India-England to play five-Test rubbers in future

India and England, who have normally engaged in three or four-Test rubbers prior to the upcoming best-of-five series from July 9, have inked an agreement to stick to this format in future contests too, according to Cricket Board Secretary Sanjay Patel.
"It will be a five-Test series (at home and away) against England and four-match rubbers against Australia. Both England and Australia will play four Test series against us (home and away) in the next eight-year cycle (from 2015-2023)," said Patel at an interaction with mediapersons here today.
The new FTP agreements and MOUs have been inked by all the ten full Test playing members of the revamped International Cricket Council at its annual meeting in Melbourne recently, said Patel.

As per the new FTP, India would have two home Test series every season between October and March unless they have to visit Australia which has retained the right to host the Boxing Day Test match at Melbourne, the BCCI official informed.
This season West Indies would visit India and play a three-Test and best-of-five ODI rubber between October 4 and November 18 after the completion of the Champions League T20 tournament which is scheduled to be held in the country from September 14 and October 4.
Next year, it would be the turn of South Africa to visit India to play three Tests and ODI to be followed by England who would split their tour into two halves - playing the Tests before the Christmas break and then the ODIs on their return in the early part of 2016.

The revamped ICC structure, which has come in for a lot of criticism, will see BCCI earn a staggering Rs 4000 crore over the eight-year cycle which works out to just over 13 times what it will earn in the current cycle (300 crore), said Patel.
"Our share of the revenue from ICC events like World Cup, World T20 etc is 22 per cent of gross plus four per cent afterwards. England's will be 4.7 per cent of gross and Australia's 2.9 per cent. South Africa's share is 1.3 per cent while West Indies and New Zealand's share would be 0.8 and 0.5 per cent respectively," said Patel.