Domestic revamp for Zimbabwe

Zimbabwe Cricket has announced a major revamp of its domestic structure with more first-class and national league matches spread over a nine-month season.

The news was broken to Zimbabwe's Standard newspaper on Thursday by Macsood Ebrahim, the head of the country's selectors. He said the decision had been reached as the board wanted to expose players to as much four-day cricket as possible.

"Officially, our new season starts in September soon after the tour to Zimbabwe by New Zealand and India," Ebrahim explained. "We will be introducing the new format, where our players will play first-class cricket, (Logan Cup and provincial cricket) from Tuesday to Friday and then play national league games for their clubs every Sunday in a nine-month season.

"This means the players will play more games as opposed to the previous format where they had a very limited number. The aim is to play as many four-day games as possible, and we are even considering implementing the new format as early as June when we start serious preparations for the Test and ODIs against India and New Zealand."

Ebrahim said the decision was a reaction to Zimbabwe's poor performances over the last year, most recently the dismal showing in South Africa.