows them to bounce back when their greats bow out of the game.
Cheers
Amit
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