The Beautiful Ugliness of the WTC...

And how the pig might have some lipstick applied.

Now that the IPL is in full swing it is, naturally, time to talk about Test cricket and the disfigured World Test Championship. At a recent meeting of the ICC’s Cricket Committee one of the challenges was to improve on the points system currently in place, a system England captain Ben Stokes described as “…utterly confusing.”

It is confusing, but probably not utterly. Any league in which the competing teams play a different number of matches, and not against all of the other teams, is confusing by necessity. There is no alternative to the basic concept of ‘averaging’ the aggregate of points to determine final positions.

As one of the world’s pre-eminent cricket statisticians, my old friend and colleague, Andrew Samson (aka ‘The Wizz’), says: “An ideal sporting competition has all teams in the league playing each other at home and away. It is rare in life for reality and the ideal to align. The WTC is highly unlikely to reach the ideal anytime soon.”

But…there will be changes for the 2025-2027 cycle which begins with India’s five Test tour of England in June, five days after Australia and South Africa have concluded the final of the current cycle.

In the first iteration of the WTC (2019-2021) 120 points were available for each series to reflect their different lengths. So, in a two Test series there were 60 points available for winning each match, 40 points in a three-match series and 24 in a five-match series. It was comically skewed in favour of teams playing – and winning – two match series and, therefore, heavily weighted against the ‘big three’ who play five Tests against each other.

In the two subsequent editions there have been 12 points available for a win and four for a draw. The final totals were divided by the games played to level the playing field. Except, as the Wizz points out, it’ll never be level while the big three are committed to playing each other over five Tests in every cycle and the small seven mostly play each other just twice.

Unlike most other ICC committees, the Cricket Committee almost exclusively comprises former players – from Sourav Ganguly to Mahela Jayawardene, Daniel Vettori, VVS Laxman and Shaun Pollock. The likelihood is that their suggestions will be implemented – provided that Jay Shah can be convinced that the changes will enhance India’s chances of reaching the next final.

There were three major topics of discussion: Extra points for ‘away’ wins, points for the losing team in close finishes and ‘penalty’ points for slow over rates. The current edition saw England penalised an absurd 19 points which obliterated their already slim chances of playing at Lord’s. Although penalties for slow over rates are likely to stay, the word is that ‘every effort will be made not to implement them.’

“There was a lot of talk about points for away wins, bigger wins and wins against higher ranked opponents. The 2023-2025 edition had an unusually large percentage of away wins – 30 of the 69 Tests were won by the visitors compared to 35 by the home team, so away wins counting more would have potentially changed the log,” says The Wizz. “Only four (all rain-affected) of those 69 Tests were drawn making attempts to encourage more attacking, result-oriented play seem moot. Also, how long will it take for people to realise that, if away wins are worth more than home wins, aren’t away draws also worth more?”

Tweaking the points system to reflect heavy wins and close losses might just keep more teams ‘alive’ for longer as the cycle comes to an end. There may also be adverse side-effects such as a team needing to finish within 50 or 100 runs of their fourth innings target in order to collect a critical consolation point – and then playing solely for that.

South Africa’s route to Lord’s on June 11 over the last 18 months was paved with ‘easy’ fixtures – two Tests against India, at home, and none against Australia or England. In the next cycle, however, they will play both Ashes rivals in three Tests in the same summer at home preceded by two Tests in India. There will be nothing easy about that!

** Please check out the Wizz’s consistently brilliant Substack – ‘The Notcher’s Natter.’

South Africa’ WTC fixtures 2025-2027:

2025

Oct/Nov – Pakistan, 2 Tests (away)

Nov/Dec – India, 2 Tests (away)

2026

Sep/Oct – Australia, 3 Tests (home)

Nov – Bangladesh, 2 Tests (home)

Dec/Feb – England, 3 Tests (home

2027

Mar – Sri Lanka, 2 Tests (away)