40-Over ODIs to WTC Reform: Every ICC Proposal to Fix International Cricket Explained
The ICC held a meeting in Scotland to discuss the future of international cricket and specifically one-day cricket which has been quietly losing ground to T20 leagues for the better part of a decade. Several proposals came out of that room.
Some are genuinely worth debating. Others could do lasting damage if pushed through without thinking clearly about what international cricket actually needs.
Here is every proposal on the table and an honest assessment of each.
International Cricket Has a Problem and These Seven Proposals Are the ICC’s Answer
Proposal 1: Cut ODIs From 50 to 40 Overs
The headline idea. The ICC believes a shorter format will re-engage the current generation and pull ODI cricket closer in pace to T20 without abandoning the fifty-over World Cup brand entirely.
The case for it: Matches finishing inside five hours instead of seven make scheduling easier and demand less from casual viewers. Younger audiences raised on T20 cricket find fifty-over matches hard to commit to across a full day.
The case against it: Cutting overs does not fix the structural problem. ODIs are losing viewers not because they are too long but because they lack the stakes that Test cricket carries and the entertainment density that T20 delivers.
A 40-over match with the same bilateral scheduling problem is still a bilateral scheduling problem. Shrinking the format is treating the symptom.
A far stronger fix is taking ODI cricket into smaller cities with proper infrastructure. A sold-out 20,000-seat ground in a city that has never hosted international cricket generates more genuine excitement and more local media coverage than a half-empty 80,000-seat stadium in a major metro. The ICC consistently underestimates this.
Proposal 2: Fixed Format Windows
The ICC is considering dedicated periods for each format in the international calendar: a Test window, an ODI window and a T20 window each building toward their respective World Cups.
Why this makes sense: One of the reasons no format gets proper momentum is that all three formats are crammed into tours simultaneously. A team plays two Tests then three ODIs then five T20Is in the same tour and none of it builds a coherent narrative. Fixed windows would allow each format to breathe and grow its own audience cycle.
The catch: This only works if bilateral series within those windows actually matter. A Test window full of dead-rubber two-match series between teams with nothing at stake solves nothing.
Proposal 3: More Tri-Nation and Four-Nation Tournaments
Replacing some bilateral ODI series with tri-nation or four-nation tournaments to increase competitive matches and reduce the repetitive feel of two-team series.
This is one of the stronger proposals on the table. A tri-nation series with three teams creates knockout pressure from game one. A bilateral series between mismatched sides with guaranteed dead rubbers by match four creates nothing.
The ICC ran tri-nation series regularly through the 1990s and early 2000s and the format produced genuine drama.
The pushback will come from broadcasters and boards who prefer predictable bilateral revenue. Getting past that resistance is the real challenge not the concept itself.
Proposal 4: Continental Championships as a Global Pathway
A structured system where winners of regional tournaments like the Asia Cup compete against winners of continental equivalents in Africa and Oceania to build a global narrative across the calendar.
The concept is ambitious and the intent is right. International cricket needs more matches that feel like they mean something beyond a ranking percentage. A genuine continental championship pathway would create investment in cricket from regions currently treated as afterthoughts in the ICC structure.
Execution is the problem. The Africa Cup and Oceania regional structures are nowhere near ready to produce the quality of cricket that would make this compelling to global audiences. This is a ten-year project being discussed as though it could start next cycle.
Proposal 5: Club T20 World Championship
Reviving a global club-level T20 tournament featuring domestic teams from around the world, essentially a Champions League equivalent for cricket.
Cricket had this. The Champions League T20 ran from 2009 to 2014 and collapsed because the scheduling, commercial interest and player availability never aligned properly.
The franchise landscape is even more fragmented now with the IPL, PSL, BBL, CPL and The Hundred all competing for player windows.
A club World Championship is worth revisiting but only if the ICC can guarantee top players will actually participate rather than another tournament where franchise obligations drain the quality before the first ball is bowled.
Proposal 6: WTC Reform
The current World Test Championship structure has drawn consistent criticism and the ICC knows it. The specific problems are real.
Points are inconsistently weighted because teams play different numbers of series. A team can win a series against a weaker side for the same points value as losing a harder series by a narrow margin.
Scheduling is uneven with some nations getting far more WTC fixtures than others. And the biggest bilateral rivalry in world cricket, India vs Pakistan, has not been part of the WTC points structure in any meaningful way.
That last point is not just a commercial observation. It is a structural flaw. The WTC is supposed to represent the pinnacle of Test cricket and a format that excludes the most-watched bilateral rivalry from its points table is inherently incomplete.
Reform needs to address three things: consistent points weighting across all series, equal scheduling access for all Full Members and a credible mechanism to include India vs Pakistan Test cricket in the cycle.
Proposal 7: Two-Tier Test System
Splitting Test-playing nations into two divisions with promotion and relegation between them.
This is the proposal that needs the most scrutiny because it carries the biggest risk.
The argument for it is that top-tier Test cricket would become more consistently competitive if weaker teams were separated into a second division.
The argument against it is that doing so would financially and structurally devastate emerging nations at exactly the point when their cricket boards need sustained revenue from marquee fixtures to develop the game at home.
Afghanistan, Zimbabwe, Ireland and the West Indies would almost certainly start in the lower tier. Relegating them means fewer high-profile matches, lower broadcast deals and reduced funding to develop the next generation of players.
Test cricket has spent twenty years trying to grow beyond its traditional strongholds and a two-tier system risks quietly reversing that progress.
The Real Issue Nobody in That Room Wants to Say Out Loud
Every proposal on this list exists because franchise cricket is winning the attention economy and the ICC does not fully control the franchise calendar. The IPL, PSL and BBL operate outside ICC windows and the boards that run them are often the same boards sitting in ICC meetings.
The ICC’s governance structure gives disproportionate influence to the major boards, BCCI especially, whose franchise interests do not always align with the health of bilateral international cricket. Any reform that does not address that structural imbalance is a surface fix.
International cricket’s value proposition is simple: matches that matter between countries with history. The ICC’s job is to protect that. More overs or fewer overs will not do it. Giving every format genuine stakes, proper scheduling windows and competitive balance will.
