The ICC World Test Championship is going to start on August 1 and a feature that makes it unique is that it will not be played as a stand-alone tournament. The test championship consists of a number of tests played over a period of two years and a final match to decide the winner.
In 2009, the International Cricket Council has come up with the idea and approved it in the year 2010. The plans for hosting the championship have started in the year 2013. The tournament got postponed to 2017 and was canceled later. Finally, it was decided that the inaugural ICC World Test Championship will be played from August 1, 2019, to April 30, 2021.
Here’s everything you need to know about the tournament that is set to bring new meaning and context to bilateral Test cricket.
It will be contested over two-year cycles, the first of which starts on August 1 with the opening Ashes Test at Edgbaston. The group phase officially began on July 16, 2019, and will run until March 31, 2021, after which the top two teams will contest a final.
Nine of the 12 Full Member countries will contest in 27 series during the window. The nine teams are Australia, Bangladesh, England, India, Pakistan, New Zealand, South Africa, Sri Lanka, and West Indies.
It comes nearly a decade after the International Cricket Council (ICC) first approved the idea for a World Test Championship in 2010, and following two canceled attempts to hold the inaugural competition in 2013 and 2017.
Here is How Points Are Awarded:
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Distributions of points in ICC World Test Championship |
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| Matches in series | Points for a win | Points for a tie | Points for a draw | Points for a defeat |
| 2 | 60 | 30 | 20 | 0 |
| 3 | 40 | 20 | 13.3 | 0 |
| 4 | 30 | 15 | 10 | 0 |
| 5 | 24 | 12 | 8 | 0 |
ICC Test Championship Fixtures:
The fixture for the World Test Championship was announced by the ICC on 20 June 2018, as part of the 2018–2023 Future Tours Programme.
