Currently sitting in Moseley and a family next to me are talking about cricket however, it feels sad..its all about the hundred

There is no reason, that with decent promotion of the county game they would be talking about a real affinity with the county game and not popcorn, skips, or whatever teams there are now

I am 34 so in theory I'm close to the hundreds catchment

That's not sad, that's great. I don't think county cricket and its supporters want it to change at all - they want it to stay not as it is now but as it was in some undefined past age. There's too much conservatism in county cricket, probably because of the average age and demographic of the members. I'm in my 50s myself but having seen my old man turn into a grumbling old reactionary I determined not to be a stick in the mud. If county cricket could be promoted such as to entice families in the way The 100 does then counties would have done it years ago. I've been watching Warwickshire for 40 years and now that a format has finally been found which really entertains families, especially young kids, and young women in particular, I'm not about to start saying it's ruining cricket.

I respect what coolerking is saying.
Whilst I have done my best to avoid reading anything positive about The Hundred, I did glance at this:
https://www.espncricinfo.com/story/the-hundred-2022-birmingham-embraces-the-hundred-as-new-tournament-finds-its-poise-1329383

I don't understand why people are all of a sudden coming out to watch the Hundred having never bothered to watch cricket before up until that point? I'm not throwing shade on the comp I'm genuinely asking the question.

What is so different about this comp in comparison to the Blast? Why have these people who have gone years not bothering with cricket now jumping out of their seats for a new comp featuring manufactured teams with players sourced from here there and anywhere?

Why now, for the Hundred?!

I think it's partly because of the heavy marketing but also because the organisers actually set out to offer the spectator an experience, as Stuart Cain puts it in the article Gerry linked to "You have to work hard to get people to spend money. Not because they're tight, but it's well-earned money. You have to give them a good day out." It's a tournament organised around the spectator, designed to make them feel welcome, happy and entertained. Can county cricket put its hand on its heart and say it does that?

What sort of experience are they getting at the Hundred then, what's different?

I think the Blast has definitely been very welcoming for a very long time, loads of stuff for kids, families etc

You'd have to go a Hundred game to find that out! Or if not, have a look at the Hundred website.

I'll pass on going to a game, this website had better blow my mind...

I really like T20 cricket and I quite enjoy the franchise leagues have done for a long time and originally i wasn't against the idea of a city based T20 comp in the UK, but I just don't get why all these people who didn't want to see/watch cricket have been so enticed so quickly by the Hundred?! I've seen bits and pieces on TV, I've not had my back turned entirely. It doesn't look anything special. I saw a game the other day where Dwayne Bravo batted no. 4 (he hasn't batted that high in years) and Garton and Stoinis opened the bowling. I mean if that's the standard...

If it's only about getting people throught he turnstyles then you might as well play rounders or table tennis because in my opinion The Hundread is an abonimation of cricket from what I have seen on TV and read about it, I'm with Andy - why would anyone not previously interested in cricket suddenlt turn up for this.

Have to agree with Andy about the standard of it all. It would be nice to have families watching CC cricket but they do not 'Get It'. The same people who watch a game in The HunDread' will look at a CC game and say "I'm not sitting through 4 days of it when I can see a result in 1, there are fewer boundaries, having fewer people watching creates no atmosphere and I find it slow and boring...". Anyone who is new to cricket cannot understand the nature of the game and why it "Takes so long", they cannot see the benefit of batting all day for 120 and the nature of building an innings is lost on them. At the T20 finals day in 2015 I sat next to a father and son supporting 'The Bears' as they kept referring to them and I asked if they were members which they were not and they turned to another woman and her 2 sons who they knew and both asked if I was and seemed to want to know why I was a member, looking at me strangely when I mentioned the CC and made a face that suggested I was mad to do so. Like so many, they call themselves cricket fans when they were T20 fans and that is the big difference and they cannot see it just like the people who flock to the Hollies stand and call themselves fans because they watch 1 Test per year and a few T20 games. Do the people who watch The Hundread actually care who wins or is it just the thought of 6's flying all over the pace that attracts them. When the thought of a 6 is not a rare thing, will they get bored because once you get bored with 6's being hit, there is nowhere else to go. I see that a lot with youngsters at T20 where initially it is entertaining and then the thought of that feeling lasting, is gone and they find running up the steps in the stands more fulfilling and the game in front of them is given barely a glance. Will the people who watch 'The Hundread' invest their time in the team they watch and even go to the trouble to go to away games and even to finals day at Lord's. In it's 2nd season, this remains to be seen and I doubt it will ever have the same effect that those one-day Lord's finals has from 1963-2005 when after that it got ruined by clogged, confusing and inconsistant fixture lists. No one tried to compare Gillette/B&H/Natwest, etc to CC in the past and it's no good trying to now, they are totally different and I cannot see what a CC fixture can do to make a spectator feel valued, it is massively different to the point that putting music on, having bits of silly dialogue and shout-outs, coloured clothing and people throwing T-shirts in to the crowd would just look ridiculous.

coolerking wrote:

If county cricket could be promoted such as to entice families in the way The 100 does then counties would have done it years ago.

But that’s exactly the point - counties cannot afford to throw tens of millions of pounds at advertising. I have absolutely no doubt that if the Blast had been marketed and promoted in the same way that the hundred has, with the free-to-air exposure thrown in, that it would have seen similar levels of growth. And on the point of offering things for kids, of course a day at a championship game is going to be difficult for that, but there has always seemed to be lots going on at T20 games for kids, so I don’t think that’s anything new

I was cordially up for the City/Region based comp in the UK years back when the all the talk began.

I figured that 6 regional based sides competing in a T20 comp over a short period (3 weeks?) featuring quality overseas stars with the England players available would be a worthwhile watch. The 6 sides would all have a 'homegrown' core, for example a Midlands based squad of say 17 would be made up of 14 players from Warks/Worcs/Northants and then 3 absolute quality overseas players. Something generally along those lines.

The Midlands teams home games would be played at Edgbaston/New Road/Wantage Road, take the comp around the counties, have all counties involved, all grounds involved etc. The Regional based teams would still have a homegrown, local feel. Something like that.

Could still play the CC or One Day Cup alongside it but they'd be no situation where some counties are missing 10 or 12 players and other counties arent missing any to the Regional based comp unlike the current set up which uses a draft/auction type way of making up squads (pretty average looking squads as far I can tell from looking at the Hundred website too I might add...). For example this Birmingham Phoenix team has a distinct lack of locally based players in it.

They lost me with this hundred ball concept though and other rule tweaks. Not to mention having 8 sides based at 8 grounds and shunning the other 10. Its a blatant cash grab.

I just don't get it.

Of course the resources available are different but nevertheless I don't think county championship cricket makes as much effort as it should to attract a bigger and more diverse crowd. It's always someone else's fault that crowds are relatively small. Counties take their existing members for granted. They have to embrace the younger generation because if they don't sooner or later they won't have any members at all.

As for whether spectators don't 'get' the county game, first I think that's snobbery and second they're under no obligation to 'get it'. They go to watch the format that they do get and enjoy. With attitudes like this from CC fans why would they want to go and try the 4-day game, with all the sneering that's currently going on? People are being put off rather than encouraged. I rather get the feeling that county members really don't want anyone else to come to CC matches. They're set in their ways. It's the conservatism of it all that really depresses me. God knows what it's like at Yorkshire.

I think we’re talking about two very different things here. The CC is of course going to struggle to attract a younger audience. Part of this is due to scheduling - it’s hard for parents to take their kids along when there are so few games played at the weekend or in the school summer holidays. I’m sure more could be done to encourage younger people to go to a CC game, but I think most of the effort goes into getting them along to a T20 game in the hope that they’ll then go to a one day cup match or a CC match further down the line. That’s where the problem with the hundred comes in. As these teams exist solely to play this format, there’s no link to the longer forms and so it’s much less likely that any of these new fans will make the transition.

Meanwhile there's the square root of bugger all else to watch which is kinda what they intended of course they want everyone to feast their eyes on the new fangled thing. I actually did that today in the pub. What a let down the thing is utter drivel. I almost fell for it last year but by god I'd rather no cricket ever again than have to stomach that garbage non stop for the rest of eternity. ECB hang your heads in shame it's an appalling way to treat women's cricket which has less history to stand up for it let alone men's cricket which has more

Which is kinda the marketing spiel. This is not for cricket fans this is for folks who get all excited about bottom lines etc...

Coolerking, you may think it is snobbery but spoonfeeding all the Hundred/T20 to young people, will mean that they don't 'get' CC cricket. If they are fed a game that lasts a day with a positive result then we have no chance of then hoping that they will watch a 4-day game and with it, the safety that goes with sending a young person to a county ground for 4 days as opposed to 1 day and mainly with a parent. In my experience, when watching cricket from the first ever game you see, if you connect with a county, you usually follow all formats whereas now, it seems young people go to just T20 with their parent(s) and the hassle of travelling, safety and time means it is unlikely they will engage with CC and it has nothing to do with 'Snobbery' and your suggestion without knowing me is crass and your sweeping generalisation of people who watch CC is the same as you have no idea what other formats they watch. I am a Bear through and through and watch all formats if Warwickshire are playing, CC, T20 and 50 over.

You're making sweeping generalisations about people who, you assume, don't watch CC. That's a huge double standard.

Talk about sweeping generalisations and assumptions. They haven't "finally found a format can entertain families" all formats of the game can and have and continue to given appropriate scheduling and support. It's a power grab pure and simple. I'm no huge T20 fan but it's just as entertaining as the blundred if not more so. I loved 40 overs cricket and am happy to let that go ditto 60 overs cricket. Were not stick in the muds we want entertainment too. The season needs mending so it's understandable to the masses. 1 proper game and 1 white ball game per week or if this 16.4 has to stay surely it should be confident enough to allow first class cricket to be played at the same time as it not just 2nd XI RLODC. Also they need to have 18 teams with promotion and relegation if they want it taking seriously. Why should Worcester not have access to these mythical new audiences? Why should the county championship not have access to August cricket lovers? I think I know why - it's because the new audience doesn't exist. All this is attempting to do is reconstituting existing fans of cricket around a smaller number of more easily controlled entities for a month plus or minus people leaving the game (dying off or giving it up) and people arriving into the game.

And do you think they'll stop at August?

The ECB (and some bigwigs at Lancs & 1/2 other counties) wants those half a million or so cricket fans watching the same small number of games instead of having a genuine choice as to what to watch and where to see it in August. This deprives the other counties of patronage. It's sinister and must be resisted.

An American general in Vietnam was once infamously quoted as saying that "in order to save the village it became necessary to destroy it"

That's what this new Eldorado format is specifically designed to do to the game. It also reminds me of classic 'Disaster Capitalism' - create a false sense of doom (some spurious stats about falling participation numbers between 2017-2018 and these past few weeks getting everyone to panic about the IPL) run existing infrastructure into the ground then sweep in with radical yet foolhardy masterplans.

Very interesting debates between you all with very good points made. Given that the 16.4 has attracted crowds by massive advertising and giving away freebies and, I dare say, loads of free tickets I wonder what would happen if counties did something similar.
During the August school holidays have at least one CC where kids came in for free and accompanying adults come in at half price. All this backed up with massive publicity with freebies for the kids and fast food outlets for them. Would it work?

Saddens me that my own county Warks (alongside Lancs obviously) must be so desperate for cash to pay off debts that they are fully prepared to chuck the other counties under the bus like this.

I note Warks haven't made themselves clear on this yet hiding letting Lancs take all the flak.

And all for what?!??

My next gas bill is more appealing than watching this 16.4 shite