Test cricket is dying, let's help save it

Pippen94

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T20 is good for people with a small brain and are just not smart enough for test cricket, Test cricket if you love cricket is so much more interesting and only the best are good at it.

All the best west Indian talents play t20 but anyway..
 
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But they are crap at test cricket just sh-t cricketers

I very much doubt that the likes of Pollard and Russell in particular, if they actually made long format cricket their focus, would be ‘crap cricketers.’
Dwayne Bravo has a test century and a test 6-for in Australia. Is he crap?

Joe Root and James Anderson have neither between them.
 

gbatman

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I think test cricket should remain as a 5 day game. I think the 5th day must be seen for what it originally was for and that is to increase the likelihood of there being a result. I think curators need to make sure that games are likely to end of the 4th day or early in the 5th.

Test cricket is dying has been a phrase thrown around for decades and there is a little truth to it but not a whole heap of truth.

The biggest killer of test cricket has been dull wickets and draws. Pitches need to maintain their character and Australia used to be one of the best places for that. The MCG was a little tricky but good to get in but could become two paces, now it's a road. The SCG used to spin and bounce but that has lessened. The Gabba used to seam and spin and bounce a little and has probably been one of few wickets to hold that up, Perth used to be hard, fast and crack and Adelaide used to be a batting paradise which deteriorated nicely for the bowlers to get a bit of variation and it has held up to that ok but probably isn't quite as it was.

I think the game needs to be promoted more, there is so much history in Ashes cricket yet I have heard so little about it this year. It's not advertised enough, it's not dramatised enough there is not enough lead up and build up to the series IMO. Promote it better.

I ask you, what turns you off going to the cricket? What don't you like about going to the cricket? What do you miss when you are at the cricket that you would have when you are at home or at a pub for example? The other area that needs to improve is the atmosphere and the experience of going to the match as to get more people to go to the ground. You can stay at home and drink what you want, eat what you want and sit in your favorite piece of furniture in comfort and watch the game on your big HD TV. Or you can go to the ground, spend too much on second rate food, terrible beer and sit in a hard plastic seat all day. Sporting events, even on TV look and feel better in a packed stadium. Spending the day at a stadium for the modern person who is used to eating and drinking better and living more comfortable than those 20 years ago, is not as appealing as it once was. We are more spoiled than we used to be, we are used to more comfort and more quality and modern stadiums have not caught up and adapted to the modern Australian.

Serve better food, good food is a big deal in terms of attraction, our diet has become more gourmet than it was 20 years ago. I love a pie and chips or a hotdog or whatever but that's not for everyone. Fix the food pricing, people don't want to pay a premium to buy food in a stadium after they have already forked out to get there. Fix the drinks, weak beer in plastic cups turns a lot of people away. Serving full strength beer at the cricket has been seen as an issue but perhaps there could be designated areas where you can drink your real VB or Draught or Craft beers or whatever you like. Sell padded covers that slip over the plastic stadium seats which make them more comfortable. Lower the ticket prices. I think getting people back in the stadiums by improving the experience and comfort there is crucial to saving test cricket. It needs an audience.

I like the Substitute. Players get hurt and it's not fair for a team to play a man down.

I like day night test cricket, people work more, they work more on weekends than they did 20 years ago, it gives them the option to watch the game. It gives people who play cricket to watch more of the game.

The other issue is money. I am not sure what test cricketers get paid but they need to be paid a premium for every game they play so we are seeing the best players out there and seeing players put more effort into their test game and hence, perform better on the test stage. Players who play tests should be making a lot more than T20 players, but are they? It seems blokes can just retire from test/first class cricket if they are going well at T20 and struggling at the other or when they get a bit older to prolong their careers. It's not good for the game if the test team is not genuinely the best 11 players in that country.

Get people back in the stadiums by making it a more comfortable and enjoyable experience. Fix the flat wicket issues so that there is an even battle between bat and ball. Get the players wanting to play test again and striving to play it well and hence improve the quality of the game as it's the players who make the game.
 
It’s India who dig their heels in and refuse to play
It's insane. They've developed great rivalries with Australia and England over the last twenty years and their greatest rival is ignored. It's like Hawthorn refusing to play Essendon or Geelong.
 

Seedsfan

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It's insane. They've developed great rivalries with Australia and England over the last twenty years and their greatest rival is ignored. It's like Hawthorn refusing to play Essendon or Geelong.
It would be the most watched test series of them all. It’s also exactly what test cricket needs

Will help Pakistan become a power again the money they could make together of the series. It also breaks up the reliance on the big 3.
 
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I think test cricket should remain as a 5 day game. I think the 5th day must be seen for what it originally was for and that is to increase the likelihood of there being a result. I think curators need to make sure that games are likely to end of the 4th day or early in the 5th.
I do not care if it four days or five. As long as it allows for 30 hours play across 4 days in a day/night Test it still a Test match to me.
When you say 5th day was originally for, you should note Test cricket also had a rest day at one point too so sometimes 5th day was really a 6th day pitch. So the day numbers is less important to me. What is important to me is a Test be 30 hours play at minimum and hopefully averaging around 15 overs an hour. When some teams get it down to only 11 overs an hour then officials need to step in and do something. But thankfully that point seems to have past. West Indies at one point were only bowling 11 overs and hour which was a farce. If someone only bowls 11 overs in an hour it more an outlier now rather than a trend a team goes with.
 

gbatman

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I do not care if it four days or five. As long as it allows for 30 hours play across 4 days in a day/night Test it still a Test match to me.
When you say 5th day was originally for, you should note Test cricket also had a rest day at one point too so sometimes 5th day was really a 6th day pitch. So the day numbers is less important to me. What is important to me is a Test be 30 hours play at minimum and hopefully averaging around 15 overs an hour. When some teams get it down to only 11 overs an hour then officials need to step in and do something. But thankfully that point seems to have past. West Indies at one point were only bowling 11 overs and hour which was a farce. If someone only bowls 11 overs in an hour it more an outlier now rather than a trend a team goes with.

Thats ok, but are we going to burn players out and retire and turn some away? No to longer days for me.
 
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Thats ok, but are we going to burn players out and retire and turn some away? No to longer days for me.
I think you forgetting there only ever going to be a few games of day/night Test matches each season.
It more the continued meaningless cycle of T20 cricket that more likely to burn any players out.
 

gbatman

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In what way? They play that many ODIs and that doesn’t bother them. Also less days means more rest.

Personally I would stick to 5 day test cricket

The fast bowlers are already scrambling to manage work loads and breaking down enough. Asking them to do longer days sounds like trouble. Can see a lot of poor all rounders getting played in this sort of cricket. Can see players retiring earlier. No doubt longer days are harder on the body.
 
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The fast bowlers are already scrambling to manage work loads and breaking down enough. Asking them to do longer days sounds like trouble. Can see a lot of poor all rounders getting played in this sort of cricket. Can see players retiring earlier. No doubt longer days are harder on the body.

Modern fast bowlers are bowling less than they ever bowled. Yes they play more games but they never bowl at training anymore. T20 bowling is like 4 overs which is hardly even a warm up.
 

gbatman

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Modern fast bowlers are bowling less than they ever bowled. Yes they play more games but they never bowl at training anymore. T20 bowling is like 4 overs which is hardly even a warm up.

What on earth are they doing at training then? Pretty sure they still do. Players are complaining about bowling too many overs a day in test cricket as it is, what's going to happen if you ask them to bowl more? Pretty sure if you put forward longer days and 4 day tests the players would reject it.
 
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What on earth are they doing at training then? Pretty sure they still do. Players are complaining about bowling too many overs a day in test cricket as it is, what's going to happen if you ask them to bowl more? Pretty sure if you put forward longer days and 4 day tests the players would reject it.

The bowlers are very much told what they can and can’t do at training. It is not the players complaining it’s the sports scientist. The coaches would have the bowlers doing twice their current workloads and swear on their heart they would get less injuries if they worked harder. The sports science guys think the opposite.
I would laugh at any bowler who said they were doing it tough these days, it’s bloody Hollywood how they have it now.
 

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I do not care if it four days or five. As long as it allows for 30 hours play across 4 days in a day/night Test it still a Test match to me.
When you say 5th day was originally for, you should note Test cricket also had a rest day at one point too so sometimes 5th day was really a 6th day pitch. So the day numbers is less important to me. What is important to me is a Test be 30 hours play at minimum and hopefully averaging around 15 overs an hour. When some teams get it down to only 11 overs an hour then officials need to step in and do something. But thankfully that point seems to have past. West Indies at one point were only bowling 11 overs and hour which was a farce. If someone only bowls 11 overs in an hour it more an outlier now rather than a trend a team goes with.
When I first heard four day tests suggested a few years back, the idea was to play them Thursday to Sunday. Partly so it would finish on a weekend rather than a Monday or Tuesday, when people are at work/school. But also because you would get a rhythm going, so a cricket fan could know that on any given Thursday, a test match would be starting. At the moment it's all a bit random, which doesn't help.
 

gbatman

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The bowlers are very much told what they can and can’t do at training. It is not the players complaining it’s the sports scientist. The coaches would have the bowlers doing twice their current workloads and swear on their heart they would get less injuries if they worked harder. The sports science guys think the opposite.
I would laugh at any bowler who said they were doing it tough these days, it’s bloody Hollywood how they have it now.

This is a side of cricket that warrants more discussion. Batsmen, particularly our batsmen don't seem to be as good as they were 15 years ago. Just seems to be less gun batsmen and consistency in batsmen around the world and our country.

Australia at it's best in my memory, the period in the late 90's early 2000's, we had a gun batting lineup and a gun bowling lineup. I was always adamant that our batsmen were so good because at training they were facing the world's best bowlers over and over again and they were used to that. IMO our super star bowlers made our batsmen the gun, all time greats they were. Ponting, Langer, Hayden, Gilchrist, Martin, The Waughs, Hussey, Symonds and Bevan all in the same era was phenomenal. We just produced all time superstars around that period but now we struggle to find anyone who comes close to their sort of quality. It probably had a lot to do with facing plenty of balls from McGrath, Gillespie, Lee, Warne, Kasprowicz, McGill, Bracken etc.

People go to test cricket matches to see the stars. It's the gun players who you want to see. If there are no real stars it's hardly worth going. The problem is that is where we are at, we have some star bowlers but the batsmen aren't that great. Who in our team could you not wait to go and see? Compare that to the team 15 years ago, you couldn't wait to see half of them because of their brilliance. IMO the quality of player test cricket is producing is a reason people are going off it. 15-20 years ago there were far more elite batsmen in the world at the one time and plenty of elite exciting bowlers. Compared to now it's chalk and cheese.

TBH we should have a serious look at how we were training back in the late 90's and early 2000's and bring that back. There weren't many injuries and cricket was as strong as it ever was. What ever we were doing then produced less injuries and a far better cricketer than whatever we are doing now.

I think what you are bringing up here is another issue. If you want 4 day tests, we need to piss off the sports scientists and maybe we need to do that anyway if we want a higher quality of cricketer who is going to bring people through the gates.
 
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When I first heard four day tests suggested a few years back, the idea was to play them Thursday to Sunday. Partly so it would finish on a weekend rather than a Monday or Tuesday, when people are at work/school. But also because you would get a rhythm going, so a cricket fan could know that on any given Thursday, a test match would be starting. At the moment it's all a bit random, which doesn't help.
Yeah, Thursday to Sunday makes complete sense.
The thing is, so far they have not played the day/night Tests over four days anyway. The been playing them over five.
The allocated playing time for a Test is 30 hours. Each day is three sessions of two hours each.
Imho, make the most of the night session to have it as long as it is in one day matches. Have it run from 6-30 pm to 10 pm. The two day sessions both two hours. The long dinner break before the night session begins each of the four days of a day/night Test. It just becomes four days of 7.5 hours each day to still have 30 hours traditional allocated playing time for a Test match.
 

The Passenger

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When I first heard four day tests suggested a few years back, the idea was to play them Thursday to Sunday. Partly so it would finish on a weekend rather than a Monday or Tuesday, when people are at work/school. But also because you would get a rhythm going, so a cricket fan could know that on any given Thursday, a test match would be starting. At the moment it's all a bit random, which doesn't help.
Pretty good idea at face value. Unfortunately with the five day system it won't work because they want 3 day breaks.

I'd prefer it kept to five days, but no problems with it dropping to four days, particularly if an extra 10-15 overs was added on each day. That would make it roughly 4.5 days of now and with properly prepared wickets there's no reason why the amount of draws should increase.

if it was 35 over sessions, each going for 140 minutes, that's an hour extra each day. 420 overs for a test. So only 30 less than current. Worth consideration I would've thought.

The six nations rugby works on game - game - break - game - break - game - game structure each year. No reason you could do the same for a home summer. Five tests (Ashes) would be the exact same, and six test summers could would just throw an extra game in between the two weekends off. The only issue - in the Southern Hemisphere - is working around public holidays but given the holiday nature of them it shouldn't cause too much confusion to shift games to the 26th Dec and 2nd/3rd Jan.

It would definitely help the crowds at the tail end of a test match. Day one and day two crowds are always pretty solid, particularly for big tests. Like you say, a nice cadence of knowing a test will start Thursday and end Sunday, will get the casual viewer's attention a bit more often. No more of "ooo s**t I forgot the test started today", which to be honest probably happens every now and then to seasoned cricketer watchers.

EDIT: The UK finishes some tests on bank holiday Monday's. Probably happens in other countries, but not aware of any of the top of my head. For those specific tests you could also alter for Friday to Monday.
 
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