Australia has displaced India at the top of the World Test Championship (WTC) as a fallout of the change in calculation of points for the inaugural edition because of the COVID-19 outbreak.
The International Cricket Council (ICC) Board on Thursday accepted the recommendation of the Cricket Committee and the Chief Executives’ Committee to not put any team at a disadvantage for being unable to participate in a WTC series due to the pandemic.
The Cricket Committee, chaired by former India captain and head coach Anil Kumble, recommended that the rankings be determined based on matches completed in the WTC cycle instead of total points earned. It has resulted in India, with a 75% score and 360 points in its kitty, being moved down to second behind Australia (82.2%, 296 points).
The top two teams at the end of the league stage in April 2021 are scheduled to face each other in the maiden WTC final at Lord’s in June.
Women’s T20 WC postponed
After the postponement of the Women’s ODI World Cup from 2021 to 2022, the ICC Board decided to postpone the Women’s T20 World Cup from the end of 2022 to February 2023. An ICC statement explained that the decision was to space out the events since 2022 will also have the Commonwealth Games.
“As there are currently no major women’s events scheduled to take place in 2023 the Board confirmed the switch for the T20 World Cup to better support player preparation and to continue to build the momentum around the women’s game beyond 2022,” read the statement.
Stalemate over ICC chairman
Meanwhile, it is understood that the stalemate over Shashank Manohar’s successor as ICC chairman couldn’t be resolved during the ICC Board meeting as the first round of voting remained inconclusive as per the regulations.
According to ESPNcricinfo, Greg Barclay of New Zealand had a 10-6 lead over interim ICC chairman Imran Khwaja of Singapore, but could not garner the prescribed majority of 11 votes.
The election will be extended and if Barclay doesn’t manage to get to 11 votes in the second or the third round, the incumbent Khwaja will be elevated as the first ICC chairman from an associate nation. The Hindu understands that the BCCI has been supporting Barclay’s candidacy.
