'There must be a points system riding on every game'

I have thought long and hard over the one-day game in the last few years. I think the 50-over game has been put under a lot of pressure with the popularity of Twenty20 cricket. As a player, whenever you play a game of cricket, you want something riding on it. Test matches are probably different from the fact that I don't think I have ever played in a meaningless type of game.

But playing a seven-match one-day series against one side in a matter of a couple of weeks is really hard, especially when the series is over early. It is really hard to maintain your focus in that series, especially knowing that there is another big series at the end of that. So you look to rotate players, leave out some of the guys and do some sort of thing.

My feeling is that if we are interested in the keeping the 50-over game as a great spectacle, and keep people around the world interested in watching and players interested in playing it, then there must be a points system riding on it, which means every game will have some amount of meaning and people would have something to watch for.

The most boring game in one-day cricket is when the team batting first is bowled out for around 180 and the team batting second goes out and takes no risks whatsoever and picks the runs in 40-45 overs. That is a boring game.

But if you had a points system, or a bonus point, then if the side batting second has a chance to score the runs in 30 overs and pick up a bonus point to move up the table then it will be good for the game.

Over the last couple of years I have been on record a few times to say that seven is too many. I think five is enough to play head-to-head in any series, but we all know the reasons why we play a seven-game series. We, as players, just get on with it and hope to win the series that we are playing.

[Excerpts from Ricky Ponting's press conference in Mumbai on Wednesday]