The Pros and Cons of The Hundred

A year late, cricket has a new format of the game. Yes, another one but is this going to be a success and is it really needed? Let’s look at the pros and cons of The Hundred.

The English Cricket Board hope that this new competition will attract more people to the game of cricket, especially youngsters. That’s always to be applauded but doesn’t the T20 Blast do that already?

It seems that cricket matches are getting shorter and shorter. We’ve gone from the legendary 60-overs a side Gillette Cup to the 40-overs a side Sunday league, that had a live match every week on the BBC. Then came the T20 and that has proved to be a massive success. It certainly helps the finances of county sides.

There are lots of children at the games too. On one hand this is good to see, though it’s a shame they can’t go to county championship games. Will they continue to follow the sport and realise there’s so much more to cricket than players trying to hit every ball for six, waving banners and dancing to music.

The Hundred is an attempt by the ECB to recreate the success of the Indian Premier League.  Teams have been created, so instead of the traditional counties, we have silly named teams playing in cities such as Manchester, Birmingham, Nottingham, Cardiff and London.

Considering it’s a tournament being played in the UK, you have to ask why in the men’s game all eight teams have overseas coaches? Why is Joe Root playing for a Nottingham team and Ollie Pope for a Welsh side?

The Hundred is slightly different from other versions of the game. There are just a maximum number of 100 balls per innings. There are ten ball overs with bowlers either having five or ten deliveries in a row. No balls give the other side two runs and a time-out can be called.

Having seen a couple of the early games in the tournament, these changes don’t make a great deal of difference to the matches. You could switch on and not know whether it’s The Hundred or T20. It’s just a limited overs match and that’s that. Yes, there have been some exciting finishes but that can happen in any version of the game.

The Hundred does have plenty of betting opportunities. Do some research before joining an online gambling site. It is important to know about areas such as financial transactions and just how good a  bookmakers welcome bonus  is and Wincomparator supplies such details on their site.

What is good about The Hundred is that the women’s game is being highlighted more. It’s not adding to their game though as the successful Women’s Cricket Super League has bit the dust.

We do now get some coverage of cricket on the BBC which is good for that broadcasting company. The Hundred may well be a success, though not on the level of the Indian Premier League but there’s still the lingering thought, ‘do we actually need this?’ What’s next? The Fifty perhaps??