Former India spinner Ravichandran Ashwin has shared a radical solution to revive ODI cricket, calling for the format to be played with a red ball. His comments came after India’s second ODI of the three-match series against West Indies, played in Guwahati on September 30 as well, where West Indies posted their highest ODI total, finishing on 405/7. In response, Shubman Gill’s unbeaten 223 off 133 balls and Rohit Sharma’s hundred helped the Men in Blue record their highest successful chase in ODIs, winning by eight wickets with 39 balls to spare.

During a discussion on his YouTube channel (Ash ki Baat), Ashwin said: “There is a solution, but they are not ready to listen. That’s the problem. The solution is very simple. As I said, play ODI cricket with a red ball in whites. First, you will eliminate the dew factor. Next, the most important factor is day-night cricket, which gives an unfair advantage.”

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However, Ravichandran Ashwin also stated that the team management and players have no control over the pitch. He also questioned the message being sent to curators when match referees do not rate overly flat pitches as poor.

He said: “Let’s get one thing straight: the team management and the players do not have any control over this factor. Now, there is another side, the curator’s side. Have you ever heard in ODI cricket that a wicket was too flat and that I would rate this wicket as poor from a match referee? If you don’t hear such criticism, what message are you giving to the curator of that pitch?”

“The one who prepared the Guwahati pitch would have gone home and slept peacefully because, according to him, the wicket had pace, it had bounce, and 810 runs were scored. Thank God the South Africa-India game didn’t happen yesterday because there was a good chance that the 1,000-run barrier would have been broken. There was a good chance India would have reached 500 against this West Indies bowling line-up yesterday,” he concluded.