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The proposal to establish a two-tier Test cricket system, which would allow for more matches between the "big three" countries of England, Australia, and India, has drawn harsh criticism from former West Indies captain Clive Lloyd. According to Lloyd, teams like the West Indies and other countries who have put a lot of effort into earning Test status would suffer greatly from such a shift. The West Indies great said that the plan violates the essence of the global game and will badly effect its growth, expressing significant concern about the possible marginalization of smaller cricketing nations.
Clive Lloyd on the two-tier Test cricket system
The Sydney Morning Herald reported that later this month, ICC Chairman Jay Shah will meet with officials of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), Cricket Australia Chair Mike Baird, and England and Wales Cricket Board Chief Richard Thompson to go over the specifics.
"I think it will be terrible for all those countries who work so hard to get to Test match status and now they'll be playing among themselves in the lower section," Lloyd was quoted as saying in the Trinidad & Tobago Guardian.
Lloyd also voiced his disappointment at the contentious proposal by former ICC head Greg Barclay to dismantle the West Indies team and allow them to compete as separate countries.
"We (West Indies) have a great history and now you're going to tell us because of a monetary situation, (we should be disbanded)," he said.
Clive Lloyd, one of cricket's most successful captains, blamed the ICC's unfair money allocation for the performance discrepancy between the top three countries and the others.
"You could imagine they're talking about dismantling the West Indies, that is not the way to go. The way to go is to give them (West Indies and other teams) the same amount of money so they can improve their facilities, get better systems in place so that they can improve their cricket," the 80-year-old added.Clive Lloyd slams WTC cycle organisation
Additionally, he criticized the World Test Championship's (WTC) cycle's structure, calling it disorganized. Three Test-playing countries—Zimbabwe, Afghanistan, and Ireland—are not included in the two-year WTC, and the nine remaining teams do not play each other evenly during the cycle.
"It's not well organised as such because if I am in a Test team, I want to play cricket so I can qualify for that system. They (ICC and cricket boards) should sit down and have a system where it's not only T20 cricket. People still want to watch Test cricket and until we get that right, we will all be in this system," said Lloyd.
