Grew up on Test cricket, still isn't over it. Writes about the game administrators would rather you not think about too hard.
· 6 min read
I enjoyed the medal, but sending elite cricketers into another short-format event illustrates a calendar that treats Tests as heritage décor. BCCI can afford to protect the long game; its reluctance is a choice, not an economic necessity.
· 7 min read
India’s crowded white-ball calendar is not evidence that every format is healthy. I want the board to stop using the Border-Gavaskar Trophy as proof of its Test commitment while starving the rest of the format of continuity and context.
· 7 min read
India’s red-ball decline will not be repaired by speeches about Test cricket while the domestic game is treated as audition footage. The Ranji Trophy needs protected space, better pitches and stars who occasionally remember where their technique came from.
· 7 min read
The Anderson–Tendulkar series showed that Indian players and audiences still care deeply about five-day cricket. That enthusiasm will mean little unless the BCCI gives home Tests better calendars, better pitches and the dignity of being an event rather than inventory.
· 6 min read
A poor result is not a reason to protect stars or compress the red-ball calendar further. If the BCCI wants Test cricket to remain valuable, it must reward preparation, domestic form and specialist skill even when those choices inconvenience the commercial machine.
· 5 min read
BCCI’s enormous domestic calendar looks impressive in a press release, but first-class cricket survives on visibility, pitches and player incentives—not on the number of fixtures alone.
· 6 min read
A huge domestic schedule is useful only if red-ball cricket remains a genuine route to India selection. The BCCI has built the structure; now it must stop treating first-class excellence as background scenery.
· 6 min read
A five-Test Border-Gavaskar series at home is welcome, but merely placing Tests on a calendar will not protect the format. BCCI must price, promote and stage red-ball cricket as a living public event rather than a heritage obligation squeezed between white-ball products.
· 6 min read
India cannot keep proclaiming its devotion to Test cricket while squeezing home series into television-friendly fragments. The BCCI has the money and leverage to make the long format feel consequential again.
· 6 min read
The BCCI’s commercial strength has not produced a similarly coherent red-ball ecosystem. If India wants Test excellence, domestic pitches, scheduling, player availability and selection must all reward the skills the format actually requires.
· 7 min read
India can field simultaneous teams and still call the schedule a success, but abundance is not the same as coherence. Test cricket needs protected time, rested fast bowlers and selection that tells players the format still matters.
· 7 min read
A strong domestic system cannot protect Test cricket if India’s administrators keep treating the format as prestige inventory rather than a living competition. I think supporters should judge the BCCI by the space it creates for Tests, not by ceremonial declarations of love.
· 4 min read
India won Asian Games cricket gold by 19 runs, but the real story is how Pakistan let a winnable final slip through sloppy hands — and extended a drought that now stretches back to a single bronze medal in 2010.
· 7 min read
India’s domestic schedule looks impressively vast, but volume is not the same as priority. If the Ranji Trophy is supposed to prepare Test cricketers, it needs coherent windows, better context and the country’s best available players.
· 4 min read
First a hockey stick, then a cricket bat: how India turned the closing days of the 2026 Asian Games into a two-sport demolition of its oldest rival — and why Pakistan is still waiting for its first-ever cricket gold at these Games.
· 6 min read
I celebrated India’s white-ball success, but the calendar and incentives still tell young players where power lies. If the BCCI wants Test cricket to matter, it must make the format a career rather than a patriotic side project.
· 7 min read
India’s rain-assisted passage in Asian Games cricket exposes the emptiness of treating a lightly contested tournament as another trophy parade. If the BCCI wants Olympic cricket to matter, it must stop approaching multi-sport events as branding inventory.
· 7 min read
An unbeaten 139 in Thiruvananthapuram put him level with Tendulkar on List A hundreds and one milestone behind him on the ODI run charts. It's time to retire the retirement talk.
