Asian Test Championship from Feb 14 to March 17 (24 December 1998)

24 December 1998

Asian Test Championship from Feb 14 to March 17

by Peter Christie

An Asian Test Cricket Championship will be held between February 14 and March 17 next year for the first time ever.

The three major Test playing Asian countries Pakistan, India and Sri Lanka will be pitted against each other in what should be the first step to holding a World Cup Test Cricket Competition.

This was decided at a meeting held in India on December 15 where it was unanimously agreed by the respective Presidents of the three countries that the Asian Cricket Council should take steps to implement the idea.

At a press conference held at the Premadasa Stadium on Tuesday, the President of the Board of Control for Cricket in Sri Lanka (BCCSL), Tilanga Sumathipala said that although the member nations of the International Cricket Conference (ICC) have in principle accepted the concept of a World Cricket Test Championship, chances of seeing such a competition in the near future is remote due to practical and logistic difficulties including the commitments of the teams involved.

Mr. Sumathipala also said that he is adamant about the fair and equal distribution of Test matches between the nine countries now in the circuit and that the BCCSL has been agitating for this from every available forum.

Sunil Gavaskar, Majid Khan and Asantha de Mel have been appointed to the Technical Committee and Esan Mani (PK), Dhammika Ranatunga and J. Y. Lele (In) to the Finance and Marketing Committees.

It was also decided at this meeting to hold the Pepsi Asia Cup Tournament in Dhaka, Bangladesh from April 25 to May 20, 2000.

February 14-18 - India vs Pakistan (in India) February 25-March 1 - Sri Lanka vs India (In Sri Lanka) March 5-9 - Sri Lanka vs Pakistan (Pakistan) March 13-17 - Final in Bangladesh

Sri Lanka is making a strong bid to hold the next Under 19 World Cup in Sri Lanka with a beautiful and explicit brochure publicising the beauty of the country's tourists' attractions.

The brochure cites eight International Cricket venues of 22 first class Cricket Grounds and that the Floodlight Premadasa Stadium, that boasts 30.000 covered seats, 700 grandstand seats two luxury players' dressing rooms and other facilities.

With a dwindling public interest in school cricket (irrespective of the fact that the breeding ground of our international stars has been the school cricket ground), the Under 19 World Cup will give schoolboy cricketers the boost they need. Many a good cricketer hangs up his boots at the end of a school season to earn a living. Encouragement to stay on can be given to these types by a receptive crowds and good publicity.

Source :: Daily News (https://www.lanka.net)