Domestic Structure from 2010

[BLUEBLOOD]

Here is the agreed structure .. my thoughts are in red

The Domestic Structure, in accordance with ECB Articles, is subject to consultation with First Class Counties. The First Class Counties voted 13-5 to adopt the following domestic structure :
•LV = County Championship has been given priority in the fixture programme and has been confirmed as a two-division competition of 8 home and 8 away matches from 2010 - 2013.
I feel 3 divisions would be better .. with 2 up and 2 down through the leagues, it’ll lead to far fewer dead rubbers at seasons end as clubs battle to go up or avoid going down .. the only drawback would be you’d either only have 10 matches (but would avoid clashing with international matches) or an imbalance of 15 with some sides getting more home fixtures (awkward to work out I imagine)

•The enhanced Twenty20 competition will be played in pools of 9 teams on a geographic basis ( North v South) with the top four teams qualifying for the Quarter Finals from each pool from 2010 - 2013.
So its Essex vs K*nt/Sussex/Sorrey/Hants/Middx year on year still .. BORING !!!!!!!!!! .. also not competitive enough, cruise through in 4th and still qualify .. I say add the Scots and Irish 4 pools of 5 home and away .. top 2 through to quarters


•The domestic limited over competition will be played mainly on Sunday afternoon throughout the season consisting of 3 pools of 7 teams with 6 home and 6 away matches progressing to a Semi Final and Final in September. The power-plays and fielding restrictions will be the same as per International cricket but the match will be played over 40 overs.
so no practise for international 50 over cricket ... 21 teams ?? Scots Irish Dutch ?? .. and how do they get down to semis from there ?? I’m sure the ECB have a genius sub plot for this !!!!!!
There will be only one unqualified player permitted in the LV = County Championship and 40 over competition while two unqualified players will be allowed in the Twenty20.
Excellent .. limit the foreigners .. except this won’t effect the Kolpaks still will it ?? Northants will still roll up with 7 non British players in their side (including the captain and Vice captain)

 

[number11]

I guess there is not much that can be done about the Kolpaks giving it's EU Law. We could only try to get around this by encouraging fielding a number of players below a certain age (who are less likely to be Kolpaks), or increasing the benefits to counties who provide players to the England set up to get this to be their main aim.

I first heard the 3 divisional system suggested yesterday and thought that it could well be a good idea. As YB said the other day, the teams are starting to filter out and there become a bigger gap between the top and bottom divisions. Have a middle group, increasing competiveness at both ends and ensuring our top players are playing against other top players. Will obviously not be appealing to the smaller counties (not sure where Essex would fit in) but it should help encourage more elite teams.

The 20Twenty should be random drawn rather than North v South so the opponents are different each year. Its not like England is massive and the travel time is huge for the teams, plus I would have thought away fan following is pretty minimal anyway. Therefore no great reason for regionalisation.

 

[Yorkshire Blue]

Absolutely crazy not to have a 50 over competition.

Bye bye England's chances of winning the world cup.

 

[canveyshrimper]

Absolutely crazy not to have a 50 over competition.

Bye bye England's chances of winning the world cup.

As England have never won the world cup with whatever domestic one day system we have I am not sure if this will overly impact on it. :nope:

 

[BLUEBLOOD]

Someone suggested the other day that England field a Lions XI in the one day competitions, good idea i feel as it could help gell the team for when / if they step up to full international level .. i'm not sure how the counties would feel about this mind

 

[The General]

Isn't this their third attempt at sorting this out?! Becoming a bit of a joke. As Mark says - not sure why it is so regionalised as its not as if you get many fans travelling to go to away games!

Kev

 

[Yorkshire Blue]

Isn't this their third attempt at sorting this out?! Becoming a bit of a joke. As Mark says - not sure why it is so regionalised as its not as if you get many fans travelling to go to away games!

Kev

I think the primary attraction to a regionalised format is to cut down on the players' travel rather than the fans' travel.

It allows you to schedule games on consecutive days which wouldn't be practicable if Essex, after finishing at Chelmsford at 6pm, had to be ready to start art Durham at 10:30am the next day.

 

[Uncle Leo]

Absolutely crazy not to have a 50 over competition.

Bye bye England's chances of winning the world cup.

Absurd isn't it. I must admit that I didn't realise until last night (there was a little debate on Sky between Charles Colville, Rob Key and Bob Willis) that they don't play any 50 over cricket domestically in Seth Efrika either. Their main comp is only 45 overs.

Oh look, they've never won the Cricket World Cup either!

 

[EastStandBlue]

It's the equivalent of not having the England Football team practice penalties in stadium-like situations, then wondering why we're always knocked out in the Quarters by Portugal in major tournaments.

Oh, Wait, Hold on...

I do worry about the governing bodies of English sport sometimes... I really do. Not everything has to be so damn complicated. What are we not succeeding in? Well, we're a bit naff at Penalties and our Cricketers never seem to adapt well to a 50 over match. We should probably practice penalties then and maybe, just maybe, play the occasional 50 over match. Not everything needs a scientific approach.

 

[Yorkshire Blue]

Absurd isn't it. I must admit that I didn't realise until last night (there was a little debate on Sky between Charles Colville, Rob Key and Bob Willis) that they don't play any 50 over cricket domestically in Seth Efrika either. Their main comp is only 45 overs.

Oh look, they've never won the Cricket World Cup either!

South Africa is a crazy example to use.

1. I think they've only recently introduced the 45 overs competition (it was reorganised a couple of years back, I assume that is when it went to 45 overs) so the players playing for Seth Efrika haven't come through the 45 over structure.
2. All their players seem to play over here anyway
3. As you say, they've never won the World Cup
4. There's a huge difference in playing 25% less overs as compared to dropping only 10%

The craziest thing is that on the same day as the ECB announce they are killing off 50 over cricket, they announce that they are going to play no less than THREE international 50 overs series next summer. Why do we need 13 games if the format is dead?

I think Giles Clarke's position is once more untenable.

 

[Ron Manager]

It's the equivalent of not having the England Football team practice penalties in stadium-like situations, then wondering why we're always knocked out in the Quarters by Portugal in major tournaments.

Not too sure about the penalty kicks comparison. You can never re-create a penalty shoot-out situation in practice. However you could argue that be cutting out the number of replays in cup competitions we now have far more of our players used to the pressures of penalty shoot-outs for their clubs in real competitive situations. Surely that will prepare them more for doing the same for their country than any practice session ever will? Now that's not part of some grand plan by the FA of course, but is a positive side effect of cutting out replays.

As for the 50 over game - I reckon it will be non-existent in 10 years time anyway. There'll be Tests and 20/20. Personally the standard 1 day (50 or 40 overs) games bore me now...the Test Matches are real cricket and 20/20 is a good bit of fun and excellent for bringing a new audience to the game. Standard one day games doesn't really satisfy the traditional cricket fan who loves the Tests or the sort of recent convert through 20/20. It just falls between both and is increasingly irelevant.

 

[The Flying Scotsman]

Would be far more entertaining having a 40 over competition consisting of two innings of 20 overs each.