Earlier this year, the English Cricket Board proposed the idea of 100- ball cricket. The concept is 20 balls shorter than the traditional T20 format of the cricket, which is currently the shortest form of the game that is being played at domestic level by different cricketing nations. However, Indian captain Virat Kohli has raised concerns over the format. He is quite frustrated with the commercial side taking over the sport.

While speaking to Wisden Cricket, Kohli said, “Obviously for the people involved in the whole process [of the 100-ball competition] and the set-up it will be really exciting but I cannot think of one more format, to be honest," Kohli told Wisden Cricket Monthly. "I'm already very... I wouldn't say frustrated, but sometimes it can get very demanding of you when you have to play so much cricket regularly. I feel somewhere the commercial aspect is taking over the real quality of cricket and that hurts me. Honestly, I don't want to be a testing sort of a cricketer for any new format. I don't want to be someone who's going to be part of that World XI who comes and launches the 100-ball format. I love playing the IPL, I love watching the BBL, because you're working towards something, competing against high-quality sides and it gets your competitive juices flowing. That's what you want as a cricketer. I'm all for the leagues, but not to experiment.”

The Indian captain further asked the boards to step up and change the quality of first-class cricket. “If you're not going to give more importance to first-class cricket, then people are going to lose motivation to play the longest format of the game," Kohli said. "And with the T20 format coming in I think there's far greater responsibility on all the cricket boards across the world to treat first-class cricket really well, because if the facilities and the standard goes up, then the motivation always stays. You don't want players to get into that mindset where they're finding the easy way out."

Kohli is quite keen on playing the inaugural edition of the World Test Championship. "I think the Test Championship is going to give a huge push to Test cricket. It makes every series more competitive, and there's going to be ups and downs throughout the Championship, which I really look forward to.”

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Aug 29, 2018 03:20 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).