UPDATE: See here for the ECB’s response.

This week’s announcement of the overseas stars for the Kia Super League has become overshadowed in the eyes of some Indian fans by an apparent row between the ECB and the BCCI over why no Indian players are involved.

The overseas contingent includes 7 Australians, 4 New Zealanders, 4 South Africans and 2 West Indians… but no Indians – much to the dissapointment of Indian fans:

The ECB had previously claimed to have contacted all the other boards offering their players the chance to participate.

But a spokesperson for the BCCI has appeared to contradict this, as Snehal Pradhan writes in India’s Firstpost:

“A senior BCCI official told Firstpost that they had not received any such communication from the ECB and that they could only consider allowing Indian players after they did.”

[Full Article]

Clearly, somebody is being disingenuous, but the question is… who?

UPDATE: See here for the ECB’s response.

UPDATE 2: This piece on Cricinfo makes it abundantly clear what the answer is to the above question!

Follow this page for updates on today’s announcements!

6:15 – The England Academy player allocations will be announced next week. See you back here then!

17:30 – Interesting to consider whether these are the best 18 players in the world – or has it been more a case of trying to create well-balanced teams? No Alyssa Healy for example – did she lose out because of lack of space for another keeper?

17:20 – Richard Pyrah, Yorkshire Diamonds coach, suggests that his main criteria for picking overseas players was success in WBBL: “I wanted somebody who’s been there, done it and knows how to win.” He’ll no doubt be pretty chuffed to have landed Alex Blackwell.

10:20 – Were we expecting any Indian players to be part of KSL? Not really, if we’re honest!

10:15 – The ECB have certainly kept their promise that this will be “The Best v. The Best” – all of these teams now have their very own Ace of Spades – e.g. Loughborough (the one team without a “marquee” England player) now have Ellyse Perry!!

10:10 – In theory, South Africa are touring Ireland during the KSL window, and despite rumours to the contrary, the last we heard is this is still “on”, so we’ve no idea what this means for the South African players named today???

9:45 – Any massive surprises here? Not really! Perhaps we might have been expecting to see South African captain Mignon du Preez in there… but there is still one player yet to be announced!

Lancashire Thunder

• Deandra Dottin (WI)
• Sarah Coyte (AUS)
• TBD
• Kate Cross
• Danni Wyatt
• Sarah Taylor

Loughborough Lightning

• Sophie Devine (NZ)
• Ellyse Perry (AUS)
• Dane van Niekerk (SA)
• Becky Grundy
• Georgia Elwiss
• Amy Jones
• Beth Langston

Southern Vipers

• Suzie Bates (NZ)
• Sara McGlashan (NZ)
• Megan Schutt (AUS)
• Charlotte Edwards
• Tash Farrant
• Lydia Greenway

Surrey Stars

• Meg Lanning (AUS)
• Marizanne Kapp (SA)
• Rene Farrell (AUS)
• Nat Sciver
• Laura Marsh
• Tammy Beaumont

Western Storm

• Stafanie Taylor (WI)
• Rachel Priest (NZ)
• Lizelle Lee (SA)
• Heather Knight
• Anya Shrubsole
• Fran Wilson

Yorkshire Diamonds

• Shabnim Ismail (SA)
• Beth Mooney (AUS)
• Alex Blackwell (AUS)
• Lauren Winfield
• Katherine Brunt
• Dani Hazell
• Jenny Gunn

9:15 – Welcome to our Live Blog of the KSL overseas player announcements – we are expecting the news to start coming in at around 9:30am. We’ll start things off with some FAQs…

What’s being announced today? Which “overseas” players are playing for which teams – each of the six teams are expected to announce 3 overseas players. Note that “overseas” means non-EU players – the vast majority are expected to be from Australia, New Zealand, West Indies and South Africa.

How were the decisions made? We understand that 80 or so overseas players applied to be part of KSL and a big list was drawn-up which was sent to all the teams. The teams said which players they wanted, with the players also given the opportunity to express a preference, before ECB then made the final decisions.

Surrey CCC have defended their social media strategy, following criticism yesterday that they appeared to have ignored the Kia Super League player announcements.

Surrey came under fire for their decision not to host a dedicated Twitter feed for Surrey Stars, and then for not Tweeting about the announcements during the morning, when there was a significant social media push from all the other teams.

However, Surrey’s Communications Manager Jon Surtees spoke to CRICKETher last night, assuring us:

“None of your concerns will be borne out over time. Indeed I hope we will be seen to be leading the way with promotion of the competition and our team.”

On the issue of the “joint” Twitter account, Surtees points to the other side of the coin: that it means they are able to leverage an existing social media presence with over a quarter of million subscribers across the various platforms – Twitter, Facebook, email, etc.. Indeed, a quick check on Twitter bears this out: the @SurreyCricket account has 46,000 followers… the other five “dedicated” KSL accounts have just over 3,000 between them!

And on the decision to hold off on social media promotion during the day, Surtees told us:

“Our Twitter and Facebook accounts have been ‘taken over’ with Stars branding and advertisements this evening – the time when our stats tell us our social media is most effective.”

Finally, Surtees promised that the women’s county team (which of course, is not the same thing as the KSL team, featuring mostly an entirely different set of players) would also benefit from an improved marketing presence this year.

With both the Stars and the “county” team scheduled to play games at The Kia Oval this season it will be interesting to see how this translates into “bums on seats”, and we certainly wouldn’t bet against them being among the best-attended matches of the summer.

Follow this page for updates on today’s announcements!

20:00 – The Surrey Stars are now front and center of Surrey’s Twitter profile; and tickets are on sale at kiaoval.com.

12.25 – Interesting to see that at least some KSL teams are charging for match tickets (given that most standalone WBBL games were free entry). Loughborough Lightning tickets are £8 for adults, £1 for U16s; Southern Vipers tickets are £5 for adults and £1 for U17s; and Lancashire Thunder are charging £5 for adults and £1 for U18s.

11:30 – Every team has posted on Twitter this morning with their exciting breaking news, except… go on… guess which one?

10:20 – All 4 Loughborough Lightning players are current or former students at the university.

10:00 – Lots of fans pledging their allegiance today based on their favourite players rather than the location of the team – ECB need to bear this in mind – it is the players that build the emotional connections for the fans – the shirt just re-enforces that.

9:55 – Interesting questions about what happens in next / subsequent years. Retirements (of which we expect at least 3 after 2017) could substantially impact the balance of the KSL- e.g. one team in particular likely to lose two of their 3 England players to retirement after the 2017 World Cup.

9:40 – Tickets for Lancashire Thunder at eticketing.co.uk/lccc/Events – click KSL checkbox on the left!

9:35 – Tickets for Southern Vipers at eticketing.co.uk/ageasbowl

9:30 – Tickets for Loughborough Lightning available online at loughboroughsport.com.

9:12 – Still waiting for an announcement about Surrey Stars on the official @surreycricket Twitter account – we have been holding our breath for 42 minutes now… and we’re getting a bit blue!

9:10 – Western Storm having Knight and Shrubsole is a surprise, though they both have local geographical roots in the south west – but is it “balanced” to have the best T20 bowler in the world and the England vice-captain on the same team?

9:05 – As far as we can see, Loughborough Lightning have not announced a captain. If we were reading too much into this, we might be thinking that this is a further indication that they expect to announce a huge overseas star… and they don’t come huger than Ellyse Perry 😉

9:02 – Captains – Sarah Taylor, Charlotte Edwards, Nat Sciver, Heather Knight, Lauren Winfield.

8:47 – At least as far as the England players go, Southern Vipers are Kent all the way. But expect to see some Berkshire names in later announcements…!

8:46 – Have Loughborough Lightning drawn the short straw? They are the only side with no “marquee” England player… but could their consolation prize be Ellyse Perry, who will be living nearby when she moves to England with her husband this summer?

8:45 – Why no Surrey Stars Twitter account? Apparently they see the Stars and the Surrey men’s side as one club with one Twitter account – a Twitter account that so far doesn’t seem terribly interested in KSL – no mention of today’s announcements yet.

8:40 – Yorkshire Diamonds look a very strong side – based on the Yorkshire team which won last season’s County Championship, with added Jenny Gunn!

Lancashire Thunder

• Kate Cross
• Danni Wyatt
• Sarah Taylor

Loughborough Lightning

• Becky Grundy
• Georgia Elwiss
• Amy Jones
• Beth Langston

Southern Vipers

• Charlotte Edwards
• Tash Farrant
• Lydia Greenway

Surrey Stars

• Nat Sciver
• Laura Marsh
• Tammy Beaumont

Western Storm

• Heather Knight
• Anya Shrubsole
• Fran Wilson

Yorkshire Diamonds

• Lauren Winfield
• Katherine Brunt
• Dani Hazell
• Jenny Gunn

8:27 – Follow the teams on Twitter with our Totally Unofficial List!

8:25 – Did the players chose who they wanted to play for? The players were consulted, but ultimately the decisions were made by the ECB in the interests of creating a balanced competition.

8:24 – Do the players know yet? Yes – they have know for several weeks; but they have been asked to keep it quiet!

8:23 – What about the other players? The overseas (international) and England “Academy” players are expected to be announced at a later date.

8:20 – What’s being announced today? Which England contracted players are playing for which teams – each of the six teams are expected to announce 3 (in some cases 4) England contracted players.

8:15 – Welcome to our Live Blog of the KSL England player announcements – we are expecting the news to start coming in at around 8:30am. We’ll start things off with some FAQs…

Sussex have announced the signing of England’s Danni Wyatt from Nottinghamshire, following the Outlaws’ relegation to Division 2 of the Women’s County Championship.

The 24-year-old Wyatt began her career at Staffordshire, making her senior debut in 2005 alongside Georgia Elwiss, scoring 4 centuries and taking 65 wickets for the county prior to her move to Notts in 2013.

At Notts between 2013 and 2015 she added another 5 centuries to her tally and also took 37 wickets, despite being forced by injury to remodel her bowling action during that period. In 2014 she helped Notts to victory in the T20 Cup, smashing a crucial 41 off 19 balls against Middlesex, as Notts edged-out their finals-day rivals on Net Run Rate.

However, the following season ended somewhat less happily, with Notts perhaps somewhat unluckily relegated from Division 1 of the County Championship on bonus points, despite winning 3 from 8, as 4 sides finished with the same number of wins.

An exodus of their England stars was therefore to be expected, with the players looking to ensure competitive cricket in the light of the vast gulf between Divisions 1 and 2 of the County Championship.

The signing is a major boost for Sussex, who have essentially opted to largely sit-out of Super League and focus their efforts on the county game, bringing the women’s performance squad directly into the men’s county “club” structure for the first time this season. (Most women’s county teams sit under their amateur county “boards” rather than the professional “clubs” which participate in the elite men’s competitions.)

The confirmation that there will be no radio coverage of England’s final WWT20 group game today in Chennai, was greeted with disappointment by fans, who have been relying on TMS to follow the tournament in a situation where the host TV broadcaster has declined to offer full coverage.

TMS commentator Charles Dagnall tweeted: “logistics mean we can’t get there” – the TMS “B Team” of which Dagnall is part are 300 miles away in Mohali for the Australia v India men’s game, and will also be covering the West Indies v India women’s match there earlier in the day.

Meanwhile the “A Team” (Aggers & Co.) are well over 1,000 miles away in Delhi, after covering England men’s game v Sri Lanka last night.

As is so often the case, there are no easy answers to these conundrums – calling up a “C Team” for just this one match would have been prohibitively expensive – so it is Twitter and a live scorecard for us today… and the hope that one day there will be a WWT20 where fans all over the world can actually enjoy all the games.

On yesterday’s radio broadcast, the TMS team repeatedly stated that England had “all-but” qualified for the semi-finals.

We considered otherwise, but started to wonder if we were wrong until TMS’s Dan Norcross backed us up:

England play Pakistan in their final group match on Sunday afternoon; but before that West Indies play India in the morning. (UK times.)

Currently, England have 6 points, West Indies 4 and Pakistan 4, all with one match to play; so if West Indies and Pakistan win their final games, both will have 6 points along with England (who in this scenario have lost their final match to Pakistan) and so Net Run Rate will be brought to bear.

The first thing to remember is that if  West Indies lose to India, it is all moot as far as England are concerned – they will have qualified regardless of what happens against Pakistan.

(Pakistan meanwhile would then need to beat England to qualify alongside them.)

But if West Indies do indeed beat India, then that is where it gets interesting from an England perspective.

Currently the NRRs stand as follows:

1. West Indies: +0.87
2. England: +0.75
3. Pakistan: +0.33

West Indies having won their final match will have improved their NRR, so it is all down to England v Pakistan.

If England win, they are through; but it isn’t quite so simple for Pakistan. Because they trail England in NRR – they need to win by… how much?

Well, NRR can be a complicated beast to pin down, but here is one permutation:

If Pakistan bat first and make 120, England need to score 108 to qualify despite losing the match; but if they made just 107 their NRR would slip below Pakistan’s and they would go out.

Would we put money on this? No! Is it “plausible”? Absolutely! And anyone who therefore thinks England have already “all but” qualified needs to think again!