Zimbabwe's embattled cricket administrators voted on Wednesday to suspend their struggling national team from Test cricket at the first meeting of a government-appointed interim committee.
"The interim board decided to suspend Zimbabwe's participation in Test matches until early next year," said a statement from Zimbabwe Cricket (ZC).
"The decision... was reached by ZC after consideration of the recent performances by the national and A teams," it added.
Seven of the last 10 Tests contested by Zimbabwe have been lost by an innings and 26 of the last 28 one-day internationals have also ended in defeat, many by huge margins.
The African nation has, however, decided to continue playing international one-day cricket for the next year.
The interim board was formed after a government takeover of cricket on January 6 following allegations of mismanagement by administrators.
YOUNG TEAMS
The statement added: "The young teams remain full of potential and hopes abound for their development into a strong and competitive performer on the test arena.
"ZC is now putting in place a programme to galvanise the development of the Zimbabwe squads. It will work with other test nations and the ICC (International Cricket Council) itself to realise this objective."
"While the side goes through the programme to prepare it adequately for the rigours of test cricket, ZC has no doubt the team will be competitive in its ODI commitments under the Future Tours Programme," said ZC interim board chairman Peter Chingoka.
Zimbabwe Cricket will now approach the West Indies Cricket Board with a view to playing only one-dayers and not test matches on their scheduled tour to the Caribbean in April.
The statement said it would do the same with other international boards "for the other fixtures under the Future Tours Programme (FTP).
"The Zimbabwe cricket team will then only resume its full programme during the tour to Sri Lanka in February 2007, subject to the finalisation of the FTP for which the chief executives are meeting in Dubai next month," the statement added.
(Writing by Neil Manthorp in Cape Town)
