The mushrooming of leagues, together with the most recent providing of SAT20 and ILT20, is placing numerous stress on the ICC’s Future Tours Programme (FTP), resulting in an “alarming disparity” within the variety of matches performed by a minority of member nations which is neither “equitable nor sustainable”, it added.

While the Big Three — India, Australia and England — get the lion’s share of worldwide assignments, smaller Test-playing nations equivalent to Afghanistan, Ireland and Zimbabwe, amongst others, get a uncooked deal due to the extraordinarily tight FTP.

MCC stated the aim of the assembly held in Dubai, “was to examine how international cricket can be protected, amidst a global cricketing schedule that is increasingly filled with short-form franchise tournaments”, and “what global cricket might look like in 10 years’ time should it be left to evolve organically”.

“The men’s cricket schedule in 2023 is saturated with franchise competitions, which overlay and compete with the ICC Future Tours Programme (FTP) of bilateral international cricket, recently released until 2027. The only gap in the combined schedules this year is in October and November, when the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup takes place in India,” MCC stated in a press release on Friday.

“This pattern is repeated yearly, with fixed overlap between worldwide and franchise cricket, and the one clear air created for ICC Global tournaments. Of the home tournaments, solely the Indian Premier League instructions something like a window to keep away from worldwide clashes.

“Also notable in the new men’s FTP is an alarming and growing disparity in the amount of international cricket played by a minority of member nations compared to others; a situation which is clearly neither equitable nor sustainable.” The MCC stated that whereas the worldwide sport had by no means been in a “healthier position”, it added that the monetary windfall ought to percolated to each single ICC member nation.
“The committee felt strongly that the opportunity to better balance the global economics of the game must be seized now so that this current position of strength can help secure the sustainability of the international game for all ICC Member nations and future generations.”

ICC Women’s FTP could be very clear: MCC
The MCC lauded the ICC Women’s FTP but in addition urged boards to take learnings from males’s sport to make worldwide cricket extra sustainable for gamers amid rise of T20 leagues.

“Unlike the men’s version, the recently released first version of the ICC Women’s FTP until 2025 appears very clean and presents no overlapping of international and domestic leagues,” it stated.

“However, the (MCC’s) WCC (World Cricket Committee) urges boards to work collectively to seek out the optimum steadiness between the 2, taking learnings from the boys’s congested schedule, to make sure that the general workload for the sport’s finest worldwide feminine cricketers is sustainable.

“With women already seeing a heightened disparity of income in some countries between the franchise leagues and international cricket (versus men), and the consequential choices some are beginning to make to step away from international cricket, there are worrying signs of potential trends to come.” Imperative to discover a steadiness: Ganguly

Former India captain and WCC member Sourav Ganguly stated it’s crucial to discover a steadiness between franchise cricket and the top of the sport — Tests.

“I nonetheless imagine that Test cricket is the most important platform for cricket. That is the place you discover the nice gamers, and that’s the reason it’s referred to as a Test. It is a take a look at of talent.

“That should always continue to be the pinnacle and I am sure that countries will give importance to it and find the right balance between franchise cricket and Test cricket,” stated Ganguly.

Former Australia males’s head coach Justin Langer stated the delight of taking part in for the nation and landmarks achieved in worldwide cricket are immeasurable, and that’s the explanation Test cricket must be protected.

“The distinction between worldwide cricket and home T20 cricket is that the entire nation cares when their nation is concerned. The finest gamers’ statistics are measured at worldwide degree: everybody is aware of that (Sachin) Tendulkar scored 100 worldwide centuries and that Muralitharan took 800 Test wickets.

“We need to protect the integrity of Test cricket, and international cricket in general. It is how great careers are judged and it is where true passion and lasting memories are generated.”