County cricket could return in August in regionalised format

Clubs are meeting on Thursday to discuss the plans amid heightened optimism that domestic cricket could yet be saved.

The other scenario being considered is a September start featuring just T20.

The 50-over Cup is off the table, while the season could be extended into October.

Mark Arthur, the Yorkshire boss who will join a conference call of his fellow county chief executives, said: “We understand that the ECB (England and Wales Cricket Board) are going to be presenting two proposed schedules – one starting in August, one starting in September.

“The August one includes red-ball cricket and T20 Blast, and the September schedule is only T20 Blast.

“The schedule won’t be published yet and it’s predicated on government advice.

“But everybody wants to get cricket on.”

If cricket is regionalised counties could be split into three groups of six in the Championship.

Finals could be held for both competitions and effectively one-third of the season salvaged at a time when Yorkshire are facing a significant seven-figure loss and English cricket in general anything up to £380m.

“Nothing is off the table,” said Arthur.

“The only thing off the table at the moment is the 50-over competition.

“At the moment we’re looking at the feasibility of playing some County Championship and some T20 Blast – meaningful, competitive cricket.

“That would be the logical thing to do (regionalise it), because the less travel for the players, the better – you wouldn’t want to send down a team to Somerset for a T20 Blast match, for example.”

Arthur said that the Championship would proceed only if teams can stay in hotels but did not rule out the possibility of T20 behind closed doors.

Although the hope remains that crowds can attend both Championship and T20, Arthur believes that there are wider issues to ponder if T20 is only permissible without spectators.

“We would have to make a decision with our county colleagues as to whether it’s worth us losing more money by putting it on in order that there is content that we could stream live to those that have been missing cricket,” he said.

“If it was a straightforward down to pounds, shillings and pence situation then you wouldn’t do it, but there are more things that you have to factor into that.

“You’ve got player welfare to consider – they are professional sportsmen and their job is to play cricket – and is there value in us streaming every T20 Blast match to our supporters, members and stakeholders? Yes, there is, although we very much hope that crowds can still watch.

“However, we can only play County Championship cricket if we are able to use hotels.

“The DCMS (Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport) has said that they want to get British tourism open as soon as they can, so we’re planning on the fact that we could start playing in August with some County Championship red-ball stuff, but we have to be led by the government’s advice.”

If the season starts in August Yorkshire will bring their players back at the start of July.

The entire playing staff is on furlough and all coaches apart from director of cricket Martyn Moxon – although head coach Andrew Gale is expected to return to help Yorkshire’s England players train at Headingley ahead of the planned July Test series against the West Indies.

“If we’re going to try to get going in August that would mean us bringing our players back on July 1 as we believe you need a good four weeks’ preparation,” added Arthur.

“Bowlers arguably need a bit longer, but they’re all doing their own individual training and although nothing is being supervised by the club as they’re on furlough, we’re aware that they’re all trying to get some mileage into their legs.

“So we’ve got really until the beginning of July to see what happens with regards to the bigger picture and the crisis in general.

“But, for me, the situation changed about 10 days ago and became much more positive as the government advice started to change and we started to see a flattening of the curve and also people talking about getting sport going once again.”

Arthur said that Headingley would be able to accommodate crowds of several thousand even with strict social distancing; the capacity is around 18,500.

“If they wanted us to have social distancing, i.e. two metres between every spectator, then chances are we could get 4,000 in there,” he said. “But we need the government to say ‘yes’.

“We don’t yet know what percentage of ground capacity we could have. Perhaps you could have people from the same household sitting next to each other; if not, there might be two or three seats between you and the next person, and you could use alternate rows as well.

“There would be lots of messages and information and you could give people an advice sheet when they walk through the door. There are various things we could potentially do.”

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