As the cricketing authorities launch their latest money grabbing exercise to a ground (not so) near you, my thoughts on the new competition due to start in summer 2020.

I Oppose The Hundred (audio)

I Oppose The Hundred

For the simple fact

Professional cricket doesn’t need another shortened format

 

With T20 and one-day already in existence

Who decreed to proceed down the path of most resistance

 

There are ways to innovate and modernise the sport

Without the trashing of the existing band of travelling support

 

I Oppose The Hundred

The assault on the county game

The ECB ignoring fans, whatever they may claim

 

England won the men’s World Cup by the skin of their teeth

Failure to build on that success truly does defy belief

 

50 over cricket domestically downgraded

The World Cup barely lifted while the counties are grifted and raided

 

I Oppose The Hundred

And the scrapping of the Super League

Where’s the planning for the future in this mindless, thoughtless blitzkrieg

 

Why is women’s cricket being shoved into a corner

With all the tact and diplomacy of a sledge from David Warner

 

I Oppose The Hundred

And the patronising claim

Women and children cannot understand a complicated game

 

Cricket is convoluted, idiosyncratic in charm

The way to learn the game is by watching

Tell me what is the harm of making the sport more attractive, with tickets reasonably priced

Without a new competition where cricket is sliced and diced

 

I Oppose The Hundred

And its tinkering of cricket laws

The MCC abetting change it traditionally abhors

 

I Oppose The Hundred

Feel as sick as a pig

Seeing old players becoming lackeys in exchange for another gig

Hankering for the commentary box or a coaching role in one of the sides

All the while embracing a scheme that so openly derides

Existing fans faithful to their team

For the sake of a new competition replete with garish colour scheme

 

I Oppose The Hundred

Each team with a stupid name

And draft pick rules designed by fools that complicate the game

 

I Oppose The Hundred

For I can count to six

A five or ten ball strategy play is not a simple fix

 

I Oppose The Hundred

The money thrown in the air

After Allen Stanford you’d think they’d take more care

 

The helicopter may have gone

But dear prudence is still playing second fiddle

To a political play, where the pawns in the game

Are the players out in the middle

 

Cricket was taken off free to air for the big money from Sky

But as grassroots have dwindled the ECB won’t eat humble pie

 

Instead they look at the franchised IPL and Big Bash

Heads have turned, 20 balls burned

By the allure of television cash

 

I Oppose The Hundred

A shameless rotten beast

Despised across the land from the south-west to the north-east

 

I Oppose The Hundred

For I truly fear

The end of the county system is drawing ever near

 

I Oppose The Hundred

And the vast expense

How will The Hundred help a 50 over World Cup defence

 

I Oppose The Hundred

And am deeply cynical

Administrators truly believe Test cricket is the pinnacle

 

I Oppose The Hundred

And all it represents

The ECB still ploughing on despite all common sense

 

I Oppose The Hundred

Most of all because

The ECB and the powers that be don’t care about the likes of us