David Morgan, the president of the ICC has said the concept of day and night test matches would be around the corner, sooner rather later. He said that he would be very surprised and disappointed if something like that did not happen in the next two years.
Test match cricket is struggling for its survival and there have been many ideas that have come forth to give it more context and meaning. One of those is to play it under lights so that those going to offices can watch the matches in stadiums, much like what had happened to ODI more than 20 years ago.
However, the major issue facing day and night cricket is that the ball cannot continue to remain red. The ICC will need to change the colour of the ball in order to make it more viable for the day and night games. Currently, the shorter format of the game uses the white balls for it, but given that the white coloured balls have to be changed after 34 overs to make it last will be a problem for the longer format of the game. Hence, there have been ideas of using a pink coloured ball for the same.
Morgan said, “I’d be surprised if we don’t see day-night Test cricket within the next two years, surprised and disappointed.”
He added that there were certain countries in the world which were made for day night cricket. Australia, for example, he said was a hot country and would find the idea of playing day and night cricket as very appealing. He also said that the day-nighters will not be relevant in countries like England, which possesses smaller grounds and cooler conditions, and hence will not find it too difficult to fill up the grounds in conditions during the day time.
He also refused to comment on how the test matches would be changed to give it more context. Especially, in the wake of the various suggestions that had been brought out by the experts which have asked for either a championship of test match cricket, or for the ICC to have a two-tier structure – both of which have considerable opposition from some of the countries due to various reasons.
He also said,
“It is interesting Test cricket has endured and I am sure it is going to continue to thrive. The ICC has recognised that in some countries Test-match cricket is not that popular in terms of people paying at the gate.”
It has been said that the West Indies first class cricket will see the pink coloured balls and day night games as a dry run for the same.
