India has a packed schedule with the warm-up series against Bangladesh and the Border-Gavaskar Trophy in Australia completing the home and away Test summer. One cannot miss the very important World Test Championship(WTC) which is scheduled to take place on June 11, at Lord’s cricket grounds in London.
So the climax of the cycle of WTC 2023-25 will be in nine months, when the teams in the top two seats on the points ladder will then organize the final one battle for supremacy.Well as it is, currently, all eyes are ahead and the later two editions’ finalists keep their heads up with India at the top of the WTC table after losing their final last year to the Australians.
In the two-Test series against Bangladesh, the World Test Challenge table of the BCCI has 68.52% of its wins, while the score of the Australian team is 62.5%. Their closest challenges on the third spot 2019-21 WTC champions New Zealand bask over a win percentage of 50 percent currently. That is why the upcoming three-Test home series vs New Zealand, which is after the Bangladesh series, becomes more crucial.
After those five Tests against the Bangla Tigers and Kiwis, India will fly to Australia to play a five-Test series to reclaim the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, the outcome of which may have a bearing in the overall standing of the WTC table.
As per the numbers from a story on the Royal Challengers Bengaluru website, India will need to win seven of those 10 Tests to sustain their present win rate. Surely, that is not beyond India given that they manage to wrap up all the five Tests at home (2 against Bangladesh and 3 versus New Zealand). Keeping it in mind that India has won the Border-Gavaskar Trophy on both occasions oy touring Australia, two more victories in Australia cannot be dismissed.
But in any case, India would want to raise that percentage to 60 or more than that, to play it safe, i.e., in order to finish in the top two, Rohit Sharma & Co need to cross the existing points from 74 obtained by 6 matches victories, 2 draws, and 1 lost in 9 matches of Tests so far and gain 63 more.
As per the stats in the RCB website, India need at least five wins and a draw in the next 10 Tests in order to be able to stand head above water with at least 60 percent figures. If Team India can add another win to that and make it a total of six Team India’s win percentage will increase to 64.03 percent however this is a stretch of imagination.
They need 47 more points if they wish to remain above 60 percent and Australia currently stands at number 2 on the table and has seven Tests left to play. They will therefore require four wins or three wins and a draw for that.
New Zealand counts 5 tests out of remaining 8 in Asia, 3 against India itself. They require 6 wins or 5 wins and 1 draw in order to achieve a percentage win 60% above.
HERE’S HOW THE WTC TABLE LOOKS AT PRESENT
