The ICC World Test Championship is creating new value in Test cricket. Indian head coach Ravi Shastri has recently advised one important addition in the points system of the World Test Championship.
In the limited-overs cricket generation, Test cricket is getting lesser value in many aspects. But the International Cricket Council (ICC) and many top international cricketers are desperate to save the Test cricket. Due to this reason, the ICC has introduced the World Test Championship (WTC) to make the Test cricket more interesting.
Top nine Test teams are participating in the inaugural ICC World Test Championship (2019-21). Only Zimbabwe, Afghanistan and Ireland are missing this tournament.
According to the WTC system, each team will play six Test series in the two-year cycle. All the six series will be against six different teams – three will be home series and the other three will be away series.
Each series can have the number of matches of two to five, according to the mutual agreements. Each match of this tournament has points as each victory, tie or draw provide the points to the teams. While each Test series have a maximum 120 points, the points in each game have been decided according to the number of matches in the Test series.
The detail of distributions of points in ICC World Test Championship is in below
| Matches in series | Points for a win | Points for a tie | Points for a draw | Points for a defeat |
| 2 | 60 | 30 | 20 | 0 |
| 3 | 40 | 20 | 13 | 0 |
| 4 | 30 | 15 | 10 | 0 |
| 5 | 24 | 12 | 8 | 0 |
At the end of the two-year cycle, the top two positioned teams in the points table will reach the final of this tournament. The final will be the one-off Test which Lord’s (London) will host in June 2021.
Ravi Shastri will be happier if the Test series victory under World Test Championship also provides the points
At present, India is on top of the points table of 2019-21 ICC World Test Championship. After completing one away and one home Test series under this programme, India have earned 240 points by winning five out of five games. Currently, there are no other teams in this table who have reached the 100 points mark.
However, Ravi Shastri feels that the series-winning points are missing in the Test Championship.
Shastri told TOI, “Right now we have a huge lead and that speaks volumes of how we have been consistently good as a team. I’d have been happier if the Test championship cycle had points for series win too. That’s missing. Let’s say if we’re looking at 120 points, 60 for Tests and 60 for winning the series — that would’ve been ideal.”
Earlier, Indian captain Virat Kohli has also brought an additional suggestion in the points system of the Test Championship. He feels that the away teams should earn double points for their every victory.