Reduced rounds of County Championship fixtures and more time between formats can help manage player workload, according to the England and Wales Cricket Board’s operations manager Alan Fordham.
The 2024 domestic schedule has 15 County Championship fixture slots instead of 16, with every side set to have a rest from action through rounds four, five or six.
With a busy international summer – which includes the men’s T20 World Cup hosted by the West Indies and the United States in June – the ECB has tried to limit the impact of another packed fixture list for counties across all competitions.
Vitality Blast matches will be staged almost entirely on Thursday nights, Friday nights and weekends, running from the end of May to mid-July.
The Charlotte Edwards Cup Finals Day will be at Derbyshire’s County Ground on June 22, while the knockout phase of the Vitality Blast is set for a ‘Super September’ which will see the remaining five trophies – across men’s county, regional women’s and disability competitions – all be decided.
Fordham accepts the ECB’s hand was forced somewhat in the schedule jigsaw, which sees the Hundred window moved slightly earlier to start at the end of July, while all the men’s bilateral international cricket has to take place after the T20 World Cup.
Fordham, though, feels the compromises will play out to be worthwhile when the new season starts on April 5, with Surrey opening the defence of their County Championship title away to Lancashire
“We are able to schedule these competitions reasonably satisfactorily, but we would all always like to do it better from a performance point of view and provide more distance between red and white-ball transitions if that is at all possible,” Fordham said.
“One thing we have done this year, and I think for the first time, which is a consequence of getting by with 15 rather than 16 slots, is ensuring that between Championship rounds there is always a three-day break.
“Normally you would expect one game to be home and one away so there is often added travel between games, so a three-day break between four-day games is really quite important.
“We have been able to achieve that in 2024. That is not something we have been able to achieve in every previous season, so again, there is a bit of give and take.
“I am confident the schedule is the best output that we can possibly have, but there are always priorities to be made and compromises to be made.”
Of the 126 Blast group-stage fixtures, 122 will be played over the most commercially appealing Thursday to Sunday slots.
ECB’s county cricket managing director Neil Snowball is confident the 2024 schedule strikes the right balance for all parties.
“Because we have got the longer (Blast) group stage, we can actually just have those two blocks with the one transition (between competitions) of rounds nine and 10, whereas previously we have sometimes flipped between them,” Snowball said.
“That was one of the things that they really didn’t like from a player welfare point of view, so I think that is a positive.
“It is always balancing the commercial with the welfare, but certainly, there was a lot of good feedback from the PCA (Professional Cricketers’ Association).”
IPL: Royals miss top-two chance after washout against leaders KKR
Rajasthan Royals were denied their shot at a top-two Indian Premier League finish after rain saw a clash with Kolkata Knight Riders abandoned without a ball bowled on Sunday.
The Royals finished third in the group stage of this year's IPL after four straight losses preceded the washout in Guwahati.
In-form Royal Challengers Bengaluru awaits in the Eliminator for Rajasthan on May 22, with the former on a six-match winning streak to reach the playoffs.
Pat Cummins' Sunrisers Hyderabad will face leaders Kolkata, whose last two games have been abandoned, in the first qualifier in Ahmedabad the day before.
IPL: Sunrisers cruise to victory to boost second-place hopes
Sunrisers Hyderabad eased to a four-wicket win over Punjab Kings on Sunday to boost their chances of finishing second in the Indian Premier League.
Prabhsimran Singh helped Punjab set a target of 215, but Hyderabad chased that down with relative ease to go second, a position they will finish in should Rajasthan Royals lose to the table-topping Kolkata Knight Riders later on Sunday.
After the Sunrisers won the toss and put Punjab in to bat, Prabhsimran top scored with 71 runs from 45 deliveries, while Atharva Taide (46 off 27) and Rilee Roussouw (49 from 24) also impressed as the Kings, already out of playoff contention, finished on 214/5.
Hyderabad's chase got off to a terrible start as Travis Head was bowled with the first ball of the innings, but the Sunrisers' other opener Abhishek Sharma helped to steady the ship alongside Rahul Tripathi.
Abhishek smashed his way to 66 off 28 deliveries before he was dismissed, while an important innings from Heinrich Klaasen (42 from 26) set the Sunrisers up for victory.
Abdul Samad and Sanvir Singh finished the job as the Sunrisers reached their target with five balls to spare, and they can now look ahead to their playoff campaign.
Data debrief: Abhishek wastes no time
The Sunrisers overcame Head's second IPL golden duck thanks to a brilliant innings from Abhishek, who reached his half-century in just 21 balls and finished with a strike rate of 235.71.
Tripathi and Klaasen achieved strike rates of 183.33 and 161.53 respectively, while Nitish Kumar Reddy also finished with 37 from 25 deliveries as Hyderabad made light work of a daunting target.
RCB secures sixth win in a row to eliminate CSK and advance to playoffs
The Royal Challengers Bengaluru held their nerve to secure their sixth win in a row with a 27-run victory over the Chennai Super Kings at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium on Saturday to book a spot in the Indian Premier League playoffs.
The Super Kings entered Saturday’s game in fourth place on 14 points while RCB were fifth on 12 needing to win by at least 18 runs to overtake their opponents and seal the final playoff spot.
CSK won the toss and decided to put RCB in to bat and that decision looked like the wrong one after openers Virat Kohli and Captain Faf Du Plessis put on a quick 31 off three overs before a quick drop of rain brought a halt to proceedings.
Play eventually started back and the pair brought the score up to 78 in the 10th over before Kohli fell for 47.
The wicket didn’t bring much help to CSK as Du Plessis and Rajat Patidar brought the fire to the Super Kings bowlers to bring the score up to 113 in the 13th before the skipper fell for a top score of 54.
Patidar and new batsman Cameron Green then put on 71 for the forth wicket to further put the Super Kings bowlers to the sword.
In the end, RCB reached 218-5 from their 20 overs. Patidar was eventually dismissed for 41 off 23 balls including two fours and four sixes while Green finished 38* off 17 balls including three fours and three sixes.
CSK, needing at least 200 to advance to the playoffs, fell agonizingly short at 191-7 from their 20 overs.
Rachin Ravindra led the way with 61 while Ravindra Jadeja made 42* against 2-42 from Yash Dayal.
CSK entered the final over, bowled by Dayal, needing 17 to qualify to the playoffs. Captain MS Dhoni smashed the first ball out the ground before he was dismissed off the second ball.
Dayal then held his nerve to concede only one run off the next four balls and seal RCB’s spot in the last four.
Full scores:
Royal Challengers Bangalore 218-5 off 20 overs (Faf Du Plessis 54, Virat Kohli 47, Rajat Patidar 41, Cameron Green 38*, Shardul Thakur 2-61)
Chennai Super Kings 191-7 off 20 overs (Rachin Ravindra 61, Ravindra Jadeja 42*, Ajinkya Rahane 33, Ms Dhoni 25, Yash Dayal 2-42)
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