New Delhi: Former India coach Ravi Shastri has claimed that soon players will start choosing the format in which they want to play and also said that senior all-rounder Hardik Pandya may distance himself from One-Day-Internationals after the 2023 World Cup. The international cricketing schedule has come into the limelight with Ben Stokes announcing a sudden retirement from the 50-over format. Cricketers are regularly playing in all three formats of the game and this makes them feel physically and mentally exhausted.
"50-over format might be pushed back but it can still survive if you focus just on the World Cup. From the ICC's point of view, paramount importance should be given to World Cups, whether it is T20 World Cup or 50-over World Cup, the bucks have to increase. Test cricket will always remain because of the importance it brings to the game. You have players already choosing what formats they want to play. Take a Hardik Pandya. He wants to play T20 cricket and he is very clear in his mind that 'I do not want to play anything else," Shastri was quoted as saying by IndiaToday.
Shastri suggested that administrators who run the world game would have to cut the volume of international cricket.
"The main issue that we have to look at right now is the reality, what is happening right now. There are things that are being said by former players, someone like me, 5-10 years ago, that is already happening. If you are not going to see the reality, then it is going to give you the biggest knockout punch that you have ever got. It is not just administrators who run the world game, but administrations who run different boards around the world, they have got to see the reality, the volume of cricket and what is the demand, go with the economics of the sport."
"It is franchise cricket that is ruling the roost and it will rule the roost. So do not wait for it to happen, then you get on your high horse and ask what should we do? It would be too late, it is going to happen, there is going to be franchise cricket that is going to rule the roost around the world. Then how will you have international cricket? You will have to cut the volume, you have to cut bilateral cricket, and go in that direction. You will never be able to stop different players going and playing for different franchises," said Shastri.