Sachin Tendulkar echoes Kohli, Gambhir; opposes the idea of four-day Tests

Mumbai: The ICC’s proposal of reducing Tests from five days to a four-day affair has not gone down well with batting legend Sachin Tendulkar and the former India cricketer felt taking away the fifth day from spinners would be just like not allowing the pacers to bowl on the first day of a Test.

“Spinners look forward to bowling with the scuffed ball, taking advantage of day five of the roughs created on the wicket. All that is a part of Test cricket. Is it fair to take that advantage away from the spinners,” Sachin was quoted as saying by Mumbai Mirror?

“There is T20, it is one-dayers and then there are T10 and 100-ball cricket. The test is the purest form of cricket. It should not be tinkered with,” he added.

Sachin also felt that scrapping a day of Test cricket couldn’t be the solution to revive the longest format of the game and said the ICC should instead try to improve the quality of pitches.

“The ICC, in my view, should focus on providing quality playing surfaces. Let the ball do things - spin, seam, swing and bounce. It will automatically liven-up the game. It will also throw up more results. Currently, there are far too many dead games,” Sachin opined.

Earlier, former opener Gautam Gambhir and India skipper Virat Kohli were also not in favor of the ICC’s proposal.

Gambhir had termed the proposal “a ridiculous idea” and felt reducing a day from the original format would lead to more matches ending without any result. Meanwhile, Kohli too didn’t back the ICC’s idea and felt it was unfair to the ‘purest format of the game’. “Some felt said day-night Test cricket is the future, others felt better management of players’ fitness was the need of the hour. I also heard that cricket needs an ‘American marketing hand’ to make it more of a global game. When my turn came, I listed two aspects: lack of champion cricketers and lively pitches,” he added.

Earlier, India skipper Virat Kohli also didn’t favoured the ICC’s idea as he felt it was unfair to the ‘purest format of the game’.

According to Kohli, the concept of the Day-Night Test, which is already in place in world cricket, is the most that should be brought to commercialize the traditional red-ball cricket format.

‘According to my, it should not be altered. As I said, the day-night is another step towards commercializing Test cricket and you know, creating excitement around it, but it can't be tinkered with too much. I don’t believe so,’ Kohli had said on Saturday ahead of the three-match T20I series opener against Sri Lanka.

Meanwhile, South Africa pacer Vernon Philander and former Australia great Glenn McGrath had also raised objection against four-day Tests. (IANS)

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