Image the dilemma. You’re given 4 pegs – a spherical one, a sq. one, a triangular one, and one which’s formed like an rectangular. Your job is to neatly match all 4 pegs right into a sequence of holes. However you’ll be able to solely see three openings. And even these seem like a good match.
What’s worse, the individuals who actually care in regards to the pegs (nicely, three of them anyway) completely detest the brand new rectangular factor. However the one who gave you the pegs insists that the rectangular is by far crucial and you want to discover a place for that first.
So what do you do? Right here’s what Sir Andrew has finished…
Strauss has predictably created a pig’s ear of an answer that satisfies exactly no person (besides the designers of the ham-fisted funny-shaped peg), after which claimed that his resolution is the one strategy to save the farm’s bacon.
He’s additionally claiming that his plan is the silkiest of all silk purses doable. Regardless that it’s no higher or worse than all the opposite plans proposed by amateurs within the pub, on the again of fag packets, and even worse, on blogs like this one.
And that, my pals, is the Excessive Efficiency Evaluate in a nutshell. It’s a simply one other ‘meh’ proposal based mostly on a sequence of porkies which have largely been left unchallenged – just like the oft trotted out fallacy that oblongs stay one of the simplest ways to interact an entire new viewers of present vegetarians.
The reality, after all, is that while The Hundred could certainly have grabbed the eye of some new Mums and youngsters, it’s not doing practically sufficient to justify the large collateral injury it’s inflicting, particularly as its success is sort of all all the way down to presentation / advertising and its publicity on free-to-air tv.
Let’s have a look at the most recent statistics, for instance. TV rankings are already down on final 12 months (by 20% on the BBC), attendances are barely down, and it’s solely attracted half as many viewers because the Take a look at match highlights on the identical channel – thus demonstrating that quick types of cricket aren’t essentially as standard because the ECB believes.
And but, The Hundred is about to bestride the calendar, unopposed, like Napoleon, till 2028 on the very least. All the pieces else has to suit round it. No surprise Strauss’s plan is about as convincing because the hyperbole spouted by competitors’s sycophantic commentators.
So what, precisely, are we going to get if Strauss has his means:
The 50 over cup in April
The Blast beginning in Might
The Championship (lower all the way down to 10 video games and a playoff) in June, July, and September
The Rectangular in August
Impressed? Me neither. Nor am I notably happy that Strauss desires to separate the Championship into three divisions. Let’s not overlook that England have performed their finest Take a look at cricket over the previous few a long time once we had two tiers of equal numbers. If it aint broke, why repair it?
The issue, after all, is that shoving an oblong-shaped dagger into the center of the home schedule hasn’t a lot as damaged the calendar as murdered it. And are they doing this to enhance requirements, create a extra compelling competitors, and even assist the England Take a look at group? Nope. They’re doing it merely to allow them to scale back the variety of fixtures to 10. As a result of it’s the one strategy to accommodate the rectangular that no person requested for within the first place. Sigh.
Make no mistake about it, of us. This Excessive Efficiency Evaluate is subsequently completely flawed – a whole waste of effort and time. It didn’t strategy the job with a clean piece of paper so it was by no means going to create an optimum plan. Its proposals subsequently profit neither the England groups, the counties, nor crucial individuals of all: the supporters who fund the sport via ticket gross sales, Sky subscriptions, licence charges, and merchandise.
Having stated that, if I needed to say one good factor about it (and one accepts that no resolution was ever going to be excellent anyway), the Excessive Efficiency Evaluate does have one ‘not as terrible because it may have been’ facet to it…
The concept of getting a six group ‘tremendous league’ (my description) supported by two feeder leagues of six isn’t as horrible as creating three common divisions could be. In spite of everything, consigning six counties to a 3rd (or backside tier) would’ve been very uncomfortable and probably hastened their demise. Now there’s a a lot greater backside tier (of 12 feeder counties) so smaller counties received’t be forged adrift to the identical extent.
In the meantime, though making a six-team high tier will inevitably assist the wealthy to get richer, at the least this shall be considerably offset by the very actual prospect of 1 large county being relegated from the highest desk each season. With simply six groups and 10 video games (a number of of which can be rain-affected) any county might be relegated in any given 12 months. This might create compelling watching.
Total, nevertheless, the drawbacks far outnumber the advantages. And also you don’t have to have an IQ larger than Tom Harrison’s bonus to determine why:
Let’s begin with taking part in the 50-over cup in April. It’s simply not going to work very nicely. Run-scoring, notably in early-April, generally is a lottery at occasions, and the situations received’t resemble something England’s World Champion ODI aspect will encounter wherever else on the planet. In reality, the climate is more likely to be colder than I’m on oblongs.
I’m additionally not sure about taking part in firstclass video games alongside the Hundred. That is only a meaningless sop to county members involved in regards to the discount in purple ball fixtures. In actuality, the cricket shall be a pseudo-second XI affair performed out by groups lacking a number of of their finest gamers. It will likely be about as a lot preparation for Take a look at cricket as feigning curiosity in Bridgerton to appease the Mrs.
I’m additionally barely involved about what all this implies for The Blast. Let’s not overlook that Blast attendances, which just about reached a million in 2019, have been cannibalised considerably by The Hundred this summer season. And for what? A contest that solely attracted half 1,000,000 attendees regardless of having a advertising finances that dwarfs the typical IPL pay packet thrown at it.
The underside line, subsequently, is that this. Andrew Strauss has tried his finest to create one thing vaguely acceptable nevertheless it was at all times going to be unattainable given the constraints. As an alternative, what he’s really demonstrated, and what the method that’s led us right here has demonstrated, is that English cricket’s priorities are nonetheless the other way up. And the tradition of spin – don’t overlook all these porkies – stays very a lot entrenched.
Don’t be fooled into considering in any other case. Oink. Oink.
James Morgan
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