The Cricket Thread

Agnew's suggestion to completely reform the County Championship is utter nonsense TBH. I shudder at the thought of franchise based red ball cricket. And besides, England players are hardly ever made available for CC cricket anyway. That's the main issue.

 

Aren’t the number of tournaments similar for the top Australians as well? They all have a domestic T20, IPL etc?

So how do they fit more red ball in ?

 

Exactly. Australia's equivalent of the CC is the Sheffield Shield. And the formats are very similar.

 

Weather's better for longer. We try playing our red ball cricket early/late summer. Games get cancelled or shortened.

 

Too right, I care about Hants more than England and I'm sure that are many others who love county cricket more than internationals.
Supporting a made up team with a silly name would not inspire the same devotion I'm afraid.

 

Grudge match to start the CC season @ChilcoSaint
Hants v Somerset first match of the season.

I suspect it won't be a high scoring match either!

 

Bring it on!

 

Tom Prest going well for England U19's in their World Cup match against UAE U19's - 48 not out off 55 balls.

 

In fact he's going really well. BBC are miles behind. I looked on Cricinfo and he's 97 not out off 91 balls!

 

Prest finished on 154 not out from 119 balls.

 

So the timing of the t20 fixtures rules out any SA white ball, or NZ red ball, players from featuring in the first two-thirds of the competition. So by and large I'd expect counties to look elsewhere for their overseas t20 players.

But come the business end of the competition, both groups could be available, and already be over here. So a few of them might yet feature. Particularly if any of those NZ players will then play in the Championship straight after the t20s.

 

Bad news. Vince has entered the IPL auction. (IPL final is anticipated for late May or early June)

Good news. He has gone in at the highest price bracket. So that might put everyone off from picking him.

(Billings, Wood, Jordan, Roy, Rashid, Craig Overton, Mahmood and Willey have also gone for the top price bracket. The lower price brackets include Morgan, Hales, Livingstone, Malan, Mills, Pope and Lawrence.)

 

Not convinced he'll get bought TBH.

 

Middlesex chairman apologises for 'painful' and 'outdated' views on black and South Asian interest - BBC Sport

Has he basically ignored the Afro and Asian communities in the London area because he assumed the former are more interested in football, whilst the later pursue their education? Or has the club deliberately ignored tapping into the latent talent at its doorstep, and prefers to go for players with old school tie connection, re Atherton;s son? Ebony is right to call the club out on thjis aspect.

 

I see South Africa have recalled Harmer to the test team. That could be bad news for Essex if he does well.

 

This is special from Bethell.

 

England getting a bit of a slapping.
Windies 153-2 off 15.

 

England target 225.
Highest t20 run chase on this ground? 155

 

Nice to see that the Bowl has been awarded the 100 eliminator. I don't know if that's a random coincidence, or a reward for winning the men's competition last season. I'm assuming the former.

Looks like it could be the first three rounds of matches that the test players are available for.

 

Abbas has resigned for Hants.