Aussies to start new Test championship on top

Australia will be officially crowned world champion of Test cricket when the International Cricket Council's new Test championship gets underway in May.

The ICC today announced the championship, which will be based on a rankings system similar to tennis built on a new 10-year Test match calendar.

The calendar, which was also revealed today, ensures all 10 Test nations play each other home and away once every five years.

Each series must be of at least two matches and all results count toward the championship, with teams earning two points for a series win, one for a series draw and none for a loss.

Australia's traditional biennial home and away series against England, the West Indies and South Africa have been retained and, while series must be of at least two matches, individual boards will still determine the length of each series.

ICC president Malcolm Gray said the Test championship and calendar were overdue to add more interest and relevance to Test cricket.

"There was a feeling that one-day internationals were taking the spotlight away from Test matches," he said.

The championship will begin with Pakistan's two-Test tour to England in May but initially the standings will be based on results over the last five years.

That will ensure Steve Waugh's all-conquering team, which has won a world record 15 successive Tests, will finally receive recognition as the world's best Test team to go with its limited overs World Cup.

The rankings will then alter according to each series result with the ICC planning to institute a trophy to acknowledge the world's best Test team.

"It's intended there will be a trophy and it will be handed over from one country to another when they fall off the top position," Gray said.

The ICC today also announced it would conduct a review of playing conditions in May, which will include the use of television replays in umpiring decisions, while a High Performance Manager will also be appointed to assist lesser nations prepare for the 2003 World Cup.

The system to appoint umpires and referees will also become fully professional with the introduction of two panels from April 2002.

The first, consisting of eight full-time umpires and referees, will be contracted to the ICC to be backed up by a an emerging panel, consisting of 25 to 30 umpires.

Gray said the change to selecting umpires was to ensure it kept pace with the development of the game in other areas with players, support staff and management now fully professional.

"There was a feeling the regulation of the game on the ground was the one area of the game that wasn't completely professional," he said.

He denied it had anything to do with a perceived decline in current umpiring standards.

The new calendar will see Australia travel to newly promoted Bangladesh in October, 2003 while Zimbabwe will come to Australia for a Test tour for the first time the following month.

There will also be additional Test matches in some Australian summers such as Sri Lanka's visit in December 2002, which will come in the middle of the Ashes series, to ensure each team plays each other twice over the five year cycle.