A First Class Cock-Up

There’s no doubt that the sidelining of the county championship is playing a big part in England’s latest Ashes debacle. As I mentioned after Adelaide, my team Worcs will only have two championship clashes at New Road between early May and September next year. And when the new city T20 begins in 2020, things are likely to get worse.

With the prospect of no championship cricket at all during the height of summer closer than ever, Media Penguin explores the anxieties and frustrations around the counties…

The annual release of the cricket fixtures used to trigger a frisson of excitement – now you can hear nowt but moans and groans up and down the English greensward.

What is becoming clear is that the staple diet of the game – the four day fixture – is now looking more like a starving beggar.

Many folk, especially those who work, look forward to a bit of cricket at the weekend especially in the height of summer. This is becoming increasingly hard to find.

Take my county. Last season saw a spell of 69 days when no county cricket was seen at Old Trafford. Next year it looks even worse. The last day of county cricket at hq is on July 25 and the last cricket of any description is on August 10.

Basically the last seven weeks will see Old Trafford’s flags fluttering over an empty stadium.

At Leicester, member Garry Bailey was distraught when he viewed the fixture list:

“I am absolutely devastated. After the middle of May there is just one day of cricket at the weekend in the county championship.

I filled in the ECB questionnaires like many others and they haven’t listened to the traditional working-class support. The money-grabbing ECB are out to destroy clubs like mine.”

Mel Ridley added: “The ECB are anti-weekend county cricket. The very days when most fans can go.”

Dan Lambert, Kent fan, said: “I’m getting to the point where I would happily see Kent lose first-class status and play four day summer fixtures against likeminded counties.”

It is apparent that T20 is now top dog and everything else has to be shuffled around it. Of course there will be winners and losers. Some fans may be quite happy with the fixture list. But they are increasingly in the minority I suspect.

How long before all county games are shoehorned into April, May and June?

Media Penguin

@BarryEditor1

57 comments

  • How do the people responsible for these decisions get in the positions to make these terrible changes to the domestic game in the first place and, more to the point, how can they be got rid of?

    • They can’t be got rid of.

      Just look at the advert for the Kent role currently… it’s literally a closed shop

  • I’d rather see less, but higher quality first class cricket, but evenly distributed throughout the season, with England players and overseas players available as much as possible. I’d invite this year’s top division plus the top 2 from the second division and draw a line, call it a premier division, and have them play each other once only – but 5 day matches with day-time matches played either Sunday-Thursday or day-nighters played Tuesday-Saturday to replicate test cricket as closely as possible. I’d charge next to nothing for entry, and give the rights away free to anyone willing to televise it.

    I’d also appoint two counties to play their home games with the SG ball and encourage them to produce dry, spinning tracks, and 2 counties to play their home games with the Kookaburra ball and encouraged to produce hard, fast, bouncy tracks to ensure potential England cricketers have plenty of experience in these conditions (might not want to reproduce the Delhi smog)

    A pyramid structure would be set up with the remaining counties and minor counties playing 3 day games, and acting as official feeders to their local “premier division”. A bit like in baseball with the minor leagues underneath the major leagues. Sorry if you don’t like this because your county wouldn’t make it into the premier division, but I think it is realistically the only way forward to ensure we produce a competitive test team for years to come.

  • Another moan about “management”. How refreshing.

    That aside, can you please explain to an Australian what English people mean when they talk about “the height of summer”?

    Do you mean that little two-week period when it doesn’t rain when English people pretend to do BBQs while simultaneously losing their minds but still finding time to complain about how it’s “scorching” outside? Yeah, 25 degrees. Make sure you don’t get heat stroke.

    My god, you’re such little freaks.

    • Tom. You come across as very anti-English. Please try to be constructive. That last line was unnecessary.

        • Or, possibly, just being an Australian? You only have to look at their politicians to see that a bit of sledging is a national game (although, to be fair, I would pay good money to see one of them deal with Boris as they deal with each other). And look on the bright side in regards to their attitude to cricket – it was one of them that broke Piers Morgan’s ribs. That excuses a lot.

    • Wow… this forum is currently filled with disappointed English fans, distraught at the prospect of ANOTHER whitewash Down Under, and yet this Aussie bloke has somehow managed to be the most bitter one on here! How is that even possible?!! Kudos Tom, it’s a special kind of achievement for sure…

      • I’m not bitter, champ. I do however feel compelled to point out that the default English response to defeat is to complain about “management”.

        If Australia win 5-0, are you going to spend the next month banging the same drum?

        It’s inadequate.

        • Far from pointing it out, it’s you who has been banging the same drum repeatedly. And it’s beyond boring. But I won’t tell you what to post, because I’m guessing the point of this forum is for people to discuss cricketing matters, on and off the field. And whether you like it or not, the role of our governing body, the ECB, has a huge part to play in our team’s fortunes. It’s not even like this is new news! For years people have been questioning their decision-making for years, wondering why our first class system isn’t producing faster bowlers or mystery spinners, it isn’t just a reaction to defeat. And even if it was, we would hardly be alone in that respect, despite you labelling other as hypocrites. I remember reading Ricky’s autobiography and he spoke at length about the Argus Review, an enquiry that took place after Australia lost the Ashes series at home in 10/11!

          So stop trying to gain this non-existent high ground, and just enjoy the game. Your team is doing well, almost everyone has said that they are the better side (especially in home conditions), so why do you feel the need for them to be praised and affirmed anymore? I can assure you, if the situation was reversed and England were in the ascendancy, I wouldn’t give a (full) toss about what was being said by your fans. So why do you?

          It’s insecure. Champ.

        • There’s a fine line between being compelled and whingeing dude.

          Think you’ve crossed the line myself, and seem to have wound yourself up in the process. :)

  • Maybe we should start a petition to make those responsible publically accountable for their decisions. All county members I am sure would sign, as they are the core of county match support. Withhold membership payments until a meeting can be arranged between the ECB and representatives of each county’s membership.
    As long as we merely just sit back and gripe nothing will change.
    Certainly there’s no need for any 20-20 matches at weekends. Attendances would still be good weekday evenings. I don’t see soccer having an issue here. Indeed, all 1-day white ball cricket could be played in the week as day-nighters, so workers would only need to take off half days to attend. Start matches at 2pm, with special concessions for anyone who’d like to come in after 6pm, so families can have an evening out if the weather’s nice and workers can drop in on the way home.
    The other solution appears to me to be splitting the season up, so we get April, May and June exclusively for county championship games, July and August for the white ball game, then finish the county championship in September. At least then players get the chance to play some meaningful cricket before test matches start.
    These are just a couple of ideas off the top of the ol’ bonce so to speak. Please feel free to comment.

    • I politely disagree. Sunday afternoon t20s are a viable option for families who live more than an hour from the ground, who wouldn’t be able to get to midweek matches, and wouldn’t want to attend a cc game.

      The entire point of T20 cricket is to make live cricket a feasible and attractive option for people who couldn’t or wouldn’t want to attend for an entire day. Lose weekend fixtures and you lose a huge number of potential fans

      • In which case then maybe they ought to play two T20 games on the same day. It is a waste of a day to have just 40 overs bowled. I’d argue that you could have four teams involved in a round robin set of games but the counties would lose income by having fewer matches. But you could charge more if had more than one game and people would stay longer so they would eat and drink more at the ground.

        • The entire point of T20s are that they are short and sharp and don’t require an entire day’s commitment. People don’t WANT to spend more than 3 hours at a cricket ground. They have other things to be doing.

          Playing 2 T20s in the same day misses the entire point. Its like carefully buying half-fat food and then eating twice the amount.

      • Fans of cricket or just T20?
        The idea is to get people interested in all facets of the game by using the dumbed down version as an introduction, and working up to the less homogenised county championship, which is where support is badly needed, if we are to produce decent international players again. To do this we need to make the long game more accessible by playing it during weekends, not castrating it by replacing it with white ball cricket at every turn.
        Midweek 20-20’s get good gates nationwide, as do 50 over day nighters.
        County championship matches only get gates of any significance at weekends.
        We need to keep as many facets of the game as we can by giving help to the needy so to speak.

        • Most people who like cricket, like cricket. There aren’t two different sets of fans. That’s a complete myth.

          • I think you will find very little support for this view.
            If it was the case why is their clearly so much hostility to the 20-20 format amongst cricket lovers. I am not one of them, finding the tactical elements and brilliant fielding compensate to a degree, but it is clear that bowlers priorities become defensive, as do field settings and batsmen show little respect for the bowlers, many shoots being premeditated. Aspects of the game that are part of its appeal become outmoded, replaced with a cavalier slog or bust mentality that even the village green doesn’t have. At the highest level the cricket fan looks for exceptional technical and mental skills, just like in any sport and many see this format as prostituting this. You can’t savour it, which is one of the distinctive joys of watching Cricket, as opposed to most other more high octane sports like soccer and rugby. Cricket fans watch cricket for the love of the game, not being too concerned about the result, which is what makes a cricket fan different.

            • There isn’t hostility. Go to any cricket club. Ask who likes t20s cricket. Everyone will put their hand up. Ask who likes test cricket. Everyone will put their hand up. Same people. Cricket fans are cricket fans. The tiny minority of people who only like one form of cricket but hate all the rest don’t really like cricket at all. They may shout the loudest, but they’re very much the minority.

              You don’t seem to really have an argument. You’re just repeating nonsense because you heard someone else say it. I’m telling you, it’s gibberish.

        • I also like how in the other thread you complain about people not treating T20 cricket with enough respect, and here you describe it as dumbed down. Make up your mind.

          There is a definite and real need for weekend afternoon T20 games. They will attract families and groups of kids that simply would not attend any other format or timeslot.

          • Our club would go from 3 Saturday league teams and 2 Sunday friendly teams (never conceding any games due to availability ) to fielding one Saturday and we’d field no Sunday side.

            A number of other clubs when they are honest would say the same. Add to that, generally the types who,do,the hard yards off the pitch wouldn’t be keen to keep doing it fo a bunch of 2020 slogging fests.

            It does have a place and there certainly should be a 2020 Saturday league system.. however, it should be in parrellel to a draw long format system so that one produces your quality cricket and the other caters for causal players who just dip in and out

          • I’d rather watch 2020 than nothing but it doesn’t compare.

            Saying that the Women’s Big Bash League is strangely compelling. Much more entertaining than the pure power game of men’s 2020 even if the fielding can be a bit hit and miss.

            By hit and miss I mean 6 Tuffnells on the ground sometimes ( I’ve never seen a keeper miss 2easy popups before) though the batting and spin bowling in particular is great to watch.

    • The season is basically already set up in blocks. I for one don’t like it. Why not play all T20s in April instead?

  • At Essex last season we had a gap of 60 days without any championship cricket, from end of June until end of August.
    It’s a gap of 62 days for the same period next season.
    We had 3 early season Friday starts at home last season, compared to 2 for next season. So the chance to see any championship cricket at the weekend, or in high summer, is fairly slim.
    Our Colchester festival went last season, and is unlikely to return, as it needs a 4 day game, plus a 50 over or T20 game tagged on to make it viable. The fixture list makes this impossible to do.

    • The loss of festival and out ground games seems to have accelerated everywhere with the reduction in championship cricket. I used to particularly enjoy the annual game at the delightful Horsham ground. That has now gone. I do wonder if the main reason the Guildford festival continues is because the Guildford ground (whilst providing an excellent wicket and proximity to town) also provides such short boundaries that scoring can be like a T20.

  • Remove all live cricket from free to view TV, unlike snooker, say, who’ve just announced an extension to their deal with the BBC (“World Snooker chairman Barry Hearn said: “So many great moments in the history of our sport are synonymous with the coverage they have received on the BBC.”), then remove the county game from almost all weekends, then from much play in late June, July & August…

    Now it may be only me, but I can see a plot here to destroy the county game and its structure, so the ECB can run T20 competitions between the same handful of made up teams to their heart’s content.

  • Before there were two divisions in the Championship, it and the then Sunday League ran concurrently, the season had a rhythm and with regular updates to the Tables it helped keep interest up amongst spectators. Doing something similar now would be Championship matches Wed-Sat and T20 on Sundays, either as one division or two.

  • Unfortunately this trend to sidelining longer forms of cricket is a case of the fish rotting from the head – and the rot is already spreading to the club game. In October I was at a Surrey League meeting where one club (one of the more successful clubs who you would expect to want long form cricket) was vehement in suggesting a move to all limited over games in the league, and actually suggested that the league may, in future, want to restructure as a pure 20/20 competition. I am glad that, at 62, I may only have a few playing seasons left and will not see this madness come about.

    • Thing is, the county game as it stood was failing and a lot of counties were and still are in terrible debt. So something needed to be done. Whatever was done was never going to popular with everyone. I’m not saying the fixture list is right, and I’m sure it isn’t, but what is clear is that cricket fans – including myself – are good at seeing things from their own point of view or that of their own county and ignoring the bigger picture. I’ve rarely seen an unbiased point of view from anyone.

      Oh and AndyB, you criticize Tom for being rude (which he certainly was) and yet you manage to sledge both Boris Johnson and Piers Morgan in one post. Pot, meet kettle.

      • I did no such thing. I defended Tom as simply behaving like an Australian. It was others who called for him to be banned.

    • The move towards limited overs and the ever increasing move towards 2020 on sat / sun will result in simply pushing people out the game.

      Not only that, the draw offers up so many more variations to games and is where you will produce wicket taking bowlers, tactical captains and of course, batsmen are able to play longer innings and learn the art of crease occupation etc

    • I have been around club cricket changing rooms since the 1970’s and have never come accross one where, when the discussion has come up, all forms of the game are equally appreciated. There is always a difference of opinion as to the virtues of each format. These days 20-20 with its off field brash antics is clearly not aimed at the more mature county championship audience and appeals to a totally different mentality. There was a similar reaction to the John Player League when it started.
      I have also never come accross a changing room where a club wants to replace the standard 40-50 over style format with 20-20. There are plenty of clubs who play midweek 20-20 in addition to the standard format, which is a good thing. Variety is the spice in cricket as in life.
      With this in mind I don’t think there is need to despair of the game’s future.

  • There’s an interesting little bit at the end of this article
    :
    http://www.thecricketer.com/default.aspx?pageid=1223&catid=71&topicid=43552

    “Far from the new tournament destroying the fabric of county cricket, the ECB believe it will enhance it. Their chief executive Tom Harrison actually wants to see the expansion of the first-class county structure, perhaps to 20 or 21 counties, rather than any shrinkage. Provided, of course, that they can stand on their own two feet”.

    Does Hughes believe any of his own nonsense?

    • That is absolutely insane. There is no way, in a million years, that Tom IPL Harrison wants more county teams not less (or the same). Not sure why Simon Hughes is putting this out there.

      • Hughes uses The Cricketer and every other opportunity afforded to him by the media to pose as a ridiculously OTT, entirely uncritical cheerleader for the T20 city franchise, four day Tests and basically every “development” brought forth by the ECB. There isn’t even a pretence of objectivity. He spouts patent nonsense such as that linked above in order to advance his arguments. One could be forgiven for imagining that he might have some kind of personal interest in all this which is driving his agenda. I’m wary of ad hominem arguments, but I’m afraid “The Analyst” (who does precious little analysing when it comes to the governance of the game) just doesnt pass the smell test for me anymore.

      • I am not sure I agree. If we think about it from Harrison’s perspective there is considerable merit in having 20 FC counties split into two divisions of 10. That way they can argue there should only be nine 4 day games in a season as each county plays the others once. It leaves much more time for T20.

      • More county teams in more Divisions of 3 Teams means less County Championship games 2 at home 2 away

    • Surely if you were going to contract one format and expand another, you’d contract the loss-making format primarily concerned with providing quality test match players (the CC) and expand the profit-making format primarily designed to be accessible entertainment for fans (the T20 cup)

      Doing the opposite just seems beyond stupid. Its idiotic in both cricket terms and commercial terms.

      • The move to white ball certainly makes commercial sense. Whether it makes cricket sense depends on which form of cricket you regard as the blue riband. If, like me, you consider test cricket to be the ultimate form of the game then it makes no sense to make changes which will result in a deterioration in standards in the test format. In my view of the cricket world, any change which reduces test standards can only be justified if clearly necessary for the test format to survive. Whilst I understand the need for white ball cricket (test and county championship could not survive financially as the sole formats), the move away from red ball has now gone further than is needed to provide financial security and cricket has been taken over by a mindset of maximising revenue, rather than supporting a balanced game.
        The origin of the current problems seems to be in the governance format of the game in this country. The ECB is structured as a public limited company. As such it is dominated by the fiduciary duties of its management, which they have interpreted as maximising revenue and profit, regardless of the cost to the quality of the game. It would be reasonable to expect that the articles of association of the company (the ECB) would provide some guidance (and constraints) on the ECB management but, despite looking for some mention of objectives or terms of reference or whatever they wish to call them, I can find nothing in the articles other than fiduciary duty and the constraints of the need for them to avoid a mutiny by the counties. As such the board (and Harrison in particular) have almost unfettered power, not just to make operational decisions but to set strategic direction and police themselves.
        No wonder we are where we are. The ECB would benefit from adopting the German style of board structure, with a supervisory board overseeing the operational management and board and tasked with ensuring both that clear strategic objectives are in place and followed, and that operational management are subject to scrutiny by something other than an unwieldy and disparate bunch of amateurs.

  • Some good comments here. You can see the result in daft scheduling and wall to wall t20 in what’s happening in the Ashes.
    People remember the Ashes and Tests, but how many remember who won the Blast last September or who won in 2016? Exactly. Its instantly forgettable cricket, rather wackit, If you want to see 150 plays 150 and slogging every other ball out the ground fine, but it don’t half become a bore. Fine as a bit of occasional fun, but like a lot in life more is not better. Incidentally they don’t schedule t20’s much at the weekend because it doesn’t fill the big grounds or attract the drinkers, as weekday evenings do.

    • Something’s worth pointing out is that test cricket attracts as many drinkers these days as 20-20. Every day at test matches we have liquored up fancy dress groups baiting each other, albeit good naturedly for the most part, and the interminable Beer Snakes with a shot of Mexican Wave for good measure. If there’s no surfeit of wickets or runs the crowd finds entertainment elsewhere.
      By lunchtime there are hundreds of lads ‘in the mood to party’ as they would put it. The worse part of it is that the ex-players who should know better, seem to find the whole thing a good laugh. We even have Sky commentators presenting prizes for the best fancy dress. ‘It’s just a bit of harmless fun’ seems to be the mantra for boorish behaviour these days, as the lads and ladettes get slaughtered.

  • I don’t really understand why they can’t schedule the white ball rubbish and the proper cricket at the same time.

    Yes it would mean having two teams but as it’s mainly the overseas players who are the draw using it as a way of bringing more cricketers through rather than less seems like a no brainer. you could even increase the amount of money spinning 2020 this way.

    Whilst Glamorgan are playing Surrey in the country Championship Surrey plays Glamorgan in white ball formats.

    I can’t personally see this leading to a weakening of the Championship. Quite the opposite, blooding more players would give more choice for selection and it isn’t as though any of the counties don’t have local leagues full of players who would give their eyes teeth for a crack at the big stage.

    Clearly if a team was chasing white ball honours they might load their sides but it would lead to specialisation which is happening anyway. The opposite would also be true, both in terms of promotion and relegation.

    Who knows maybe you might even unearth quality players more interested in playing four day cricket to represent their counties and countries than hoping the IPL comes looking.

    • This used to be the case with the 40 over John Player league in the 70’s. There were no divisions then to disrupt the idea that everyone played everyone else home and away in both formats. It also meant a lot of Saturday county play. The increased white ball itinerary has made this impossible, although even then there was the regional league format 55 over Benson and Hedges Cup, where teams were blocked into regions with Oxford and Cambridge Universities and a Minor Counties X1, making up 20 teams in 4 local divisions, to encourage away fans, the distances not being too great to travel. These were mostly played in midweek early in the season, alongside the existing 60 over Gillette Cup knockout. However the B&H never really caught on. A poor relation to the Gillette. A bit like the League and FA cups in footie.

    • I’d be al for playing full season long 4day games and getting players to specialise.. after all, it’s only the rare few who are actually capable of playing both formats anyway.

    • Not sure that “most” fans see it that way. Some do, some don’t. Rather like pop music usually attracts different people from Clapton, Jeff Beck, Van Morrison etc but it’s the latter who have the exceptional skills and genius. Curiously you have more chance of seeing them in concert if you’re in Germany. The here today, gone tomorrow stuff is pumped out everywhere in this country.

      I’m toying with the idea of buying a Sussex membership next season but hesitate because of that 2 month gap in the summer. Do I want to spend £200 when, for a long time, there will be nothing I want to go and watch? Goodness knows they need the money.

    • Test cricket is the ultimate test, hence the name, but if you analyse 20-20, purely on what is going on on the field, forget the razzmatazz off it, it has become an increasingly sophisticated form, both tactically and athletically. Some of the shots the batsmen play are extremely skilled. It is far from mindless slogging and clearly a lot of practice goes into the finished product. The fielding is amazing. Bowlers have to think about every ball, varying line, length and pace at will and produce under real pressure. A bad over can lose you the game. Admittedly there are drawbacks, where aspećts of the game become outmoded, like close to the wicket fielding and wicket taking bowling especially, which is clearly affecting test selection. There was the same criticism of The John Player League when it was first introduced. It maybe dumbed down, but it is far from shit.

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