The final is all that’s left to be played, and we still don’t know what the next edition of the World Test Championship will look like, with the longer term make-up of the competition in even greater doubt.
This week came more information that only served to muddy the waters further, with a report in The Telegraph saying that changes for the next cycle could include bonus points for big wins, with the worth of each win depending on the strength of the opponent, the margin of victory, and whether the game was home or away. This is a competition already labelled “utterly confusing” by England Test captain Ben Stokes, and in response, a solution that would make it much more complex.
The practicalities and details are yet to be laid out, and whether this would supplant or complement a mooted two-tier system is unclear. But cricket already has - and in fact still has - an opaque ranking system taking into account strength of opposition and controlling for the number of games played. The WTC was designed, in part, to replace it, and now finds itself in danger of becoming more and more like it.
There are several competing aims here, some of which serve as smokescreens for others. ‘Fairness’ is one, which is a way of saying, ‘How did South Africa get to the final? We need to make that harder next time.’ It’s true that the Proteas had a schedule on the easier side, playing India at home and avoiding Australia (and England, though whether that’s a caveat is up for debate). It’s also true that they excelled in winning seven in a row to reach the final, and that beating Bangladesh away is more than England or the Aussies managed on their last trip there. Awarding more points for better teams is effectively England, Australia and India wanting to reward themselves for playing just under half of their schedules against each other every time.
Simplicity should be another aim, and what we have now does feel somewhat unsatisfactory. ‘Points won per points contested’ doesn’t exactly trip off the tongue, and can skew how the table looks. A situation is conceivable where Team A is above Team B, each with one game left to play, only for both sides to win and for Team B to leapfrog Team A. But an easy-to-follow intuitive system is a nigh-on unachievable goal. Some degree of imbalance is effectively baked into the competition.
If you were starting from scratch, a structure with everyone playing everyone either home or away in a three-Test series across four seasons would seem logical. But as it stands that’s impossible for two reasons. First, India and Pakistan don’t play bilateral cricket, a hurdle to everyone playing everyone. Their last Test was in 2007, and tensions have only been made more strained by India’s refusal to visit Pakistan for the Champions Trophy. Playing in a neutral venue could be a solution, but right now who is driving towards it?
The second is less serious but, in a way, trickier to solve. Everyone’s series becoming three Tests long might be unattractive for those outside the Big Three, who have generally favoured two-Test encounters. But for India, England and Australia, reducing their marquee summers by two games is unthinkable. Even if you say that only three of the five Tests will count towards the WTC table - and imagine what would be said about the competition if England were to win the Ashes 3-2 and somehow claim fewer WTC points than Australia - you’re still left with the issue of squeezing in the other series in that season. England, for one, have never played eight Tests in a home summer, as they would need to if playing five against Australia or India and then three against someone else.
So where does that leave the World Test Championship? Still, somehow, despite everything, not in an awful position. The most recent cycle was its best yet, with five teams in the hunt until the final rounds and a slew of surprise results showing anyone can beat anyone on their day. The worry is that, unless those in charge accept its necessary limitations, that each iteration will bring with it an attempt to solve problems that can’t be solved, diminishing what we do have in the process.
