England’s test skipper Ben Stokes suggests reducing ODI format to 40 overs

When England Test skipper Ben Stokes made the announcement to retire from ODI cricket citing an unsustainable schedule after the first of three matches against South Africa at his home ground in Durham, the cricketing world was left in shock.

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With Cricket South Africa’s new T20 league and UAE’s ILT20 starting next year, the international bilateral calendar is increasingly getting choc-a-bloc with the relevance of ODIs being questioned.

A case in point has to be Stokes’ decision to quit the format in which he played 105 games with nearly 3000 runs and 74 wickets, including a top score in the 2019 World Cup final at Lord’s.

“It is a great question at the moment with how much cricket is being played around the world,” he answered another PTI query.

“The last thing anybody wants is a format, I don’t know, be taken away from people. Maybe there is a way, ICC can look at it. Maybe restructuring the schedule or redoing the format.”

Just like ‘The Hundred’ exists alongside T20, Stokes suggested trying out 40-over one-dayers, something that was prevalent in the English county circuit with a tournament called pro-40, which was played some years back.

“You look at England now with ‘The Hundred’, they are making a completely new format but that still goes alongside the T20 version. Something can be looked at. It is my own personal view that they could look at maybe turning 50 overs into 40 overs”.

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“Because there is so much cricket, is there a way that schedule and formats can be looked at to still keep the 3 formats, but maybe less cricket? If you look at 40 overs than 50 overs, I think that can be a solution.”

He wants the custodians of the game to put some thought into it.

“I think there needs to be a lot of thought put into it but the last thing you want I think for the sport is that a certain format is completely chucked away.”