Detailed plans for the England and Wales Cricket Board’s (ECB) new Twenty20 competition can be revealed today after a briefing memo sent to county executives was seen by 'The Times'. The revolutionary tournament, set to start in 2020, aims to create an English league that will rival the Indian Premier League and Australia’s Big Bash League (BBL), but has caused controversy among the counties (PTG 2030-10274, 25 January 2017).
The eight-page memo confirms that the eight teams involved will have 15-man squads that include three overseas players, with 13 of those players picked during a draft that the ECB hopes will be televised. The two other players in each squad will be picked as “wild cards” after the NatWest T20 Blast has been played. All county cricketers, plus overseas players who enter themselves, will be put into the draft unless they request not to be. They will be placed into different salary bands. The tournament will run from mid-July, after the conclusion of the ECB’s 18 county T20 ‘Blast' and alongside a 50-over format competition (PTG 1950-9813, 18 October 2016).
Despite the memo outlining the basics of the T20 series, there is no mention of where the eight teams might be based, an issue that is likely to cause ructions as some counties will miss out on hosting matches. Hosting decisions will not be taken until at least the end of March (PTG 2001-10115, 10 December 2016).
A number of county chiefs had expressed concern over the original proposal that the eight teams would be solely owned by the ECB (PTG 1987-10019, 26 November 2016). In an effort to alleviate some of those worries, the latest proposal about the governance of the competition is that the eight sides would be separate legal entities, but each will be controlled by two to three first-class counties. So for example, a team based in Nottingham may be controlled by Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire and Leicestershire.
Head coaches and directors of cricket from counties who work in the new tournament will not be permitted to coach at their local county venue. The memo explains that this is borne out of a desire that the proposed competition is not a facilitator for player movement from smaller counties to the larger Test-venue counties. Coaches and support staff from county cricket will be eligible to work in the new competition should their counties be happy to release them.
Each of the eight teams will be allocated the same fixed budget for players, a separate budget to cover coaching costs and a salary cap similar to the one in place in the BBL. Originally the ECB had hoped that players would not play for the team at their “home” club so that each new team would have a totally separate identity from the county side based at that venue. However, this was a bone of contention among some of the larger counties, who did not wish to see all their best players based at other venues, so the ECB has rowed back on this proposal.
Teams will be able to call up players from the county 50-over competition in case of injuries and, similarly, players can be released back to the county 50-over competition should their coaches in the new T20 competition want them to play competitive cricket. It is anticipated that players would be released by their counties to join the new team squad not more than a week before the T20 competition begins and would be given back to their counties as soon as their team are eliminated.
Players will be signed on an initial one-year contract with an option to extend for a second year. A proportion of a player’s existing county salary will be deducted if he plays in the new competition and it is anticipated that the salary from taking part will more than make up for any shortfall in his county pay.
The new competition will be played over 38 days — England players will not be available, as Tests will be played at the same time. There will be 36 games, rather than the 35 expected initially. This is because there will not be semi- finals. The finalists will be decided on the results of three play-off games. The team who finish top of the table will play against the second-placed team in “the qualifier” for a place in the final. The third and fourth-placed teams will play each other in “the eliminator”. The winner of the eliminator and loser of the qualifier will then go head to head for the other spot in the final.
The memo sets out that each team will be run by an operations board comprising an independent chairman and chief executives from the two or three counties who control the team. The board will be in charge of appointing a general manager and coaches.
It is believed that the consultancy firm tasked with coming up with the venue options is not just looking at Test grounds for hosting and there is a potential move away from the competition being purely city-based, with some host teams having one or more of their four home group games at a second or third venue. Each first-class county will also receive a guaranteed minimum amount of revenue from the proceeds of the competition.
While the tournament is three years away, the ECB needs the details signed off before it puts the broadcast rights for this, international cricket and the other domestic competitions from 2020 onwards out to tender, which it wants to do at the end of next month (PTG 1936-9729, 1 October 2016). The broadcast tender document will specify that a certain number of the matches — possibly ten — must be shown live on free-to-air television and that highlights and clips should be available on other digital outlets such as ‘YouTube' or 'Amazon Prime’.
