Royal London One Day Cup

^^ You are right, but I believe that we will see some, Championship Cricket (4 day) whether it's a conference or 2 division format, played before & during the Test matches. This year they were happy to see, the 50 over Royal London Cup, played without it's best players, losing then to the hundred & International call-ups, in order to protect the Championship to a degree, despite it being mainly played in April, May & September. I would expect some back-tracking next year, with Championship Cricket losing it's top players for some matches when the hundred takes place.

(21-08-2021 13:56 )Boomerangutangangbang Wrote:  ^^ You are right, but I believe that we will see some, Championship Cricket (4 day) whether it's a conference or 2 division format, played before & during the Test matches. This year they were happy to see, the 50 over Royal London Cup, played without it's best players, losing then to the hundred & International call-ups, in order to protect the Championship to a degree, despite it being mainly played in April, May & September. I would expect some back-tracking next year, with Championship Cricket losing it's top players for some matches when the hundred takes place.

To further downgrade the County Championship would be a retrograde step also. Same outcome!

Easy victory for Essex over the Spitfires! Quality innings from Westley, with back up from Snater who - after coming close to being pulled out of the attack by the umps - made up for it in the field with a blinding catch - one ball after a near miss which, if he had executed it, would have been catch of the season - quite possibly overall when the season ended too!

Interesting to hear of a number of sell out attendances at the RL matches today, whilst at the 'all important' cash grab event.........not quite the same!! Yes different sized venues, but we were told that people would just 'flock' to this bright and shiny new 'diamond'

Another cracking encounter today between Durham and Gloucestershire! I am not a fan of 300 and plenty playing the same, as it suggests a flat do nothing track. Today however, was the type of match (whatever the scores) that shows the utter stupidity of messing with this tournament, and downgrading 50 over cricket overall.

It looked like Gloucestershire may have built a total which Durham would never get near, but thanks to a quality innings from Coughlin (only 77 but worth so much more) and contributions from Dickson and Trevaskis, they managed to get to within one more big hit for victory.

Had Durham held crucial catches - particularly Dent who went on to score a pivotal ton, the outcome would have been different.

There was lots of talk from the comm box and from email about the changes coming, with nobody in favour - including the commentators themselves. One emailer suggested that the BBC send the comments to Strauss et al to show the strength of feeling. I would argue one additional thing and it is this.......... The BBC comms teams are only there to bring us the description of the matches in front of them thanks to we license fee payers. Since it is clear they share our views on what is happening, I feel it only right that they drop this convenient 'facade' of 'objectivity' ( a moving definition for them anyway) and make submissions to the review panel ( they were scathing about who is on the panel) on behalf of those of us who tune in to listen to county coverage.

After a handful of Hundred games, Nasser said that the tournament needed a close game, last nights 9th match finally delivered. He said that you would expect that the shortest form of the game to provide more tight finishes, at the other end of the scale a 5 day Test can produce large margins of victory. That said I've been happy to see a good amount of tight games in the RL Cup, we've even had a tie !
Moeen chose his words poorly in an interview, discussing if the format had a place, he used the words boring, as did a Glamorgan commentator, this week, describing the boring middle overs, saying he preferred the 40 over format. Thankfully Bairstow called in "proper cricket" as he was almost mimicking Boycott & others from his era.
Speaking to Yorkshire members who are pro 4 day cricket, they love the 50 over comp. I think that you get the best of both worlds, sometimes getting a rapid start or a collapse of wickets, yet often chance to rebuild, or the fielding side to mount a fightback, true ebb & flow, & sometimes a slog at the end.

(12-08-2022 19:23 )Boomerangutangangbang Wrote:  After a handful of Hundred games, Nasser said that the tournament needed a close game, last nights 9th match finally delivered. He said that you would expect that the shortest form of the game to provide more tight finishes, at the other end of the scale a 5 day Test can produce large margins of victory. That said I've been happy to see a good amount of tight games in the RL Cup, we've even had a tie !
Moeen chose his words poorly in an interview, discussing if the format had a place, he used the words boring, as did a Glamorgan commentator, this week, describing the boring middle overs, saying he preferred the 40 over format. Thankfully Bairstow called in "proper cricket" as he was almost mimicking Boycott & others from his era.
Speaking to Yorkshire members who are pro 4 day cricket, they love the 50 over comp. I think that you get the best of both worlds, sometimes getting a rapid start or a collapse of wickets, yet often chance to rebuild, or the fielding side to mount a fightback, true ebb & flow, & sometimes a slog at the end.

And that is it right there!! You have hit the nail well and truly on the head. Nasser has to flog this damn thing for all he is worth, since Sky have nailed their true colours to the mast and relegated everything else for it.

The 'boring'bit is the part of the innings that allows you to get to the point where a chase that seems well out of reach, becomes more than a reasonable one. Today, it was Durham that showed why the middle overs are so crucial - yes they fell tantalisingly short, but they were well behind the eight ball until they used 0vers 15 to 35 to work their way back from an over rate of 7 to 8. It shows the true qualities of a batsman, and his ability to manage an innings.

I think that a major problem is the disparity between sides with player availability, even the "money club" Surrey have had to dig deep & explore their bench strength, I expected them to still have the resources to field a much more experienced XI.
The smaller Counties clearly see it as an opportunity to win a trophy, but still Lancashire have played 2 overseas.
Yorkshire have chosen to use it as a development competition, last year Hill & Revis put in some performances, & have become regulars in the Championship side. It has proven to be an excellent stepping-stone as batsmen have time to build an innings, bowlers can still have 3 decent spells requiring different skills during the innings, & despite 30% of the best players away in The Hundred, the quality is still above 2nd Team Cricket. Opting to not employ any overseas players has opened up 2 further opportunities, but this has been in part to do with the clubs financial situation, & also bringing in players for short term contracts hasn't worked well.
I would doubt that any of the other counties will have fielded a younger side, for the opening game tis year, the average age was 22.

^^ Well today Booms they (Surrey) were certainly using the squad to its' fullest, with the team against Sussex being the nest generation of players the club will turn too. Given, though, the hiding they took, I wonder what benefit the club is deriving from using virtually a full untested team, without at least including a sprinkling of experienced personnel for the rest to play with, and learn from.

By Sussex including Pujara (a class hundred) they had someone of the highest quality for the other less experienced players to gain valuable insight into how to build and execute a knock like that. It is one thing for Messrs Batty/Stewart to disregard the tournamant as a serious competition to compete for, but in the wider context, a whipping like that may leave its' mark!

A positive note though seeing the skill level and execution of Karvelas and the skills of bowling he showed us. An absolute joy to watch, and maybe 'one to watch' for England duty - (although would you want a talent like this to be ruined by the England set up like Finn or Archer??) May not have been the best batting line up he will ever bowl against, but man this guy really has something! I know he too has only just begun his county career after playing in South Africa, but he seems a fair bit down the road already to being the bowler you would want him to be. Maybe a few more MPH to come, but not at the expense of his future please.

A bit of rain around today which hampered the play, however, Gloucestershire V Leicestershire was the one I tuned in to while the rain fell at the Test match. Leicestershire are actually performing well in the tournament, and today again, they chased down a challenging total of 262 to take out Gloucestershire. Quality Inns from Kimber, Hill and Mulder.

Sky had the opportunity to go to the RL when the rain came, but inevitably chose the Hundred. When we get to the final, I wonder will they hide it on Youtube like the rest of the competition??, or show it on 404?? Harris. Taylor and Price shone for Gloucestershire who lost 3 for 18 in the middle overs (you know the boring ones) otherwise might have been different outcome as they really should have reached somewhere close to 300

Watched some of the Essex Yorkshire match, which ended in rain, which contributed to a heavy defeat by Yorkshire, although the DLS result provided a much heavier loss than what may have transpired with a full 50 overs. I think that the expected rain played it's part when Yorkshire batted, losing regular wickets & unable to find the right tempo to their batting, with one eye on the weather.
Given a clear day, Yorkshire had a good chance of chasing a modest 241 target, even at 6 down, with Hill & Bess at the crease. Just one partnership was required, & that was all that Essex could muster. South African Roelofsen & Westley combined for 151, & they looked well placed on 184-2, in the 33rd over, before 8 wickets fell for 56, in 14.1 overs.