Zoom Forum Slideshow

 

No mention of what the gathered members said. That meeting was much like the Zoom version last night where members were muted, but I'm sure one of the panel might have preferred neutered as well.

Little credence was given to the opinions of other counties by the panel.

All discussions with members have surrounded the County Championship and any views of the members have been brushed aside, evidently.

The flawed members' survey by the club asked about how members would prioritise different formats with a view to reductions but of the 6000 members, only 10% responded to that survey.

Mick Newell admitted he saw the benefits to a balanced first division (everyone playing everyone else twice) but was of the opinion that (as almost everyone gets relegated at some time) a ten team second division would be to difficult to gain promotion from and a county could find itself stuck in the lower tier with never any chance of winning the championship. All a bit strange as one of Notts' promotions during his time was with a 9 team division. That was all just an illusion, the decision has been made to go with the second option.

To add to the illusion, details of rejected options were thrown-in as with the view that "look how bad a decision we could have made!" We should be grateful to "GEE CEE".

This were where the GEE CEE* were led to in their Committee meeting (how many on zoom for that eh?) on the day of the game at Cleethorpes, not that apart from one notable exception, any of the GC had bothered to attend there.

The club rejected deregionalising the Blast groups, in an aim to freshen up the competition, because of the additional travelling times.

Mick Newell said he wants jeopardy. But not in his current job I would suspect!

Hiding behind the GEE CEE* who would have been advised by external influences brought into that meeting, I have little doubt, chose to disregard the majorities' wishes. There can be little doubt that if asked directly if you'd support a reduction in Men's County Championship in order to support the growth in Women's one day cricket, then that reduction would be rejected. The Blaze still aren't a Nottinghamshire team, yet they endeavor to brainwash us with this. Meanwhile, opponents of the Blaze were demoted by the Chair, as according to Mr Hunt, Somerset DO NOT HAVE a Tier 1 women's team, so Somerset obviously would have differing priorities to those of his GEE CEE*. Somerset are one of at least 3 counties that support Option 1 - an 8 team Division 1 with 14 matches.

[note Somerset do have a Tier 1 women's team]

A permitted question was about "why the hurry and why couldn't the decision making have waited and then presented face to face next week to members?" No explanation was made as to why the ECB had a July cut off, as four months is a long time to agree a schedule once the competition structure has been finalised.

The flaws in zoom conferencing where one half of a debate is muted (by design) quite evident.

Why not revert to 3 day games? Mick Newell played the ECB card where games had to replicate Test cricket as much as possible and many a 3 day game was won after a declaration and a target set, to get a result in his day playing, the best performing team in a contest not always coming out on top. Hey, that's sport!

How will any expansion of The H*ndred impact on there being too much cricket for the PCA members? LP - the ECB owns the competition and the competition will not expand beyond its 27 days for at least the next 4 years.

LP - the H*ndred is all about the best against the best and that is how they want all cricket to be, teams not hindered by injuries or fatigue blah blah. 

MN answered a question about the the reduction in the SEC, which he didn't seem to grasp as he thought that there were at the same level this year to last, offering Freddie McCann and Farhan as examples of how a competitive second eleven system produces cricketers. Much of the second eleven timetable is now taken up with friendly matches, so can hardly be of the same intensity as the SEC.

How can the members trust the General Committee? The Chair responded, waffled on about finances, new pavilion work and budgets, "they're all voluntees" and they do an amazing job. Which on day to day matters they do but...

12 of the GEE CEE have voted against the obvious wishes of the people that they are supposed to represent and should take collective responsibility for the resulting loss of trust.

The terrible trio, would have us believe that they somehow were given a mandate by their awful survey, for the decisions made by the GEE CEE.

One lifeline to sanity is that should no consensus be achieved by the CEOs and Chairs, then any vote for a change will need a 12 out 18 majority, however the CEO did admit that a vote was being avoided if at all possible. So fingers-crossed that we get some democracy in this process right at the very end as there are so many conflicting views from different counties. Whereas with us members around the country, we're quite united.

Any changes, for better or for worse, will be in place until 2031.

"Membership fees for 2026 are yet to be reviewed", but you get so many other benefits as well".

* In light of there now being a petition for a vote of no confidence in each of every member of the General Committee, I have been asked that I should point out that the GEE CEE's vote was not unaminous and their vote was 10-2 in favour ofthe above reductions to the men's schedule. I'm sure this will be reflected in the minutes for that meeting once they are published. Members will probably be able to work out which two of the dozen voted in accordance with how any other ordinary member would have voted.