England: New league will raise competition not standards (5 December 1998)

5 December 1998

England: New league will raise competition not standards

By Christopher Martin-Jenkins

SPORT, like all human activity, changes and evolves. Structures have to bend with the times, or break. County cricket has had its halcyon days and its fate now, like it or not, is to be a nursery for the international game which pays the bills and produces the income to regenerate.

It is important to realise the reality of what was decided at Lord's this week. The two-division competition to be played from 2000 will ensure an urgent purpose to every match and will newly stimulate media and sponsorship interest.

The county game has a life of its own and the changes can only refresh it. But anyone who believes that this aping of professional football will do much to advance the cause of a consistently strong England team is mistaken.

More matches will be deemed to be "meaningful", although there has never been such a thing as an 'uncompetitive' county match, for the great majority of those taking part, at least. Personal reputations as well as team positions and, in recent years, not insignificant prize money, have all been at stake. There is no guarantee that cricket in the top division will be harder, or of a higher standard, not least because, given seven Tests and 10 one-day internationals from 2000, England's international players will miss half the fixtures.

It is more likely that the level of the second division will drop or that the difference in standard between the two divisions will be negligible. For a time at least county cricket will be more marketable and it is up to the clubs to seize the moment when it comes. At this stage, anyway, no club need feel inferior.

Had the championship been divided on the basis of finishing positions in 1997, Leicestershire, the 1998 winners, would have been in division two; Essex, beaten 11 times in 17 matches, would have been in division one. There have been numerous incidents of similar fluctuations of form from one season to another. It is part of the charm of the county game.

Perhaps, with three counties promoted and relegated each season, it will remain so, but if, despite an equal sharing of the central spoils and equal voting rights, we gradually witness the kind of polarisation which has occurred in football since the Premier League was established on the back of television money, that charm will go. Some of the variety must be lost in the search for harder Test cricketers because each of the counties will no longer be playing all the others.

That some clubs will be in the first division of the 45-over competition and in the second of the championship, or vice versa, increases the chances of playing more than eight counties a season. Moreover, for one more season in 2000 there will be a Supercup for the top eight counties in the final all-play-all championship.

Do not imagine that, thereafter, the space created by the abandonment of the Benson and Hedges competition will be used for the practice and preparation in which the Australians set so much store. Instant evening cricket - Super Max or something like it - is bound to be introduced.

By the time the Australians come to England again in 2001 county cricketers will probably have gained about seven more days a season for rest and preparation. The clubs have taken on board the need for physical fitness - Surrey's first week back next spring will be spent with the Royal Marines - but they have skimped by comparison on old-fashioned net practice and indeed on making sure that facilities for practice are of the necessary high quality.

Expect some dull games, too. The urge to play for a draw to consolidate positions in the table will be more commonplace, especially given the sensible decision to reduce the points for a win to 12 and increase those for a draw to four.

Equally, there will be less inclination to risk picking young, untested players in important matches or to rest senior players who might need a break. The counties without players in the Test or international squad will be even more inclined to stretch them when they are available to play, exactly what those trying to keep the best players in the country fresh do not want.

Still more fundamental to the question of whether standards will improve is the fact that there will now be even more temptation for counties to prepare pitches to suit their interests.

The pitches have been the most important reason for England's international struggles in the last decade and more. Two-division cricket brings no guarantee that they will get better: rather the reverse. Yet well prepared pitches, which start true and turn in the later stages, are essential if the right sort of cricketers are to be produced. David Lloyd, the England coach, though he has welcomed two divisions, feels that nothing will do more to bring English cricket on to a level with Australia's than to improve the facilities at all county grounds.

"It is high time," Lloyd said yesterday, "that net pitches were of top quality, mirroring the character of the pitches in the middle of each ground."

Michael Atherton is not alone in believing that a regional competition between the championship and the international sides would have been the best route to take. Good judges working in theoretically influential positions at Lord's agree, but they have not had the necessary drive or vision to produce a structure which would work.

Let us be clear then. The effect of the changes will be to make the counties commercially more competitive in relation to rival sporting attractions, which is fine. What they will not do is to raise standards, which is what the real debate has been about in the light of England's reduced international status.

Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)