As T20 cricket and its global rise continue to marginalise Test cricket, India's No.3 Cheteshwar Pujara fears for the future of the longer version and hopes that it survives the test of times. 

The ICC is contemplating the idea to mandate four-day Tests with an eye towards relaxing the financial burden that various cricket boards face in trying to sell the five-day version to the masses, something that is yet to be universally accepted especially by the players, former and currently active. 

Read Also: Misbah, Waqar oppose the idea of four-day Test cricket 

"Times are changing and white-ball cricket has become popular. But Test cricket is always special and it will always remain special. And let us hope it continues for as much time as possible," Test specialist Pujara was quoted as saying by ESPNcricinfo. 

Pujara just scored his 50th first-class hundred (an epic 248 versus Karnataka) in the Ranji Trophy for Saurashtra. The 31-year-old is going through the hard grind of another domestic season ahead of India's next Test assignment in New Zealand in February. 

"If you achieve such a thing before such tours, you feel confident and you start trusting your game again."

"That is because when you are going abroad and you are playing in challenging conditions, you need to trust your game, trust your preparation," he said. 

"It is the right time actually - we are going to New Zealand soon so it is good for the preparation. Whenever you score runs, you are high on confidence and you also get back your rhythm."

Pujara joined the list including eight other Indian batsmen, the likes of Sunil Gavaskar, Sachin Tendulkar and Rahul Dravid, to have scored 50 first-class hundreds. 

18 of Pujara's tons have come at the Test level and he is fourth in the list of active players with most first-class centuries behind Alastair Cook (65), Hashim Amla (52) and Wasim Jaffer (57).

(Inputs from ESPNcricinfo)