Kevin Pietersen is Upset with the State of the Test Cricket

Kevin Pietersen

We all love to watch cricket but what happens when a high profile test match slips under your nose due to the lack of coverage from the media. The Betway ambassador Kevin Pietersen said that being a purist and reaching 100 test match caps in his career was one of his greatest achievements. He said that he was extremely upset about the fact that such an important test match series between the two giants was going on unnoticed and there was no conversation about it in the media and on social platforms as well.

Being a test match player himself, he said that there is a lot of hard work, sweat, blood and tears going into a test match career and making the longest format the best. He felt as if the interest in the format was vanishing and it was a matter of concern.

He even said that he understood the commercial structure of the shorter forms of the game and he was working on The Hundred and was thoroughly enjoying it but it was nothing compared to the satisfaction of having played 100 tests and that outweighed anything he achieved in the shorter formats. He says that he is very worried about the state of the test match. He even provided a solution for this and said that he would do what he can to save test cricket and proposed on social media that cricket in England needs to be franchised.

If the game is franchised it would increase the quality and popularity of the game. He said that the best teams or individuals would get to play against each other every week that would help them and also every team will get to play at least 8 to 10 matches every season. He even said that the people who won't be playing first-class cricket can play in minor counties and improve their gameplay. If the players are desperate enough for the game, they will break into the first-class category. He never settled for mediocrity and he said he won't even now.

According to him, there are a lot of first-class players in the country. He said England should be able to provide opening batsmen that come into international cricket and clean up but they haven't been able to because the standard of the country's cricket is rubbish, plain and simple. He said that the only way to improve this was if the best of the best players played against each other. He said that the test match has to be made popular again and that can only happen if they create an elite competition that people want to play in. he said that he had a lot of support when he proposed the idea but some dismissed this progressive idea and some didn't agree just because they disliked everything he said. According to him, it's their problem. He just has to bring back the interest of people in test cricket.

He also said that he had total sympathy with Ben Stokes withdrawing from the test series because the players were asked to do a lot and no one could handle that much pressure for the amount of money they were being paid. He said that there is a lot more cricket than there used to be and more than needs to be for the viewers alone! He said that players should be encouraged to pick their schedules if we don't want to see them dropping out of the game entirely like Stokes chose to do.