The Sourav Ganguly-led technical committee of the Indian cricket board is not in favour of either fiddling with the Ranji Trophy format or of playing the matches at neutral venues, as proposed by the working committee.

After the meeting of the technical committee here Friday, Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) secretary Sanjay Jagdale said the committee felt that Ranji Trophy should continue in the present format.

"The present Ranji Trophy format was discussed at length, and it was felt that the Elite Plate format be continued," said Jagdale.

The working committee earlier this week in Chennai had decided to play Ranji games at neutral venues but the technical committee decision has forced the working committee at re-look at its decision.

Ganguly also said the home and away system should persist.

"The recommendations have not been that. At the end of the day the BCCI decides but I feel the home and away system should persist," said Ganguly.

The Technical Committee recommended making Ranji Trophy quarterfinals and semifinals five-day games. At present only the final is a five-day affair. The committe also recommended a reversal of the schedule of domestic tournaments with Duleep Trophy to be followed by the Ranji Trophy.

The committee recommended that if a domestic match is played on an under-prepared wicket in the opinion of match officials, two points will be deducted from the host association's tally for the season.

The committee also increased the number of short-pitched deliveries from one to two in domestic one-day tournaments per over. The rule will come into force in the inter-state one-day matches starting on Monday.

The panel wanted the use of Kookaburra balls for the inter-zonal tournament.

The points system recommended by the panel for Ranji Trophy: outright win 5 points; 1st innings lead but no outright win 3 poits; loss on first innings 1 point; washout/weather interference with no first innings result 1 point each; Innings win/win by 10 wickets 1 bonus point; tie on first innings without outright result 1 point each; tie on both innings 2 points each; outright loss; 0 pt; first innings results not achieved without any weather interference 1 point each.

If a first-innings result is not obtained at the end of the scheduled play in a knock-out match, then the match will be extended into an additional day. If the first innings are not completed even on this additional day, then the winner will be decided by the spin of a coin.

BCCI secretary Jagdale said te recommendations will have to be ratified by the Working Committee,

The committee also recommended the use of floodlights during Test matches played in India.

The Technical Committee meeting was attended by Ganguly, Krish Srikkanth (in his capacity as chairman of the Board's senior selection panel), Roger Binny (as a former Test cricketer), the five zonal representatives (Venkatapathy Raju, Shantanu Sugwekar, Arup Bhattacharjee, Chetan Chauhan, Rahul Sapru) Jagdale, BCCI chief administrative officer Ratnakar Shetty and BCCI's manager of cricket operations Suru Nayak.