Ross Taylor: One-day World Cup could have joint winners

The New Zealand allrounder talks about how he would have liked the 2019 World Cup final to be concretely decided (2:30)

Ross Taylor does not believe there would be anything wrong in having joint winners in the one-day World Cup rather than using Super Overs to split the teams.

It is almost a year since England and New Zealand could not be separated across 100 overs and the Super Over in the World Cup final at Lord’s with England taking the title on boundary countback.

The ICC has since amended the playing conditions and if the situation played out again there would be additional Super Overs to decide the winner, but Taylor does not see a problem with having joint champions.

“I’m still undecided in a Super Over in a one-day game, I think one-day cricket is played over such a long time that I have no problems in a tie being a tie,” he told Cricingif. “In T20, to continually go on is the right way to go. A bit like football or some other games, trying to get that win in, but I don’t think the Super Over is necessarily needed in a one-day game. I think you can have a joint winner.

“During the World Cup I actually went up to the umpires to say ‘good game’, I didn’t even know there was a Super Over. A tie is a tie, I suppose you could have this argument either way, but in a one-day game I think if you can go 100 overs and still have someone equal at the end I don’t think a tie is a bad thing.”

Since the World Cup final, New Zealand have been involved in another three Super Overs in T20Is and lost of all of them against England and India. Overall they have won just one of eight they have been involved in.

“One over across 50 overs or 20 overs is tough to swallow, but if we are in that same situation we still back ourselves,” Taylor said. “First and foremost you have to try and win the game in the allocated time. We haven’t been able to be ruthless enough there, and if we can do that and not even let it get into a Super Over then hopefully the right results comes.”

Taylor, who won the Sir Richard Hadlee Medal as New Zealand’s player of the year for 2019-2020, has previously spoken of his motivation to extend his career to the 2023 one-day World Cup in India. He is New Zealand’s leading ODI run-scorer with 8574 runs at 48.44, the fifth-highest average for a batsman with over 200 innings.