Today, there are heavy qualifications placed on teams who desire to play Test cricket. The countries responsible for placing these restrictions are India, Australia and England. The first step to win Test status is to win the ICC Intercontinental Cup, which takes a nonsensical three years to play. Incidentally, Ireland have already won the "I Cup" a record four times. The winner of this tournament will then get the opportunity to play four Tests against the bottom-ranked Test nation in 2017. If Ireland win the "I Cup" and then the Test series, they will earn Test status. But the bottom Test team will not lose Test status if they are beaten by Ireland. This ludicrous, lengthy qualification period is not good enough for the Irish, who live in constant fear of losing more players to England such as Eoin Morgan and Boyd Rankin. Ireland have eight players already playing County Cricket in England. I understand that the ICC has to protect the playing standards and integrity of Test-match cricket, but the process is ridiculous. Have Zimbabwe or Bangladesh improved significantly since their admission? No, but both countries continue to play Test cricket. Maybe Test cricket standards have been weakened by the simple fact that since 2000, there have been 295 Test series with an astonishing 93 whitewashes. Obviously teams who lose the first Test in a series, tend to turn their toes up and get smashed. There are not enough first-class matches played between Tests for players to improve form and arrest momentum that is going against them.

The big question is if Ireland did win Test status, will they go along the same performance path as Zimbabwe and Bangladesh? Do the Irish like playing cricket? In 2011 Ireland had 25,000 registered cricketers. Now it has more than 50,000. Ireland has a domestic competition where it plays three-day, 50-over and Twenty20 cricket, but does not have first-class status as that is also dependent on ICC approval. Since Ireland's good performance in the 2011 World Cup, the growth of the game is huge and the kids are wanting to play cricket, with many schools making way for cricket in the curriculum. The Ireland Cricket Board is trying improve its infrastructure and governance by trying to build a quality first-class system with four teams. This is what they need for future success, along with maybe introducing two overseas players for each county to improve the standards and help future Test players develop. The ICB has already created a quality Cricket Academy to quicken the developments of its younger elite squads. The under-19 team play in the ICC under-19 World Cup and the board has 24 players on contract. ICB chairman Ross McCollum told me this week: "We want Test status and we are not there to make up the numbers. We want to hit the ground running and be very competitive. We are doing everything in our power to make this Irish team successful. We have employed Richard Holdsworth, who is our high performance manager, to make our representative teams successful. But we do find ourselves in the classic chicken-and-the-egg situation.

"For us to get the best coaches and the best first-class facilities we require, then we need to play Test cricket to attract sponsorship and media partner dollars. Cricket is on the up in this country and we need to play more International cricket, like 20 one-day internationals a year, in order for us to keep up with other countries around the world." I have enjoyed watching the Irish play. Their batting is very good. They struggle somewhat against spin, but that is an experience thing. The main weakness is probably with their bowling ranks, where their quicks need some improvement. Their fielding makes up for it, though, as they show plenty of skill and exuberance. Interestingly, the ICB fields many requests from overseas players wanting to take up Irish citizenship to play international cricket. Ireland is attracting many admirers around the world, such as Michael Holding, who believes Ireland should be granted Test status. Surely with a proper investigation by ICC officials they can award Test status to Ireland. Why do they have to go through this rigorous qualification process when they have already proved themselves against other associate teams? Ireland are a proud sporting nation and have played hard, tough and competitive cricket in this World Cup. What they have done already is brilliant, considering they have only played nine one-day internationals against Test countries over the past four years. Ireland need to play more one-day internationals against the big boys. Herein lies the problem for the ICC. None of the big boys want to play against themas their International calendars are quite full.

If the ICC continue with the policy of 14 teams playing in the next World Cup, then they must make it mandatory that full-membered teams play more ODI cricket against associate teams.