Do Changes Need to Be Made to The English County System?

[aussie_ben91]

Well, until England gets ride of the county system as their domestic competition then I don't see things going uphill much, TBH.

 

[Precambrian]

England should just dump the entire county system idea and just make 6 teams comprising of the most talented players in England. This way, all of the talented players in England will get exposed to quality cricket all the way through their first-class careers before making their International debut and they'll be better prepared for International cricket for when they do debut.

Plus English players will have to earn their stripes, because it's ridiculous the amount of young cricketers that play county cricket but yet can't make the England u19s team. Either merge a bunch of countys together or just make teams like North, South, East & West, etc.

Quite moronish suggestion. It completely disregards the rich tradition of county cricket, which sometimes have gone on par with English test cricket. And secondly, how can reducing the no. of teams automatically ensure the remaining teams become jampacked with the "best" cricketers? Bull crap.

Teams will continue to pick Kolpaks because unfortunately they are better than average English born players. Rather than reducing the no. of teams, constructive suggestions like mandatory 4 U-25 English players etc will do a whole world of good.

 

[aussie_ben91]

Quite moronish suggestion. It completely disregards the rich tradition of county cricket, which sometimes have gone on par with English test cricket. And secondly, how can reducing the no. of teams automatically ensure the remaining teams become jampacked with the "best" cricketers? Bull crap.

Teams will continue to pick Kolpaks because unfortunately they are better than average English born players. Rather than reducing the no. of teams, constructive suggestions like mandatory 4 U-25 English players etc will do a whole world of good.

Reducing the number of teams will ensure that the best 60 odd players in England that are eligable to play for England are playing against eachother at alltimes. It will help develop potential if they are facing the better opposition from an early age, rather then rubbish. Some players could be extremely talented but be stuck in division 2 throughout the majority of their careers and never develop properly. Dunno how someone can so blindly ignore that.

 

[sohum]

India's domestic structure has a zillion teams and yet it produces the goods. No. of teams are not the problem.

27 to be exact. But you will hardly see Plate League team players get selected to the national team. Dhoni's selection was a revelation but let's look at our Test squad:

Sehwag - Delhi (Elite)
Gambhir - Delhi (Elite)
Dravid - Karnataka (Elite)
Tendulkar - Mumbai (Elite)
Laxman - Hyderabad (Elite)
Yuvraj - Punjab (Elite)
Dhoni - Jharkhan (Plate)
Harbhajan - Punjab (Elite)
Mishra - Haryana (Plate)
Zaheer - Mumbai/Baroda (both Elite)
Ishant - Delhi (Elite)
Munaf - Mumbai/Gujarat (both Elite)
RP - Uttar Pradesh (Elite)

Only 2 plate league players and of that, only Dhoni has really cemented his place. Are the teams languishing in the plate league devoid of any world class players? No, but since they are performing day in and day out against sub-par players, their achievements are being taken with a grain of salt.

 

[Precambrian]

Reducing the number of teams will ensure that the best 60 odd players in England that are eligable to play for England are playing against eachother at alltimes. It will help develop potential if they are facing the better opposition from an early age, rather then rubbish. Some players could be extremely talented but be stuck in division 2 throughout the majority of their careers and never develop properly. Dunno how someone can so blindly ignore that.

There is nothing to prove that reduction in number of teams, would automatically limit county admissions only to the best. That is a big fallacy in your theory. In the end good Kolpaks will play against good Kolpaks. The quality of English guys coming out of the system will more or less remain the same.

Instead of going for such stupid measures, the composition of the squad is one thing that can be tinkered with.

Precambrian added 1 Minutes and 52 Seconds later...

27 to be exact. But you will hardly see Plate League team players get selected to the national team. Dhoni's selection was a revelation but let's look at our Test squad:

Sehwag - Delhi (Elite)
Gambhir - Delhi (Elite)
Dravid - Karnataka (Elite)
Tendulkar - Mumbai (Elite)
Laxman - Hyderabad (Elite)
Yuvraj - Punjab (Elite)
Dhoni - Jharkhan (Plate)
Harbhajan - Punjab (Elite)
Mishra - Haryana (Plate)
Zaheer - Mumbai/Baroda (both Elite)
Ishant - Delhi (Elite)
Munaf - Mumbai/Gujarat (both Elite)
RP - Uttar Pradesh (Elite)

Only 2 plate league players and of that, only Dhoni has really cemented his place. Are the teams languishing in the plate league devoid of any world class players? No, but since they are performing day in and day out against sub-par players, their achievements are being taken with a grain of salt.

Excellent analysis. Even Dhoni came to be noticed only because he played so well in the Deodhar trophy games in 2003-04. I think Sreesanth is another player who did well to come from a perenially substandard state : Kerala.

 

[aussie_ben91]

There is nothing to prove that reduction in number of teams, would automatically limit county admissions only to the best. That is a big fallacy in your theory. In the end good Kolpaks will play against good Kolpaks. The quality of English guys coming out of the system will more or less remain the same.

Instead of going for such stupid measures, the composition of the squad is one thing that can be tinkered with.

The Kolpaks wouldn't be playing though because as I stated only players eligable to play for England.

Dividing the best 80 odd players into 6 different squads would be better then the current method of having over 300 players fitted into 18 different squads. If you do the math, the difference between the top 10 domestic players compared to the 80th best player is closer then then the top 10 domestic players compared to the 300th.

Not only would the competition be more competitive and more beneficial but the discipline for all of the players involved would increase and character would be built, which would be needed for the rigours of International cricket in pressure circumstances. Why? Because players would be fighting and working harder for their spots instead of being handed county contracts on a silver platter. You've got to make the road to county cricket tough, if you want results.

They should compile a draft similar to the IPL, but just of players eligable to play for England, with the best 80 players being selected and going from there. Devise a new fixture system and get rid of Pro40, less of Twenty20 and focus more on First-Class & List-A cricket. The Kolpaks can go play club cricket.

Having something like 4 u/25 players in a team is a rubbish idea, because if anything... that's going to make county cricket even MORE weaker. If they aren't that good or if the captain doesn't have faith in them, then the captain will most likely underplay them during matches and the whole idea will go down as a complete waste of time. What you need to understand is that you've got to make the competition STRONGER for improvement, no weaker. Get the very best players playing against eachother. Don't leave potential players dangling in Division 2.

 

[Dare]

If I can just ask what is the rule about foreign players playing in South Africa and Australia. Is it like in England.

 

[aussie_ben91]

If I can just ask what is the rule about foreign players playing in South Africa and Australia. Is it like in England.

We rarely let foreign players play domestic cricket in Australia.

 

[Dare]

is it because its so competitive and hard to come in or because Australia just wants to develop its own talent.

 

[aussie_ben91]

is it because its so competitive and hard to come in or because Australia just wants to develop its own talent.

Bit've both. Allot of players from overseas come over to Australia to play club cricket during the Aussie summer. Paul Collingwood, notably played grade cricket in Australia, the year before he was selected to represent England.

 

[Themer]

England's lack of great players is more down to not having enough talented players than the county system if they were truly good enough they'd suceed regardless of how many counties they play against.

 

[Skater]

The Kolpaks wouldn't be playing though because as I stated only players eligable to play for England. The Kolpaks can go play club cricket.

By law, Kolpak players can't be limited/banned. Kolpaks and 35+ year old journeyman are the problem, but there isn't a lot that can be done.

 

[aussie_ben91]

By law, Kolpak players can't be limited/banned. Kolpaks and 35+ year old journeyman are the problem, but there isn't a lot that can be done.

Yeah, but if they make a different first-class system then why can't they just not pick Kolpak players?

 

[jordox]

We've been through this on this forum before. Too many teams in England blah blah blah, we are better in Australia because it's harder to get in the squad blah blah blah.

When you look at the populations of the 2 countries, percentage wise, there are more people playing in Australian Domestic versus the population than there are playing in County versus the population. (Although, if I recall, not that greater a percentage).

Good point, but it ignores the fact that Australia has more talented players than England has had during the last decade and arguably still has today.

Population means very little. What does mean something are the amount of very talented players a country has. The fact that only 6 teams play in the domestic competition makes it a brutal process to get in. Australia has had more talented players than England has had so the fact that only 72 players can play professional cricket at a time makes Australian domestic cricket harder to get into.

It isn't as true today, but a few years ago the Australian domestic system was too hard to get into, because their line ups were packed with players well beyond international standard. Tell a promising 17 year old to get into that system. He wouldn't have a chance. That is the reason I think the Australians had such a terrible time adjusting after loosing those players they lost 2 years back, because their domestic teams were cramped with players too good for that standard of play. Players like Haddin, Lehmann, Elliot, Love, ect.. (I know there are HEAPS more I just don't know that many Aussie players). Those blokes made the domestic teams pretty much international level - which forced the young guns to sit in grade cricket and not progress as much as they should have been.

Don't get thrown off by population. I stand by the fact that it is miles harder to get into the domestic squads in Australia than it is in England. Maybe not to the same degree today, but for the last 20 years Aussie domestic cricket was brutal.

 

[Skater]

Yeah, but if they make a different first-class system then why can't they just not pick Kolpak players?

The chances are the Kolpak players would be more likely to lead a team to silverware, so it would be stupid not to pick them. What we can't do, under European law, is block Kolpak players being employed.