How ICC plans to finish WTC next year amid COVID

Aiming to complete the World Test Championship cycle and host the final in June as per schedule, the ICC is contemplating splitting points for all those WTC bilateral series that had to be postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The matter is likely to come up for discussion at its Cricket Committee meeting next month, ESPNCricinfo reported.

According to the report, while one of the options is splitting points, the other feasible option could be considering the points for only those matches that will actually be played by the end of March next year.

Based on those matches till March, the final positions on the points table could be computed based on the percentage of points the teams have won from the matches that they have contested.

As of now, each series carries 120 points and depending on the number of matches, two, three, four or five, the points are distributed.

For a two-Test series, winner gets 60 per match and 30 for a draw. For a three-match series, it is 40 and 20 for win and draw. For a four-match rubber, it is 30 and 15 while for a maximum of five-game event, it would be 24 and 12 points.

"A significant number of Tests have been postponed this year because of the pandemic. In many cases, it isn't clear when they might be rescheduled to, let alone whether they can be squeezed in within this WTC league cycle, which concludes at the end of March 2021," the website reported.

The points split system that they are mulling will be distributing one third of the total points for the postponed series.

"Splitting the points would be within the regulations as they stand, whereby all Tests in the cycle that can't be played (through no fault of either side) are deemed draws. In that scenario, both sides receive a third of the points available for a Test (120 points are available for every series). Basing it on percentages of points played for would require a tweak to existing regulations," the report added.