I'd love to get people's feedback on the coin toss in Test cricket. With all the discussion about pitch preparation and local captains requesting preferable home team pitch conditions what if they did away with the coin toss and allowed the away team to choose whether they wanted to bat or bowl first?

some things are unimportant, some things are traditional… in the scheme of things, It works okay.
we could ask all kinds of questions… as to whether they want to wear any other colour except white, or whether a scrum in rugby league matters any more.
Interesting thought but why meddle with something that works perfectly

Yes the home team has an advantage with the conditions and yes home captains might be influencing the kinds of wickets prepared for home series but giving the visiting captain the right to choose is a horrible idea.

With the toss atleast there is a 50% chance that the home captain's decision might back fire but giving the visiting team a choice is just not on.

Touring is always a tough gig and that is what test matches are about. A good player or team would perform well in all conditions. Yes they might have to work harder than usual but that is what test cricket is all about.

Home team's influence in pitch preparation is a known fact, but we also have to consider that many a times this has backfired across the playing conditions be it preparation of a rank turner where the visiting team has demolished the home team or be it a green pitch.
The competition is always between bat and bowl, skillset and mindset, strategy and planning. Toss in these cases makes these battles interesting.
Let it be as it is and let the best team win.

Hey Rob, I'm very much a traditionalist but don't mind your thinking.

The coin toss adds to the theatre but I think it's an initiative that could be trialed for a series over 3 Tests and let's see how it works.

It was tried in County cricket. Did anyone see any analysis of the results?