Anurag Thakur:India will play day-night Test against New Zealand this year: Anurag Thakur

Anurag Thakur on Thursday also said that Duleep Trophy, the domestic tournament, will serve as a dress rehearsal, to give the board an idea of what factors need to be accounted for hosting such an event.
 Anurag Thakur, the secretary of BCCI said  that India will play a day-night Test against New Zealand later this year.

"We have decided that we will play one day-night Test match with pink ball against New Zealand later this year. Before that Duleep Trophy will act as a dress rehearsal for the day-night Test match.

"While we have not zeroed in on the venue, there are lots of factors that need to be taken into account. Things like dew factor, how the spinners bowl with the pink kookaburra on Indian pitches. These things we will get an idea during the Duleep Trophy," Thakur said.

Test matches in India are played with 'SG Test' balls but an exception will be made for the day-night game, where the 'pink kookaburra' ball will be used. "We may ask 'SG' to manufacture pink balls later but that has to be of the quality of pink balls that 'kookaburra' produces," Thakur said.

The first-ever day-night Test match, played out by Australia and New Zealand in 2015 at the Adelaide Oval was well-received by both sets of players. However, there are still a lot of reservations regarding the same, with South Africa said to be wary of playing a day-night Test against Australia in Adelaide that is earmarked during the Australian summer of 2016-17.