By CricketCountry Staff
Former Sri Lankan captain Arjuna Ranatunga criticised the International Cricket Council and India for focusing too much attention on Twenty20 cricket at the expense of Test matches which is considered as the highest standard of the game.
Published: Apr 20, 2012, 04:19 PM (IST)
Edited: Apr 20, 2012, 04:19 PM (IST)
Arjuna Ranatunga chose to express strong words against ICC and BCCI for ignoring the importance of Test cricket © AFP
By CricketCountry Staff
Dubai: Apr 20, 2012
Former Sri Lankan captain Arjuna Ranatunga criticized the International Cricket Council and India for focusing too much attention on Twenty20 cricket at the expense of Test matches which is considered as the highest standard of the game.
“All the boards are controlled by India. If the ICC thinks that the World Test championship is not important and Twenty20 is important I am sure that they should check their brains. The biggest problem for them is that they are concerned about earning money only.”
“What is ICC? Do they have a single cricketer on their director board? When you take decisions on cricket, you need cricketers to take decisions. Presently the administrators who are taking decisions haven’t played cricket at all,” Ranatunga vented his ire towards ICC on the sidelines of the 13th Shyam Bhatia Awards on Wednesday.
The former Sri-Lankan skipper further slammed the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) for dominating decisions of other boards.
“India controls cricket and all the boards have spineless people. They don’t want to take a decision hurting India and it hurts cricket eventually. It is the bottom-line. People don’t realise the way it hurts cricket. The way India are heading now, I am telling you in two-three years’ time they’ll be really down in one-day and Test matches. They won’t be producing Gavaskars or Tendulkars or Dravids or Gangulys or Laxmans. They will produce some sloggers.”
He was also of the opinion that players are not doing anything good to themselves by pressurising their respective boards especially to be part of the Indian Premier League (IPL).
“For me the country comes first. We played at the right time. Good that we are not playing now. The West Indies board allowed their players to go and play the IPL, but the board went ahead and played Australia in the Test series. That is a good approach and they say whoever wants to stay back and play can play for the nation and whoever wants to play IPL and earn money can do that.
IPL is private franchise tournament so that should run differently,” he added.
Though Sri Lanka is scheduled to host the fourth Twenty20 World Cup starting in September, the World Cup winning captain is least interested in the shorter format.
