How to Play · Test Cricket

What is the Test Cricket game?

Test cricket is the five-day, red-ball original — the format the Ashes is won in, along with the Border-Gavaskar Trophy and the World Test Championship (WTC). In 14-0-0's Test Cricket game you draft from two decades of Test legends (the 2000s, 2010s and 2020s, built from real ball-by-ball data) and your finished XI is projected over a WTC cycle of 13 Tests. Win them all — no draws, no defeats — and that's the perfect 13-0-0.

It works in two stages

Stage 1 — draft a squad of 15

1. Spin the wheel. It lands on a random nation + era — “India · 2010s”, “Australia · 2000s”, “West Indies · 2020s”.
2. Draft one player from that nation-era's squad. Repeat over 15 spins until your squad of fifteen is full. You get 2 re-spins per game.
3. Watch the balance warnings. A Test squad needs a keeper, six batting options and five bowling options — leave a gap and your team is penalised at simulation time.
4. One of each player. The same person can appear in more than one era (Anderson in three of them!) but can only be drafted once.

Stage 2 — pick your XI

1. Choose 11 of your 15 and place them in a real Test batting order: two openers, numbers 3–6, an all-rounder at 7, and four frontline bowlers. Four squad players miss out.
2. Position fit matters. The slots a player suits light up when you place them. Keepers fit naturally in the middle order — there's no separate keeper slot in a Test XI, but an eleven without a keeper is penalised.
3. Set your order, then simulate. Tap placed players to move or swap them, then send your XI through the projector.

How Test players are rated

Every player-era has an overall rating (OVR) built from real Test stats, era-normalised within its decade so a 2000s great and a 2020s great rank fairly against each other. Batters are rated on patience (balls faced per innings), average, conversion (turning fifties into hundreds) and run volume; bowlers on control, wickets, pressure and strike rate. Because everyone bats in Tests, the all-rounder tag is only earned with genuine quality on both sides of the ball.

The tiers

• 13 wins — The Invincibles (S): a whole WTC cycle unbeaten. The perfect 13-0-0.
• 11–12 — World Test Champions (A): the mace is yours at Lord's.
• 9–10 — Final at Lord's (B): right in the WTC Final mix.
• 6–8 — Mid-Table (C): good sessions, bad collapses.
• 3–5 — Rebuilding Era (D): a transition, they're calling it.
• 0–2 — Whitewashed (F): follow-ons and long tours home.

Notes for the purists

• Ratings are built from Cricsheet ball-by-ball data, which reliably starts around 2003 — so Test mode covers the 2000s onwards. Bradman, Marshall and Warne's 90s peak will have to wait for a legends set.
• Bowler slots are generic for now — the data doesn't tag pace vs spin, so build your attack's variety yourself.
• The 11+ win teams make the Test leaderboard. Sign in before you play to put your username on the board.

Prefer the white-ball chaos? The IPL game is where 14-0-0 started — and the IPL guide covers it.