BCCI SGM

India to host 81 more home games during 2019-23 cycle

by Cricbuzz Staff • Last updated on

Kohli had expressed his reservation about the amount of cricket India plays. © BCCI

Indiawill host 81 more home games in the 2019-23 cycle but the number of days have been reduced, it was decided at the Board of Control of Cricket in India Special Governing Body meeting on Monday (December 11).

The total number of playing days relating to the 2019-2023 time period for India have been reduced to 306. India are scheduled to play for a total of 390 days in the 2015-19 cycle and the decision was taken after Virat Kohli expressed his reservationwith the amount of cricket that's being played.

BCCI's acting secretary Amitabh Choudhary had earlier acknowledged that the viewpoints of India captain and other team members will be taken into consideration while discussing the future tours programme (FTP). "Unfortunately we get only two days before we fly to South Africa after this series gets over. So we have no choice but to be in game situation and think of what's coming ahead of us," the Indian captain had said ahead of the Nagpur Test against Sri Lanka.

"Had we got a month off, ideally, we would have done a proper preparation in a camp sort of scenario but we have to make do with what we have. As usual, [we're] cramped for time, which I think we need to assess in future as well because we very easily assess the team when we go abroad but we don't look at how many days we have got to prepare before we go to a particular place to play." Kohli had said.

Chaudhary also confirmed India are looking to have two home seasons one that'll run from October to December and and another one from January to March. "Traditionally speaking our season begins in October and goes on till March. While we were negotiating and preparing for the FTP conferences, we made certain assumptions. One of them was that it was a long season so let's qualitatively assign them into two parts," he said.

"We decided October, November and December are our primary season. And January, February and March are our secondary season. The reasons mostly being the fact that you will attract more home crowd and there will be more certainty of matches in the first three months than the next three. The next three months, half of India will have other difficulties.

"We have tried to make sure that our home matches fall in our primary home season firstly, and otherwise secondary. We know that the seasons of Australia, South Africa and New Zealand will clash with ours, and we will tour them but will prefer to do so in January, February and March."

The board also agreed to lift the ban from Rajasthan Cricket Association (RCA) given Lalit Modi, the former RCA president, stays away from its function. It was also decided that India will play Afghanistan in a Test in India in the next two years.

The board continued to maintain its position and confirmed it won't allow its players to be tested by National Anti Doping Agency (NADA).

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