Why do people hate the hundreds

It might all have been the game ever needed. But just gimme some truth, as John Lennon put it. While trumpeting the record figures, let's also acknowledge that the crowd for Thursday's men's Hundred game at the Kia Oval was well, below what Surrey would expect for a domestic T And let us acknowledge that the crowd for the men's game at Edgbaston was, at 12,, below what Birmingham Bears or are we calling them Warwickshire again now that there's a second Birmingham team in town? Given the vast marketing outlay - the primetime TV adverts; the thousands of free tickets; the hubris and bluster - that seems a modest return.

And while there were some signs of the mythical "new audience" at The Oval on Wednesday, the crowds on Thursday and Friday have seemed very similar to the normal T20 audience. We had the same chants, the same behaviour, the same enthusiasm. In no way should that be perceived as a problem - T20 audiences have kept counties afloat for two decades now; they deserve more respect than they are sometimes given - but let's just be straight about where we are here. The use of the name Phoenix in connection with Birmingham is revealing.

For those with any real association with the city, it surely evokes memories of the Phoenix Consortium. A history of car-making that stretched back a century in the city was ended. The Longbridge area, where the car-plant once employed over 25, people and stretched over 70 acres, has never fully recovered. It suggests the link between this team and the city it purports to represent is as flimsy as some of the marketing rhetoric that has accompanied it.

If the idea was really to cut the length of games, they wouldn't have introduced timeouts; if the aim was really to appeal to non-white communities, they wouldn't have employed a coach who has been suspended for hurling racist abuse; if the ECB really wanted to protect the county system, it wouldn't have introduced a format which could endanger them.

What was it the US major supposedly said all those years ago: something about being necessary to destroy a Vietnamese town in order to save it? Just give us some truth; we'll respect it much more than the bluster we've been fed so far.

So, what have we learned so far? The format seems to work. Just as the T20 format works. But the cost? Well, we may be working that out for many years to come. Well, it would enable more teams to participate in the very narrow Olympic window. It was Andy and I on the front then Lina and Laura on the back nine. Talking about his play on the hole, We got a good read on the putt, the team gave me good comfort and I holed the putt. We as a team get on really well and are all quite chatty out there, which I like.

All that is required is online registration. Visit www. Yorkshire and its people have always regarded themselves as special. This is embodied in its county cricket club, which has won more championships than any other county. It has, however, been notorious for a tendency towards outbreaks of internal controversy that become public property. A part of its special nature stems from a rule on formation in that no one born outside of the county should play for it. This did not prevent Lord Hawke, born in the neighboring county of Lincolnshire, from playing matches for Yorkshire and being captain for 28 seasons between and His eligibility to play for Yorkshire rested on conveniently revised qualification rules in , when players had to decide at the start of a season whether they would play for the county of their birth or residence.

It was not until that Yorkshire further relaxed qualification rules, making eligible those educated within the county. This facilitated the selection of another future England captain. Subsequently, the majority of overseas players have been Australian and South African.

In , none other than Imran Khan accused Yorkshire of failing its Asian community. This generated an open trial for young Asians, but it was not until that a small trickle of Asian players produced the first British-born Asian to play for Yorkshire.

In the following two decades that trickle failed to flow much faster. Alongside the research was a parliamentary motion that called for action by the ECB on racism in the game. This was an issue in Yorkshire, where there was a tendency for a ghettoization of clubs according to color and race but, in my experience, it was not the only county to experience this feature. If no one addresses these issues head-on, divisions become entrenched, yet no one is prepared to admit that they are racist — quite the opposite.

There seems to be much of this in the Yorkshire situation. In April , a new chair was appointed with a reforming agenda. In an interview published in September , Azeem Rafiq, a former Asian player, claimed racial harassment and bullying. Stung into action, the chairman commissioned an investigation of the allegations.

Eventually, the report was submitted in August. Yorkshire chose not to make the report public or share a copy with the ECB, issuing a summary on Sept. Indeed, the outgoing chair has stated that, in his view, no one at the club is racist.

This storm has been a long time in the making, brewed to the point which has made it a focus for criticism by race equality activists. There are many layers to the issue. The former chairman rescued the club financially in and helped in acquiring its Headingley ground in He has urgent business to address if the cracks are to be prevented from widening. Already, he has reached a settlement with Rafiq ahead of a parliamentary select committee on Nov.

The outcomes of this tawdry affair have implications for cricket all over the world, not just for Yorkshire, which needs a Lord Hawke figure to rebuild its crumbling house. So the draw was a better result for the visitors than the hosts.

As the teams came out amid the pouring rain on Thursday, Saudi fans watching back home could have been forgiven for feeling some trepidation. After two years of football that had taken place exclusively in the Middle East, these were very foreign conditions for the Green Falcons — quite cool and very wet.

Originally 20 overs was marketed as like a one-day game with the boring bits taken out. And that applies potentially even more to domestic cricket, where attendances are below commercial levels, than to international cricket. A lot of players will make better livings as over airmile-earners than as international cricketers. The same marquee players, a different airport and a differently garish kit. The same auction system and resulting disconnect from local communities. Especially the ones that are actually ingrained in the popular consciousness even of casual fans.

Cricket statto types are going to have a minor nightmare classifying these weird metric overs and relating it to existing data. The Hundred just feels a bit Cricket Maxy to me. City franchises are probably the thin edge of the wedge that will marginalise county cricket to the point that eventually it expires.

Cricket in general and cricket in this country specifically had two main problems: 1. A dwindling interest in the county game 2. Ridiculous fixture congestion. To attempt to fix the first by exacerbating the second is just pig-headed stupidity, and further divides an already fairly small audience between four formats, rather than three. What is particularly obtuse is that is all this is done in order to bring in a format which, in terms of appeal attempts to fill exactly the same niche as T20 already sits in but with the added bonus of not appealing to cricket fans, and having some peculiar rules tweaks that will make it more difficult for any new fans picked up to transition to watching proper cricket.

We already clearly see that cricket is more popular in areas of the country where there are first class teams i. If that goes, you can envisage a sort of cricket blackout in areas like Derbyshire and Leicestershire or even Somerset and Essex. I think the threat to the counties is real: when figures like Trevor Bayliss and even Jonathan Agnew are suggesting it, you know that the mood is turning. The Hundred franchise system presents a clear template for remodeling domestic cricket in England from the bottom up.

That would be a recognizable and distinctly English tournament format that strengthened the counties, played to existing fans and had some potential for attracting new ones. In UK, in football there are 18 teams?

Seems that the is a political project, to start on a clean slate, rather than involving any existing county competitions. The comments here read like some sort of specialist support group for aggrieved cricket fans — is this one of the new services which Patreon donations are supporting….?

It is also a bit bemusing although perhaps an unfair criticism that so much effort has gone into this new competition seemingly at the expense of promoting domestic versions of the two forms of cricket with with many non-cricket fans have just spent months getting acquainted and, in some cases, getting emotionally involved with.

I would be sad if the County Championship was abolished, but not too upset if the T20 Blast was replaced by The Hundred. I should have added that, of course, all this is just the next step on the inevitable path to Brockian Ultra-Cricket …. A great KC commenter Bert once wrote about cricket administrators upgrading cats to dogs. That got the cat lovers among the readers angry — although their ire was really aimed at Giles Clarke back then. It is almost as difficult to find this match on the TV as it is to pronounce or even get to Visakhapatnam.

We can assume that Mr Strauss means those who are liable to retain only a passing interest in the game, what with their smart phones, social media and avocado toast. We want that audience but a different audience as well, who perhaps would like things slightly different. That's the driver behind this idea. Hold up a moment. Now you want the new audience and those who already love T20? Make up your mind there, ECB, me old chum. Those who have no vested interest in cricket? Right, this case got a whole lot weirder.

Will they be flogging free tickets to this thing with every pack of Pampers? I get it I think.