DEBRIEF: T20 Cup – Farce At Edgbaston As Worcestershire & Surrey Finish Level… And No One Knows The Rules!

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Div 1 Played Won Lost Tied NRR Points
Warwickshire 2 2 0 0 1.7 8
Middlesex 2 2 0 0 1.16 8
Lancashire 2 2 0 0 1.08 8
Kent 2 1 1 0 0.93 4
Sussex 2 1 1 0 -0.19 4
Worcestershire 2 0 1 1 -0.17 1
Surrey 2 0 1 1 -1.53 1
Yorkshire 2 0 2 0 -0.9 0
Nottinghamshire 2 0 2 0 -1.88 0

In the first round of the T20 Cup, the big excitement of the day took place off the field at Edgbaston Foundation Ground where Worcestershire, chasing 117 against Surrey made… 117. The question then was: what now? Super Over? Wickets down? Nobody there was sure, and a long discussion ensued, which included people texting us at Mill Hill, over 100 miles away!

We pored over the rules on our phones, alongside Martin from Women’s Cricket Blog, eventually concluding that we didn’t know either, because the playing conditions (which are in two separate documents – one general one for non-professional T20 in England, and one specifically for this competition) appear to have changed independently and now contradict each other.

The generic conditions suggest wickets down, whilst the T20 Cup conditions (which supersede the generic conditions) imply a Super Over, without actually explicitly saying so, because they refer to another section which… doesn’t appear to exist!

Only in women’s county cricket!!

In the end they decided not to play the Super Over and call it a tie, so that is how it has gone down for the moment, but this may change – we will keep you posted if it does!

(And yes – 4 points for a win, but only 1 for a tie.)

(And no… we’ve got no idea either!!)

On the actual field of play in Birmingham, Warwickshire beat Worcestershire and Surrey to go top on Net Run Rate. (Although in the final standings the result between the teams supersedes NRR.)

Middlesex avenged their County Championship relegation, beating Sussex and Yorkshire at Mill Hill with Sophia Dunkley continuing to press her case for a possible England call-up ahead of the T20 Tri-Series later this summer.

Finally Lancashire also took 2-from-2 with wins against Kent and Notts.

13 thoughts on “DEBRIEF: T20 Cup – Farce At Edgbaston As Worcestershire & Surrey Finish Level… And No One Knows The Rules!”

  1. Jolly japes what? Who sets out these regulations and why do they not check?

    Ah well, it’s only women innit…

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    • As so often with cricket in this country, this is someone’s job, but they also have 50 other jobs to do, and so unsurprisingly they make mistakes. Not fair to blame them – blame those higher up who won’t allocate the budget to hire someone to do it properly.

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  2. I was at Portland Road for the Warks game in the morning but couldn’t stay for the Surrey match so missed all the shenanigans, sadly.

    The first question is, are the rules published on Play Cricket the current version? Would it surprise any of us if they weren’t? If they are out of date, then our discussion ends there, and we accept the umpires ruling unless and until it is overturned from on high.

    If they are correct, then how do we interpret the apparent discrepancy?

    It seems to me that the T20 Cup rules DON”T imply a Super Over, they merely say what should happen if one isn’t possible due to rain setting in before the SO can take place. Obviously a SO is only needed if the match has reached a natural conclusion, and rain is not a factor in being able to determine a winner by any of the other methods laid down in the Generic conditions – wickets lost firstly, then score at 6 overs, 5 overs, 4, 3, 2 and 1, and ONLY THEN a Super Over.

    FWIW, the anomaly is in Rule 13 (ha!) of the T20 Cup rules – “If, due to weather, an (sic) one over eliminator cannot be completed (see 10. Result) each team will take 1 point from a tied match).

    The trouble is, Rule 10 relates purely to the scorers! It is irrelevant to Rule 13!

    I would agree with Syd and Raf’s assertion yesterday that a SO should have been played, entirely without prejudice, to “cover all bases.” What happens now if it is decreed that is what should have happened?

    I blame nobody at the ground, particularly given that one of the teams involved were immediately back out playing another game. That’s where their concentration will rightly have been.

    I’m looking forward to a definitive answer on all this!

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    • One other point. T20 is supposed to be about entertainment and “razzamatazz”. A Super Over SHOULD be the way to decide a winner, yet the rules as published seem designed to avoid this at all costs. One must therefore conclude that that is deliberate. The only reason I can think of for it being that way is the shortage of time between scheduled matches to be able to fit a Super Over in.

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  3. What a shame that this has glossed over the fact that there were three very good games and in particular two excellent performances from the Warwickshire team…

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  4. Given both the 50 over format and the 20 over format are leagues it is not immediately obvious why there would need a facility for a super over in the 20 format when there is no such facility in the 50 over format. It kind of makes sense in a knock out when one team has to be declared a winner but in league format this is not so.

    Of course this still leaves the question of why one only gets 1 point per team in the T20 format but 2 pts per team in the 50 over format. On the face of it, that’s bonkers.

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  5. Syd writes “As so often with cricket in this country, this is someone’s job, but they also have 50 other jobs to do, and so unsurprisingly they make mistakes. Not fair to blame them – blame those higher up who won’t allocate the budget to hire someone to do it properly.” However, what about all the people (myself included) who take care of writing regulations for grassroots cricket? We’re expected to get it right without being paid. Undoubtedly the regs have been very badly written, but putting together the generic regs and the competition regs, I have concluded that Worcestershire win on fewer wickets. The result cannot be a tie as a tie can only occur if weather prevents an SO taking place. And an SO only takes place if it is a tie after D/L has been used, or in the unlikely event that teams are tied on wickets lost, and the score after all of the first 6 overs.

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    • That’s exactly the conclusion I came to within 10 minutes of hearing the final score. I’m not sure whether the teams having apparently “shaken hands on it” draws an official line under the matter or whether there is further room for an edict from above?

      And again, all this is assuming that the version of the rules we are all looking at is the current one.

      Interestingly, I have looked back at last season and found two “tied” matches in Division 2 of the T20 Cup. Both involved Staffs (v Essex on 18th June 2017, and v Scotland on 2nd July 2017). According to Play Cricket both were “won” by Staffs, even though on both occasions they lost MORE wickets than their opponents. Needless to say, there is no word on how these outcomes were determined if NOT by fewer wickets lost. The humble Joe Public is left completely in the dark! This has served only to confuse me further!

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      • EDIT to above! I was looking at the mobile version of PC, but having looked now at the laptop version it appears both matches were settled – rightly or wrongly – by way of “Super Overs”.

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      • Haven’t got 2017 rules to hand, but I know an SO was used for all ties back in 2012. I was Cheshire’s manager at that time and we had a match where it very nearly happened, and I was all primed for what would happen and how it would work should it have ended level!

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  6. Just pre-empting another not dissimilar scenario that could unfold over the next 2 weeks. It has been known more than once for the ECB to fail to write into the regs any provision for what happens if a match is washed out or sufficient overs can’t be completed (in England, yes it does sometimes rain!!) Especially thinking of some County Champs play-offs a few years back. The National Women’s club T20 knockout concludes with regional finals on June 17 and national finals day on June 24. A re-arrangement of any cancelled matches is surely impractical, but what happens if weather stops one or both sides from having 5 overs batting. Neither the competition regs nor the generic regs appear to cover this? Anything I’m missing?

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  7. Pingback: NEWS: Worcestershire Awarded Win In “Tied” T20 Cup Match | CRICKETher

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