As the sport content of this English-based newsletter seems to mainly revolve around American sports, I thought I would add a little home-country value by writing about the most English of sports - the gentlemanly game of cricket, and in particular, out esteemed county championship, which, as some records would have you believe, dates back to the early 1800's.
In recent years, the county championship had become rather boring. With a massive 18 teams competing in a single division, games towards the end of the season, between teams that had no chance of winning the championship, seemed meaningless, and the counties would often put out understrength sides, often playing in front of crowds numbering under a hundred.
In recent years, the county championship had become rather boring. With a massive 18 teams competing in a single division, games towards the end of the season, between teams that had no chance of winning the championship, seemed meaningless, and the counties would often put out understrength sides, often playing in front of crowds numbering under a hundred.
But the introduction of the two division championship last year added a little spice to things. Teams now had to fight hard for either promotion or against relegation, and while I applaud the efforts of the England and Wales Cricket Board, there is one other thing they could have done to liven things up a little.
In the second division of the championship, teams who have no hope of promotion play their matches in the same way they did before the restructuring. But what if, like their counterparts in the Football League, they tried this - what if the bottom-placed team in the second division were replaced by the winners of the Minor Counties championship?
This would indeed liven things up a bit. Imagine Middlesex, bottom of the second division, playing at Lord's, the Mecca of Cricket, fighting for their very survival in the big league, because they know that the following season, they could have to play two day matches in the Minor Counties Championship against the likes of of Norfolk or Dorset. This would certainly make things a whole lot more interesting.
But this will never happen. Cricket, despite the introduction of modern technology to help the umpires, and other things in recent years, is essentially a game mired in centuries of tradition. Such a radical plan would never be introduced, because the counties, and the ECB, would fear a loss of revenue from a county like Hertfordshire entering the first class game.
A shame, really. After the recent world-wide match fixing scandals, the game of cricket could use a life. Guess I'll just have to dream on then!
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