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The Hundred has been a success already, says ECB's Tom Harrison
BBC Sport 22/02/19
The 100-ball competition starting next year "has been a success already", says England and Wales Cricket Board chief executive Tom Harrison.
The Hundred - the rules for which were confirmed this week - has been criticised since it was proposed.
"It will be something that cricket fans all around the country will flock to see," Harrison told BBC Sport.
Eight new city-based teams will play over a five-week period in the summer of 2020.
The Hundred will be the fourth different format in county cricket, alongside the four-day County Championship, 50-over and 20-over competitions.
Last year, the Professional Cricketers' Association said players had concerns over the tournament, while India captain Virat Kohli said commercialism "is taking over the real quality of cricket".
Former England director of cricket Andrew Strauss said the competition is aimed at "mums and kids in the summer holidays", while England bowler Stuart Broad praised the concept's "unique selling point".
"We've managed to excite people outside the traditional cricket bubble," Harrison told the Test Match Special podcast.
"Cricket fans can start to get very excited about this.
"We've managed to create something that's excited partners. We've managed to generate new revenue, new levels of exposure to this tournament, reach to a wider audience."
Playing conditions for The Hundred were confirmed on Thursday. They include 100 balls per innings, bowlers bowling five or 10 consecutive balls, a change of ends every 10 deliveries, and a strategic timeout for the fielding side.
"It's optimised short-form cricket," said Harrison.
"We're getting people to re-appraise cricket in terms of their perceptions of what the game means to them, and ultimately addressing the complexity of cricket - presenting it in a simple way."
Counties vote 17-1 to adopt 'The Hundred’ Playing Conditions.
PTG Editor.
Thursday, 21 February 2019.
PTG 2735-13667.
The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) have announced that the “first class Counties of England and Wales" have agreed to the Playing Conditions for its new competition, which is now officially known as 'The Hundred'. The Playing Conditions had been recommended by ECB’s Cricket Committee and were endorsed by the ECB Board late last year, but as required by ECB governance processes, the 18 first class Counties were then asked to formally vote on the proposed format.
The voting process started after a 'Whole Game' meeting in January - where a game-wide strategy for 2020-24 was presented - and the final vote was received this week. A two-thirds majority in favour was required for the 100-ball format to be agreed and this was well exceeded as the counties voted 17-1 in favour, with Surrey believed to be the stand out.
The key elements of the new white-ball game are: 100 balls per innings; change of ends after 10 balls; bowlers deliver either 5 or 10 consecutive balls; each bowler can deliver a maximum of 20 balls per game; each bowling side gets a strategic timeout of up to two-and-a-half minutes; a 25-ball Powerplay starts each innings; and two fielders are allowed outside of the 30-metre circle during the Powerplay. The strategic time-out, which was originally introduced in the Indian Premier League, essentially as a way of fitting in extra advertising during broadcasts, will be taken at a time chosen by the bowling team.
Tom Harrison, the ECB’s chief executive, called the Playing Conditions announcement "a significant step, with overwhelming support for The Hundred". “Over the last three years we have worked closely with the whole game to create an important opportunity for the whole game. This new competition has already helped to secure vital new partnerships and substantial broadcast revenues and it will help us to meet the ambitions of our game-wide strategy for 2020-24. The Hundred will help cricket to reach more people”. He emphasised the ECB “remains totally committed to the existing, popular forms of cricket and will be committing significant funds and focus to all levels of the game, protecting and nurturing the core whilst reaching out to a wider audience”.
Confirming the next steps, Sanjay Patel, Managing Director of The Hundred, said: “This agreement shows the confidence that the Counties have in the new competition and their desire to help take cricket to more people. You will now see an acceleration in the progress of The Hundred and a series of significant building blocks over the coming months, before our first ever Player Draft in [October]. The next major step will be to confirm the team identities, with their names and kit colours, following months of research and consultation and, operationally, the new competition team will be able to move into the next phase of developing The Hundred”.
Harrison declined to confirm that The Oval would be one of the host venues, but Surrey were not advocates of the new format, leading to suggestions they could be stripped of their hosting rights (PTG 2734-13666, 21 February 2019). “We’d love the whole game to be with us”, Harrison said. “I’m not going to comment. It’s a board-level matter”.
BBC Sport 21/02/19
The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) has made the "significant step" of confirming full detail of the format of the new 100-ball competition.
Eight new city-based teams will play in The Hundred over a five-week period in the summer of 2020.
The white-ball competition will be 100 balls per innings, with a change of ends after 10 balls.
Chief executive Tom Harrison said the ECB remains "totally committed to the existing, popular forms of cricket".
The new format is intended to bring a wider audience to the game.
"The Hundred will help cricket to reach more people," Harrison said.
"This new competition will help us to meet the ambitions of our game-wide strategy for 2020-24".
The new 100-ball format was confirmed announced in November and the first-class counties voted 17-1 in its favour this week.
The format will be:
- 100 balls per innings.
- A change of ends after ten balls.
- Bowlers deliver either five or ten consecutive balls.
- Each bowler can deliver a maximum of 20 balls per game.
- Each bowling side gets a strategic timeout of up to two-and-a-half minutes.
- A 25-ball powerplay start for each team.
- Two fielders are allowed outside of the initial 30-yard circle during the powerplay.
Sanjay Patel, the managing director of The Hundred, said the next step was to agree team identities, such as names and kit colours.
The new competition will also feature a player draft, which will be scheduled for the autumn.
It was reported in April that the player draft would consist of squads of 15, with three overseas players.
Embarrassing, members of the @ECB_cricket should hang their heads in shame....& then resign forthwith.
ReplyDeleteWhatever else The Hundred is, it is NOT a simplification!
ReplyDeleteCan’t see it working Stupid Idea ECB should bin it now & concentrate on running the tournaments we already have Ok it’s not perfect now but it’s better than a 2020 calamity Well done Surrey for not agreeing Its a pity nobody else had the balls to challenge the circus !!
ReplyDeleteMembers need to ask some serious and searching questions of the Notts Committee at next week's AGM. Such as, why are Notts playing at Grantham (and where else in 2020 onwards) when 100-ball non-Notts matches will take place at Trent Bridge. Why NO Notts. cricket at all in May 2019 - is this likely to happen again in the future? What GUARANTEED income will Notts receive from the 100-ball knockabout? This is NOTHING TO DO WITH NOTTS CCC - it is entirely an ECB Competition - so what are they making out of it all?
ReplyDeleteGood luck to anyone trying to get proper answers to these types of probing questions. I've stopped going as they're more interested in spouting about community projects in glowing terms. The question as to why we are having to play a home game at the remote outpost of Gorse Lane, however, does need addressing, when as stated previously by Nottsview there would appear to be sufficient time to play this game before the ODI. If it something to do with the ECB then the hierarchy should at least let us know. I suspect it's a perfectly adequate venue for the players, committee and staff, the only people it's totally unsatisfactory for are the ones who seemingly don't matter anymore..........the Notts supporters.
DeleteQuestions - questions and yet more .....questions !
ReplyDeleteThe 100 Comp seems very complicated . The people that its aimed at (those with a low attention span ) - will they understand the rules ?
i am going to the AGM next week . Is there anyone on here that cannot go but would like a question put to the top table ? Let me know ASAP .
It would be interesting to find out why the powers that be have deemed it necessary to play the game at Grantham, 14 days before the ODI at TB. FYI Surrey play a game at the Oval just 6 days before their ODI in that same series against Pakistan. So it isn't the proximity to hosting an International game that is the reason.
DeleteWhy do Notts not accept that, like Surrey, the T20 is a resounding success and so SUPPORT SURREY? Notts will need to carefully monitor attendance figures at the T20 when 'competing' with the 100ball fiasco.
ReplyDeleteAs I remember it, the ECB objective originally, was to get more people playing cricket because the number of participants in the game had dropped drastically. The All Stars programme in conjunction with a new-nothing-old-county-orientated-T20-competition designed to excite the youth of the UK and to rival the IPL and the BBL, plus with coverage on free terrestrial TV was supposed to be the answer and to rescue cricket from obscurity and imminent extinction in England.
ReplyDeleteWhat we've got in 2020 with this Hundred is alienating existing cricket supporters, the ones that will be the initial audience figures on terrestrial or pay to view TV. The un-named teams are likely to have no natural fan base and draw upon a random collective of spectators brought to the grounds by cheap overly hyped tickets. Spectators that will be confused to the extreme if they had any prior knowledge of the rules or format of a game of cricket and if they hadn't they would have no appreciation of the high or otherwise standard of play that they are bearing witness to and so not be inspired to take up the sport because they won't know if what they've seen is worth trying to emulate. Money will have been wasted on paying the top appearance fees for domestic and overseas players to take part. Meanwhile, the existing game in its three formats is pushed to the margins further, crowds will suffer, advertising revenue will be reduced and county incomes will drop. Counties will wither once the £1.3M sweeteners stop.
If no one watches The Hundred games on TV, the schedulers will quickly sideline it, sticking it on increasingly remote channels, how soon for a Sky sports 4 or 5 channel or a red button on BBC 4. Has no one cottoned on yet, the youth don't watch traditional TV no more anyway - if it's not coming through their phone, that is constantly in their palms, as an alert or update, it doesn't exist!
The Hundred on the face of it is less likely to be cricket's saviour than it is to be it's eventual executioner.