This week:
It’s been an up and down few months for Pakistan in T20 cricket. The ups: clean-sweeping South Africa 3-0 at home; and beating New Zealand 2-1 away. The downs: a 2-1 away defeat to Bangladesh; and most recently a 4-1 loss to West Indies at home – the latter essentially a 4-1 defeat to Hayley Matthews, who won 3 Player of the Match awards in the 5-game series.
Their failure to take anything much from a one-woman Windies team at home didn’t bode well for their chances against England, who for all their flaws remain indisputably one of the top 3 sides in the world, albeit that their 2nd-placed ICC ranking (ahead of India in 3rd) probably flatters them a little.
The one advantage the Pakistanis did have over some of the England XI coming into this game, was that they had played some recent cricket, with the West Indies series having wrapped up less than a fortnight ago. Contrastingly, two of England’s brightest young stars – Alice Capsey and Lauren Bell – have played a combined total of zero games between them since England returned from New Zealand over a month ago. There was rust on both of them, and it showed.
Capsey got off the mark with an edge off the back of her bat, which somehow missed the stumps and went past the befuddled keeper for 4, and… it didn’t get any better from there. With England having lost a 2nd wicket in the meantime, Capsey needed to knuckle down; instead, she played the kind of shot that looked like she’d just closed her eyes and swung, with all-too-predictable consequences.
Bell also started poorly, her first over going for 12 as Gull Feroza went on the attack up-top for Pakistan. Bowlers do of course get second chances that batters don’t, and Bell got her revenge on Feroza with a decent ball in her second over, with the help of a brilliant catch from Amy Jones. Bell also added another couple of wickets as Pakistan collapsed, giving her final figures of 3-22, which don’t read too badly; but she definitely didn’t have the control today that she showed on the New Zealand tour, and which England will need from her if they are going to challenge for the T20 World Cup.
Ultimately, none of it mattered in terms of the outcome of this match. England had enough depth and experience to recover from 11-4 to post 163. Amy Jones and Heather Knight were dealt a difficult hand with the situation they found themselves in, but they played their cards with all the nous of a pair who have over 450 caps between them.
In this, they were ably assisted by some terrible fielding from Pakistan – Nida Dar just couldn’t get her placements right – everything England hit seemed to find a gap, and when it didn’t, it found a misfield.
Having dug in in the early-middle phase, England were then able to accelerate and maintain a pace of 10+ over for the remainder of the match. Knight and Jones’ stand meant that Dani Gibson could come in and add a very useful 41 not out at the death, to take the game out of Pakistan’s reach. (It doesn’t feel like a coincidence that Gibson is one of the ones who has been playing regional cricket, batting herself back into form with a half-century for Storm at Bristol last week.)
Pakistan made a decent start to their chase, and by the half-way mark were on-track to win the match, according to our new toy – a win-predictor called “Win-her”, which is based exclusively on data taken from women’s cricket.
Of course, Win-her turned out to be very-much not correct in terms of the outcome of this game, but that doesn’t mean it is “wrong”. What it is saying is that a team that has made a decent dent in the chase and only lost 3 wickets at the 10-over mark in the chase, will mostly go on to win the match.
And Pakistan should have! But where England used the late-middle phase to explode, Pakistan imploded, losing 5 wickets for 10 runs and handing the game to England, leaving 12,000 fans to go home happy on the opening day of England’s international summer.
By Andy Frombolton
The whole structure would be stronger, more inclusive and more likely to unearth additional talent. Here’s why…
Under current Project Darwin proposals, most, possibly all, of the current women’s squads at the 8 counties selected for Tier 1 status will find themselves homeless at the end of the year; displaced by a cohort of professionals. In the case of the 3 Tier 1 counties which aren’t migrating from being regional hosts, many of these players will be ‘guns for hire’ representing counties with which they have no affiliation.
For those in power focussed on the ‘headline’ goal – the creation of 8, soon to be 10, premier counties, the fate of these players might seem of little interest. Surely these players can move to an adjacent county if they’re that keen to carry on playing county cricket comes the simplistic response; disregarding any issues of practicality or feasibility, the implications for the cricketers in the receiving county who they would displace, or the sheer inequity of the situation where an amateur player’s opportunity to play for her county (the ultimate goal for 99% of all players) will no longer be based solely on her skill and determination but also on where she lives. And what of the gifted amateur playing in the North East from 2027 when neither Yorkshire or Durham have an amateur county team?
But if the notions of fairness, inclusion and equity aren’t enough to trigger an ECB rethink, let me instead show this will undermine and weaken the top tier of the game.
Consider first the 15-strong squads at the Tier 1 counties. Simple maths means at least 4 players aren’t being selected every match. Nor are many academy players. For this reason, regions used to host inter-squad matches or blended ‘region vs host county’ matches – but the increase in the number of RHF and CEC matches now makes that unviable. The current preference seems to be that there will be 2nd XI matches between the Tier 1 counties – but the standard is going to be variable –any such team would have at most 3 contracted players (fewer if contracted players are injured) with the balance of the squad comprising academy players (since there’ll no longer be any older amateur county players to supplement the ranks). And it would involve a lot of travel.
Consider next any competition featuring the Tier 2 counties – the precise number of which isn’t yet determined. ECB has indicated they expect Tier 2 to comprise 10 to 14 counties i.e., the remaining 10 (and then in 2027, 8) [men’s] counties plus some of the stronger smaller counties. Both logic and experience suggest that the larger counties will have a huge advantage – since they typically act as a magnet for the best amateur players in a region, have stronger county age groups and have better resources and facilities. The result will be mismatched fixtures. Ask any player at a smaller county how much fun it is to turn up for a match knowing they’re going to be thrashed by a much stronger team, and the answer is ‘none’. And the best players in the stronger counties aren’t going to be stretched or tested, meaning that late developers are less likely to be developed and new, diverse or unusual talent is less likely to be unearthed. Coaches and scouts at the Tier 1 counties are likely to dismiss any outstanding performances on the grounds that they were ‘only’ achieved in a Tier 2 match.
In reality the potential for any Tier 2 player to progress to Tier 1 will thus be very limited. The dream of a seamless path from All Stars to Country disappears as the professional game becomes unrelatable and unattainable for anyone who hasn’t secured a professional contract by the age of twenty.
But it doesn’t have to be this way.
If the Tier 1 counties also ran an ‘amateur’ team, this team could play against (a much smaller number of) Tier 2 counties in a 18-20 team second tier competitions split into 4 regions (to minimise travel) but culminating in national semi-finals and finals.
The Tier 1 teams obviously wouldn’t be amateur since they’d include (a capped number of) contracted players but the ECB has also stated that Tier 2 will become semi-professional, so it should be that Tier 2 teams might also include a couple of professional players (probably combining the role of playing professionally with a county development/coaching role – incidentally such a role which would also create opportunities for players leaving full-time professional cricket ; a looming issue which will grow as more players enter, and then leave, professional cricket).
The standard of these games should be just as good as any inter-Tier 1 2nd XI match, particularly as the ECB has promised to increase funding for the county game. They would provide quality match practice for any contracted Tier 1 player not playing RHF or CEC. And the best Tier 2 players who hadn’t been picked up by a Tier 1 county in their teens would have a stage on which to showcase their talents and thus the opportunity to progress to a professional career.
The structure exists today. It would easy to implement. And it would maximise the chances of finding talent across the nation. The complete reverse of the current proposals.
This week:
This week:
Ella “Mac” McCaughan has been a constant fixture for Southern Vipers in the short history of the RHF Trophy; and she has been a consistent but not spectacular performer through the past four seasons, averaging 23 across 36 games for the team she made her 50-over debut for as a 17-year-old, back in 2020.
The one caveat about her career so far was that she had never made a really BIG score in senior cricket before today, and… if we’re being brutally honest… she still hasn’t; but her 83 off 97 balls, opening the batting for the Vipers against a perennially strong Diamonds side, was the difference between the two teams on a day that ended in a rain-adjusted win for the Vipers at the newly-renamed “Utilita Bowl” in Southampton.
Lizzie Scott was the victim of an early assault by McCaughan, who struck five 4s off Scott’s first two overs. On an outfield which was lightning-fast, despite overnight rain, Vipers hit 49 off the first 6 overs of the powerplay, with McCaughan 31 off 24 balls, eclipsing Maia Bouchier at the other end, who had made a mere 14 off 12 at that stage.
Runs were a little harder to come by after that, with the two balls in use at either end not quite pinging off the bat the way they had when they were new. Nonetheless, Vipers reached 72 before Bouchier was dismissed – caught by Lauren Winfield-Hill having skied an attempted pull.
A second big partnership, this one for 93, ensued between McCaughan and Aussie import Charli Knott, who has made herself very-much at home in English domestic cricket. Today’s 40 off 40 balls was actually her lowest score of the season so far, and thanks to a not-out against Sparks in the week, she currently averages 69. Given that Knott is (realistically) nowhere near the Australian national side, that might be indicative of a continuing gap in standards between English and Australian domestic cricket; or it might be a sign of greater things to come. Time will tell, but it is worth noting in passing that one of the day’s other better performances was another Australian who has never added to the handful of caps she won in 2019 – Erin Burns.
McCaughan and Knott were ultimately dismissed in successive overs by Turners – not balls that span, but deliveries from medium-pacers (and not sisters, despite both ending up playing cricket for the same team) Sophia and Phoebe Turner. But by that time Vipers had a platform of 168 with 7 wickets in hand to push on towards something really big. They didn’t quite achieve that, finishing on 287 after losing wickets towards the end; but it was still a big total, well in excess of the 250 which is an average 1st innings score in the RHF.
With spots of rain already in the air, and a deluge forecast from about 4pm, Diamonds walked out to bat facing not only the Vipers’ bowling lineup, but also Professors Duckworth, Lewis and Stern, with “stern” being the operative word for the test they were about to undergo. As Winston Churchill might have said of DLS, it remains the worst form of deciding a rain-affected cricket match, apart from all the other ways which have from time to time been tried. My view is that it is fair, but it certainly feels harsh when you see the par score go from 19 to 40 in one ball due to the loss of an early wicket.
Having lost 3 wickets early, and with the weather palpably closing-in, Diamonds found themselves frantically chasing DLS for the rest of their innings. They did actually get the gap down to single-figures at one point, as Winfield-Hill and Burns put on 82 for the 4th wicket, but their dismissals suddenly added another 40-odd runs to the target, and there was clearly going to be no way back for the Diamonds, with the umpires calling time after 30 overs as the rain took hold.
The result was a big one for Vipers, against the only other side to have won the RHF Trophy. It lifts them to second in the table, just ahead of Sunrisers on Net Run Rate, but still behind Stars, who continued their unbeaten start to the season with a DLS win of their own versus Sparks. With two semi-finals, rather than a single “eliminator” this season, there’s a bit more to play for than there has been mid-table than in previous years, and the Diamonds I saw today should certainly make that top four, but Vipers have shown once again why they remain the team to beat.
By Andy Frombolton
In 2019 the ECB launched its action plan for Transforming Women and Girls cricket “underpinned by [2 years of] robust research and consultation”. Central to professionalising elite women’s domestic cricket was a new [8 team] regional structure built on “collaborative cross-County working”. “Each region,” it was stated, “will have its own identity, allowing cricket fans in the region the opportunity to support their local women’s team.”
The plan reassuringly added: “It won’t signal the end of an individual County’s relevance” – although how the ECB had the confidence to make this statement is unclear since it subsequently starved county cricket of funds and deemed it so irrelevant in the exciting world of regional cricket and The Hundred that it wouldn’t even organise proper national T20 and 50 over competitions. Fortunately for the ECB the dedication and determination of a small cadre of dedicated individuals at those counties not hosting a region ensured that women’s county cricket didn’t wither away.
The 2019 Action Plan did caveat: “[This] it is not the destination. …[W]e will continue to evaluate the structure” … and … “potentially the number of regional teams”.
And so here we are, just 4 years later, with the ‘WOMEN’S PROFESSIONAL GAME STRUCTURE 2.0’ – and, guess what, those unloved Counties are back. Why? Because apparently a regional structure doesn’t provide “strong and clear ownership or accountability” nor “provide stability and a sense of belonging for the women’s teams and female players” (which is somewhat at odds with the numerous statements from many players in the past few days saying how upset they are about the break up of the current regional structure).
John Maynard Keynes said: “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?” But what has changed? The ITT argues there are “some significant challenges inherent to the underpinning delivery structure” which are “now prohibitive to future growth”. Or, put another way, the ECB is saying that 2 years of [* refers to the ECB’s list*] desk research, consultation, primary research and engagement with primary stakeholders and subject matter experts culminated in a structure which within 4 years is apparently incapable of accommodating the very growth or fan loyalty that it sought to deliver?
Exactly when did this realisation come to the ECB isn’t clear but the ITT states that it is the result of 6 months of consultation, so let’s assume early 2023. Working back from a self-imposed deadline that all the changes would be in place for the 2025 season enforced an accelerated tender and selection process which started (formally) with a tender document at the end of January and the selection of winning bids less than 3 months later. That’s less than ten weeks for parties to decide whether to bid, develop proposals and make a pitch to the ECB.
As it us, the fans and supporters, who are ultimately paying for it, we should expect the rationale to be explained and for the selection process to be professionally-managed and transparent.
Recap. The Project Darwin Invitation-to-Tender (ITT)
It’s obviously imperative that what comes next is well-thought-out, robust and flexible enough to accommodate whatever happens not just in the next 4 years, but across the next decade. What was the envisaged structure?
What’s just been announced?
Many people worried that the bid process might be a charade and that the end result would simply see the current regional hosts re-appointed.
Then came the first media leak – Durham had beaten Yorkshire (Northern Diamonds), Essex had beaten Middlesex (Sunrisers) and Somerset had beaten Gloucester (Western Storm).
It looked like the ECB had made some radical selections and that regional incumbency had not been any guarantee of success.
… But then came the official announcement and swiftly it became apparent that all was not quite as it seemed.
For the ECB had deviated significantly from the ITT against which the counties bid.
And, in the interim these 2 counties would receive new additional funding to help them prepare.
Together these changes represent significant and fundamental changes to the selection process and to the structure of the game as presented in the ITT.
The ECB’s explanation
The ECB’s justified these changes as follows: “The decision to select two additional Counties – Glamorgan and Yorkshire – as the ninth and tenth Tier 1 Clubs by 2027, and our stated aim to move to 12 teams in Tier 1 by 2029, is testament to the strength of the bids and the pace at which we all want to move to effect change.”
Professional and transparent?
In any commercial tender situation, the most basic expectation of any bidder is that key terms or conditions are fixed since these form the basis upon which a party will decide whether or not to bid and to make forecasts about likely investments and returns.
However, the ECB made numerous changes which constitute material revisions to the terms and conditions.
[Had the selection panel been tasked to identify 9 dispersed Tier 1 counties in England (plus Glamorgan), not 8 as now, from Day 1 this would unquestionably have generated different regional permutations and would not have seen 2 adjacent counties secure Tier 1 status.]
[Given the precedent that a new entrant can be a neighbour of an existing Tier 1 county, presumably the ECB will have no issue if e.g. Gloucester is one of the teams most warranting promotion in 2029 despite the resultant regional concentration of Glamorgan, Gloucester and Somerset? Ditto Worcester creating a Glamorgan, Worcester and Warwickshire ‘block’. What if both Gloucester and Worcester earned promotion? Similarly Kent and Sussex?]
I’m really unhappy with the way the ECB has run this tender!
Bidders might have hoped for an independent appeals process, but the ITT looks like it copied the terms for a competition on the side of a crisp packet to win a holiday.
Section 5.6: “The ECB Board is the only entity empowered to award Tier 1 women’s team status and its decision on such awards shall be final. The ECB Board shall have no obligation to give any reasons for its decisions or to enter into any correspondence or other communications in relation to its decisions.”
The link between having a Tier 1 team and securing a future Hundred franchise
Finally, it’s been widely suggested that by being awarded a Tier 1 team Somerset and Durham are guaranteed to get a Hundred franchise in the future.
I offer 3 observations:
This week:
South East Stars got their 2024 Rachael Heyhoe Flint Trophy campaign off to a winning start with a 4-wicket win against reigning champions Southern Vipers.
But, on a freezing cold day at Beckenham, Vipers made them fight for the win tooth-and-nail, taking the match right down to the 50th over before Ryana MacDonald-Gay finally hit the winning run.
Elsewhere, Storm were bowled out for 114, Blaze for 135 and Thunder for 165 in three one-sided contests. By contrast, this had all the feel of the two strongest sides in the competition laying out their cards early.
Jon Lewis doesn’t seem to frequent regional cricket, but if he did, he would certainly have watched this match with interest. The story of the day was two England bowlers-turned-batters – Freya Kemp and Tash Farrant.
Kemp, who sadly reignited her old back injury over the winter and didn’t even warm up to bowl today, came to the crease in the 30th over with Vipers 150 for 3. Ella McCaughan (30), Charli Knott (41), Georgia Adams (33) and Georgia Elwiss (44) had got Vipers off to a solid but by no means rollicking start, but it was the more aggressive approach from Kemp (50 off 47 balls) which catapulted their total above 250.
It might have been enough were it not for Tash Farrant’s spectacular effort – 94 off 97 balls, the only bum note being the missed sweep which saw her adjudged LBW to Knott, six runs short of a century.
Given that Farrant has played only a handful of matches in the past couple of seasons due to a stress fracture in her spine, and the highest she has batted for Stars previously is no.4, chucking her in at the top of the order felt like a big call from Johann Myburgh. But it paid off handsomely: Farrant hitting an opening stand with Bryony Smith of 165 runs, which is Stars’ highest partnership for any wicket, ever.
When you suffer recurring back injuries as a fast bowler, life is tough. Could Farrant rewrite her future career as a very good domestic batter? Could Kemp rewrite hers as an international pinch hitter in T20 cricket?
It was after Farrant and Smith were dismissed, within 6 overs of each other, that things got a bit sticky for Stars. With 10 overs remaining, they still needed 60 runs at a run-a-ball – they had 7 wickets in hand, but it felt like the pressure was on.
But at the best possible moment Sophia Dunkley finally found some form, hitting an unbeaten 48 from 60 balls which was almost certainly the difference between her side starting the season with a win and starting with a loss.
Even with wickets falling at the other end in the death overs – ADR bowled swiping across the line, Phoebe Franklin run out looking for a second run that wasn’t there, and Aylish Cranstone skying one to mid-off – Dunkley kept her head, doing enough to keep Stars on track until they finally got over the line with 3 balls remaining.
CRICKETher understands that the England players were mostly given a choice about whether they turned out for their regions this weekend. After a long winter (she only got back from New Zealand 10 days ago!), no one would have blamed Dunkley for sitting this one out. But no – she showed up, and Stars (and the comp) were richer for it.
This week:
CRICKETher 