The ICC and Cricket Australia have approved requests from free-to-air broadcaster Seven to conduct in-game interviews with Australian players and coaching staff during the upcoming Test series against India, according to ESPNcricinfo.

Lengthy discussions were required, first with Australian Test captain Tim Paine and coach Justin Langer before the network received permission from the ICC, Cricket Australia and the Australian team. The broadcasting concept is likely to be seen in action as early as the first session on day one.

These interviews would either take place through earpieces worn by players or in a studio near to the players’ changing rooms.

‘We would love the opportunity should Nathan Lyon take five-for in the first innings, we’d love the opportunity for him to come and sit on the couch and have a chat with Ricky Ponting about what’s happened,’ Jones said to ESPNcricinfo.

‘If we’re 2-200 and Usman Khawaja’s made a hundred, and he goes and cools down and we’re going ok, then absolutely we’d love for him to come across.

‘Justin Langer’s the other one, we’d love to get access to Justin to come across, sit on that couch with one of his very good friends Ricky Ponting to talk about the state of the game. There’s a whole lot of things we need to do, it’s not just up to the cricketers whether we can do that, there’s ICC regulations and all those sorts of things, but we’ve been working really hard to try to get as much of that access as we can, and we’ll be pushing really hard to try to make sure it happens.’

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