The International Cricket Thread

[olaftab]

We need a sixth and deciding test. I’m not ready for this to be over.

Not allowed….the real cricket starts today!  Feckin ECB suited imbeciles

Yes the wonderful 100 played over 16.4 overs each, what's the point. Total nonsense.

[Proposition Joe]

At lunchtime yesterday the BBC Sport app said Australia had won by 7 wickets.

A lot of us were saying the same

I should have more faith in our team, but being a Villa and England cricket fan are very similar things. Scars take a long time to heal...

[London Villan]

With the money making potential I'm surprised the ECB hasn't looked at reverting to a 6 test series for the Ashes.

[simboy]

With the money making potential I'm surprised the ECB hasn't looked at reverting to a 6 test series for the Ashes.

it would interfere with the "T20 less 20" we have coming up, or would have to start in April ... a climate change blessing?

[Gareth]

With the money making potential I'm surprised the ECB hasn't looked at reverting to a 6 test series for the Ashes.

They are obsessed with finding a new market not building the existing one…wasting August with this complete made up nonsense that has no international value whilst devaluing the 50 over comp to a largely developmental one, having condensed the premier test series into 6 weeks and no championship cricket is an utter farce. 

[PaulWinch again]

So I think the Hundred has been really good for women’s cricket. But it’s confusing having it AND a twenty20 competition.

Test cricket generally, beyond the Ashes, just needs funding, focus, and prioritisation. There’s no Test match being player in world cricket until November. I get there’s a World Cup coming up but that is mad. It just needs sorting out - starting with funnelling a bigger chunk of money to countries who want to develop Test cricket.

[Nev]

People would be far more open to The Hundred if it wasn't prioritised over all other forms of Cricket. The hype and bullshit from both media and players has made it even more unpalatable. No other nation has picked up the format, the football season returns days after it starts, the forecast remains poor and the shadow of a monumental Ashes series will hang over it for some time yet. It already feels as though it has run out of steam but of course the ECB will plough on and rather like Brexit there will be a series of small steps backwards without any admission of failure or responsibility until eventually the Men's competition is finished and only the Women's remains.

The TV deal means we're stuck with it for a while but it is the lamest of ducks.

[tomd2103]

So I think the Hundred has been really good for women’s cricket. But it’s confusing having it AND a twenty20 competition.

Test cricket generally, beyond the Ashes, just needs funding, focus, and prioritisation. There’s no Test match being player in world cricket until November. I get there’s a World Cup coming up but that is mad. It just needs sorting out - starting with funnelling a bigger chunk of money to countries who want to develop Test cricket.

Jonathan Agnew made a similar point about Test cricket on TMS after the game yesterday.  He said a good starting point would be trying to untangle the political problems and having India v Pakistan tests played again. 

With the Ashes, test match cricket will always have context for us, as we are only ever two years away from one and have some interesting series against the likes of India, South Africa (though they are struggling a bit), New Zealand, Pakistan etc. to build towards the Aussies. 

It's hard to see how it can be fixed in other countries though as the appetite just doesn't seem to be there.  It's also a format which doesn't lend itself to having a meaningful competition, as the World Test Championship just seems a bit of a mess. 

[tomd2103]

People would be far more open to The Hundred if it wasn't prioritised over all other forms of Cricket. The hype and bullshit from both media and players has made it even more unpalatable. No other nation has picked up the format, the football season returns days after it starts, the forecast remains poor and the shadow of a monumental Ashes series will hang over it for some time yet. It already feels as though it has run out of steam but of course the ECB will plough on and rather like Brexit there will be a series of small steps backwards without any admission of failure or responsibility until eventually the Men's competition is finished and only the Women's remains.

The TV deal means we're stuck with it for a while but it is the lamest of ducks.

We've seen some skirmishes amongst the cricket community about The Hindrance, sorry The Hundred, over the past couple of summers, but I think this will be the summer when the hostilities really break out.  I think the backlash of people not being able to watch England or their county play for the best part of a month because of a format which clearly is never going to catch on will really start to register.

The annoying thing is that the solution seems so obvious.  A block of County Championship fixtures from April to mid August on a Tuesday to Friday, with a return of the 50 over Sunday League and perhaps even a knockout tournament involving the minor counties.  Then a revamped T20 Blast tournament in one block going into September and culminating in Finals Day. 

I can see the ECB ditching the men's Hundred soon though, but it will be replaced with a T20 franchise tournament.

[Risso]

India Pakistan would be good, as it's the only other real match up with the sort of spirit you see at Ashes games. The problem obiously is compounded by the fact that there are only 12 test playing nations, and at least a third of those are fairly poor nations. Obviously 5 day tests don't really lend themselves to a tournment format as it would take 6 months to play all the games! Thinking out loud, what about a northern hemisphere v southern hemisphere series, with players from England, the West Indies and India etc against players from Australia, New Zealand and South Africa?

[Gareth]

They could play a World Test Championship in 5/6 weeks if they get over this daft obsession to only play one game at a time.

If you have 12 teams - you’d only need 4 grounds in whichever country staged it
Qualifier round teams ranked 5-12 is 4 games played over same 5 days leaves 8 teams so 4 quarter finals again played in tandem then two semis and a final…done and dusted in 6 weeks leaving a few days between rounds

[tomd2103]

India Pakistan would be good, as it's the only other real match up with the sort of spirit you see at Ashes games. The problem obiously is compounded by the fact that there are only 12 test playing nations, and at least a third of those are fairly poor nations. Obviously 5 day tests don't really lend themselves to a tournment format as it would take 6 months to play all the games! Thinking out loud, what about a northern hemisphere v southern hemisphere series, with players from England, the West Indies and India etc against players from Australia, New Zealand and South Africa?

Agree with that Risso.  Some of the countries have the double whammy of players not really wanting to play test cricket because of the offers from franchise cricket and Boards losing money staging games.  It just isn't an attractive package to some I suppose.

Maybe we're just trying to hold back the tide of white ball and franchise cricket and it will eventually just take over and test cricket will be relegated to being one off series that occur every couple of years or so.

[tomd2103]

They could play a World Test Championship in 5/6 weeks if they get over this daft obsession to only play one game at a time.

If you have 12 teams - you’d only need 4 grounds in whichever country staged it
Qualifier round teams ranked 5-12 is 4 games played over same 5 days leaves 8 teams so 4 quarter finals again played in tandem then two semis and a final…done and dusted in 6 weeks leaving a few days between rounds

Part of the problem.is that we are the only country that really plays in the NH summer, otherwise you could potentially have windows throughout the year where it could be coordinated for a group of fixtures to take place at the same time.   

Maybe the large South Asian diaspora in North America could see fixtures played over there in the summer, especially once Major League Cricket has taken off.

[paul_e]

This thread risks being a bit of an echo chamber when it comes to the hundred, everyone posting here is a follower of test cricket so there's a pretty clear bias.

Attendances across the season have topped 500k both summers so far, if they stay at that sort of level then the format won't go anywhere. One of the biggest challenges with cricket outside top level test series and t20 is that the crowds just aren't there, which holds the sport back.

[Risso]

Part of the problem is  that when you consider (English) football, rugby and cricket in that order, then in descending order, club football is very much the pinnacle of the game, with the national side being of secondary importance to the majority of players and fans, and the clubs/league are the most powerful people in the game. Rugby is somewhere in the middle I'd argue. A fairly strong national and European league, with the national side more popular with a lot of fans. Then comes cricket, where the test playing side is miles more important and popular with the players and fans, such that the better players play very little county cricket, and the majority of fans will never have been to a county game or even watched one on TV.

Then on top of this, all of a sudden new formats such as T20 and The Hundred appear, which further takes away talent from the traditional long format game.