Amid the ongoing idea about shortening the number of days of Test cricket, former England captain Mike Gatting on Tuesday opposed by saying that five-day Test cricket is unique. He, meanwhile, stressed that the current format has more possibility of having results than the proposed four-day format.
“If there’s less Test cricket fine, but I will be very, very opposed to getting rid of Test cricket, it has to be five days,” Gatting said at the launch of the Tendulkar Middlesex Global Academy DY Patil Sports Centre in Navi Mumbai as quoted by IANS.
“Test cricket is unique, we keep saying it day in and day out. Sadly, it’s the administrators who don’t play, who understand that they have a problem in scheduling I suspect. Therefore, they don’t understand what a unique game Test cricket is.
“So, it’s good to have a chat, let’s talk about it so that people can understand both sides of the story,” he added.
Gatting feels that it is the administrator’s inefficiency in scheduling Test matches that has given rise to the very idea of shortening the format. He asked the administrators to focus on how the promotion of the longest format can be improved.
“Let’s talk about what are the areas we might actually try and improve the promotions of Test cricket and ways of making it a little better to fit it in the schedule,” said the former England captain.
Gatting represented England 79 times in Tests scoring 4409 runs laced with 10 centuries and 21 half-centuries. His best score is 207.