Lol, Platini - yes
We've discussed this before about rankings - I don't think the rankings are perfect, but I do think they are better that what you think
Anyway...will say this about the rankings system: when teams like Australia come out and say they are playing for the
#1 ranking, that gives at least some credibility to the rankings system. If teams and officials support the rankings by their words, that will help sell to the public that the rankings mean something. Of course, if there was a Test championship Australia would come out and say they wanted to win that too...but it's a start, and Test cricket needs something to play for. Don't know how many times I've read 'what's the point of Test cricket' by uneducated white-ball lovers - teams stating their aims helps answer that question.
Oh but please for the love of god scrap the T20 rankings quick smart, they are useless without more frequent series.
In a perfect world, cricket - test cricket doesn't need a ranking system as i always say.
Just lets go back to how things were from 1948-2002 when we had no ranking system and all erudite cricket fans and pundits during those 54 years always had a clear understanding of who the best team in the world was.
This is why we had many unofficial # 1 series such as Ashes 58/59, AUS vs WI 64/65, AUS vs WI 68/69, AUS vs SA 69/70, Ashes 72/73, AUS vs WI 79/80, WI vs PAK 87/88, AUS vs WI 90/91 and 92/93, AUS vs WI 94/95, AUS
vs SA 2001/02.
People assessed the state of international cricket before all those series and bestowed the # 1 tag on it before hand.
Between 95-2006/07 as you would agree nobody needed a point system to tell you AUS was the best team in world, it was that obvious.
But........I don't mind a ranking system, once they have a credible tournament in the sport that will eventually iron out the cobwebs of what essentially is a human formulated, computer generated system. Even in football, rankings aren't perfect. Up to recently England was ranked in the top 3 or 5 (can't remember exactly) & Brazil were ranked outside the top 10.The whole world accepted this as a major faux pas.
So in football, rankings are treated as a general easement of your strength - instead of the 100% gospel truth of your actual position, because come football world cup time & tournament qualifiers - the legitimate strength of all teams are well exposed.
Test cricket doesn't have that defining tournament & the rankings are treated as the gospel. In case you might have forget my friend, this is the basis of the test ranking -
ICC Test Championship - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
quote said:
The calculations for the table are performed as follows:
Each team scores points based on the results of their matches.
Each team's rating is equal to its total points scored divided by the total matches and series played. (A series must include at least two Tests).
A series only counts if played in the last four years.
Series played in the first two years of the three-year limit count half; essentially, recent matches are given more weight.
The bold is why the system is messed up & whichever human deduced that theory, does not understand cricket.
Not only that, cricket has a situation as we know (that will get worse now under the revamped ICC) of a stupid FTP, in which teams don't play each other home/away is structured manner. That factor is more important for determining the best test team (even without a test championship) - than a ranking system.
