CLS to host some decent england games but nee t20 franchise



Both London grounds being used, which is intriguing. Be interested to see how it works.

Agree with @brandon about watching it fall from the outside mind. Would be much happier if SCCC and the Oval weren't a part of that, but ho hum.

Both will have a franchise I'd imagine.

South (London) Superkings - sponsored by Benson & Hedges.
North (London) Numpties.

Jokes aside though, would be stupid not to have two in London given the crowds Middlesex and Surrey get on big T20 nights.
 
Not looking for bites but in terms of franchises they were the only choices they could have made.

Wouldn't be surprised if they farmed out the odd fixture to the smaller grounds e.g. Bristol get one from the Swalec, Sussex from Hants etc.

Looking forward to a comp that draws public attention again.
 
Do you think this franchise competition will do that?

FTA in the height of summer, yes. The current system is killing cricket and if you listen to the likes of Simon Hughes the BBC would only go with it if it was a new super league.

In terms of identities it's plastic as fuck but cricket needs to pitch itself at a 10 year old lad, not me or you. The identities grow with time too, e.g. nowadays people properly support the likes of Melbourne Stars and Chennai Super Kings whereas at the start there was no real feeling.

I'd rather watch Durham of course but unless cricket stops contracting its fan base there'll be no Durham in 40 years' time anyway imo.
 
FTA in the height of summer, yes. The current system is killing cricket and if you listen to the likes of Simon Hughes the BBC would only go with it if it was a new super league.

In terms of identities it's plastic as fuck but cricket needs to pitch itself at a 10 year old lad, not me or you. The identities grow with time too, e.g. nowadays people properly support the likes of Melbourne Stars and Chennai Super Kings whereas at the start there was no real feeling.

I'd rather watch Durham of course but unless cricket stops contracting its fan base there'll be no Durham in 40 years' time anyway imo.

Except it isn't going to be FTA - only part of it is.

I don't listen to the likes of Simon Hughes, because I'm of the opinion he talks far too much bullshit. On the subject of televised cricket it's bollocks - right now, the only live sport the BBC have (that isn't protected and is worth a wank) is British Tennis. Personally I feel the Beeb would jump at the chance of a bit of cricket.

The free to air debate has been done to death on here and funnily enough we all agree that England Cricket NEEDS to be on FTA in order for the game to grow. Unfortunately, that doesn't make the top people at FTECB rich, so I can't see it happening.

Again, parallels with Australian and IPL franchises are a waste of time. You just can't do it. To take the Aussie model, no state misses out, in FTECB's model, over half the counties will miss out. Chalk and cheese.
 
Except it isn't going to be FTA - only part of it is.

Snip ...

Again, parallels with Australian and IPL franchises are a waste of time. You just can't do it. To take the Aussie model, no state misses out, in FTECB's model, over half the counties will miss out. Chalk and cheese.

never mind Counties it's the NE entire region

Somerset must be miffed, they get good crowds at Taunton.

Ah well. Pretty sure all's already been said on this topic that could be said.
 
Not looking for bites but in terms of franchises they were the only choices they could have made.

Wouldn't be surprised if they farmed out the odd fixture to the smaller grounds e.g. Bristol get one from the Swalec, Sussex from Hants etc.

Looking forward to a comp that draws public attention again.

So a city based franchise that spreads the games outside of the cities?

Tell me the point again?
 
never mind Counties it's the NE entire region

Somerset must be miffed, they get good crowds at Taunton.

Ah well. Pretty sure all's already been said on this topic that could be said.

Indeed most counties get good crowds, it seems that only we struggle to sell it - but I'd put that more down to number of Fixtures and unhelpful scheduling.

The only thing that seems the case with the franchise thing is that there will be large areas of the country completely isolated from it.

NE England, the South West, it's all very central.

Just to provide clarity of what we knew all along, the T20 venues are all Test venues..... Which Riverside was too, until FTECB took it away - it would be funny if it wasn't so f***ing corrupt.
 
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So a city based franchise that spreads the games outside of the cities?

Tell me the point again?

100k county members out of a 65 million population. Hardly filling the nation with excitement at present though is it?

@brandon I guess where we differ is believing Hughes. I do, although perhaps he's talking about getting on BBC1 rather than the red button or something daft.
 
100k county members out of a 65 million population. Hardly filling the nation with excitement at present though is it?

100k is a decent starting base, rather than pissing more that half of them off at the outset. Do everything they are proposing for the franchise system with the T20 Blast and see what happens, it's not that difficult.

One other thing I've been contemplating since they announced the format... Having only one game a night is going to mean quite a few nights where there is no game due to weather. Lots and lots of dead air is not good look.
 
100k county members out of a 65 million population. Hardly filling the nation with excitement at present though is it?

@brandon I guess where we differ is believing Hughes. I do, although perhaps he's talking about getting on BBC1 rather than the red button or something daft.

I used to think he spoke a lot of sense - which he does, but not as much as I thought, I've found that out since I started listening to his cricket podcasts.......

You simply can't measure cricketing interest in this country solely on county memberships.

However I say this with absolute confidence - if all English cricket was on FTA, there'd be far more than 100k county memberships.
 
100k is a decent starting base, rather than pissing more that half of them off at the outset. Do everything they are proposing for the franchise system with the T20 Blast and see what happens, it's not that difficult.

One other thing I've been contemplating since they announced the format... Having only one game a night is going to mean quite a few nights where there is no game due to weather. Lots and lots of dead air is not good look.

But the point is (if you believe it) that the current Blast wouldn't get a prime FTA channel.

What I found interesting was that they're going for an 'IPL style play off system'. So no more finals day.
 
But the point is (if you believe it) that the current Blast wouldn't get a prime FTA channel.

What I found interesting was that they're going for an 'IPL style play off system'. So no more finals day.

Not for a second, not even half a second.

And for my evidence, I'll submit that the IPL, Big Bash and CPL have all been on free TV when the opportunity arose. You trying to tell me that they wouldn't clear ITV2 or E4 every night for T20 cricket? Bollocks.
 
Not for a second, not even half a second.

And for my evidence, I'll submit that the IPL, Big Bash and CPL have all been on free TV when the opportunity arose. You trying to tell me that they wouldn't clear ITV2 or E4 every night for T20 cricket? Bollocks.

I agree, but those channels don't have the prestige or real reach of BBC1 which is where the ECB wanted to be. That's why the big horse races going from BBC to even C4 was a big blow for that sport (as illogical as it seems).
 
I agree, but those channels don't have the prestige or real reach of BBC1 which is where the ECB wanted to be. That's why the big horse races going from BBC to even C4 was a big blow for that sport (as illogical as it seems).

BBC2 and 4, even better. And then the online platform is great. There's absolutely no way that they would say yes to showing the Manchester Moonpigs but no to Lancashire Lightning.

I don't think the racing has suffered at all, I thought audiences were up? And remember, C4 did for racing the same as they did for cricket, with things like The Morning Line and so on.
 
North east where never going to get a franchise due to the poor attendences at Durham T20 matches thats the top and bottom of it. Our county is already a regional team but the crowds are poor. Sadly not the image they are looking for for their new fancy competition.
 

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