The second round of county championship matches gets underway on Friday (there is an IPL commentary today, which is just getting underway). This post looks into the rights and wrongs of the points system used in the county championship.
THE POINTS SYSTEM
The points system in use for this season is as follows:
16 Points for an outright win
8 points for a draw
In addition bonus points are awarded in the first 110 overs of each side’s first innings as follows: batting – 1 point for 250 runs, 2 for 300, 3 for 350, 4 for 400 and 5 for 450 and bowling – 1 point for three wickets, 2 points for six wickets and 3 points for nine wickets.
PROS AND CONS
I approve of the 16 points for a win, and though I accept that it adds a degree of complexity I also largely approve of the bonus point system. I have a problems with the allocation of eight points for a draw (it used to be five last season). Two matches in different ways illustrate the problems with rewarding a draw so highly. At Lord’s neither Middlesex nor Glamorgan were within a country mile of winning – the pitch won hands down, and there is no certainty that there would have been a result had that match been allocated eight days rather than the regulation four. At Hove Sussex utterly outplayed Northamptonshire but bad light forced an end with Sussex highly likely to win had it not done so, and Northamptonshire gained eight points which they had done precious little to earn. I do not go so far as legendary Somerset skipper of yesteryear Sammy Woods who was once heard to say “draws…they’re for bathing in” – I have witnessed some classic drawn matches, including the Old Trafford test match of 2005 and a match between Surrey and Hampshire, when with no chance of anything more than a draw for Surrey former South Africa test batter Hashim Amla batted the whole of the final day to shepherd his side to that draw. However I also do not particularly want to encourage sides to play safe and look to avoid defeat, and I feel that awarding as many as eight points for a draw (which if it comes with full batting and bowling points thus means 16 in total) is likely to encourage negative tactics. I think five points is ample for a draw. A further problem with eight points for a draw is exemplified by the fact that Durham and Hampshire have eight points a piece for four days of doing nothing because the outfield was always deemed too wet for cricket. Surrey meanwhile have 11 points because in just over 80 overs of cricket at Old Trafford they managed to bowl their hosts out for 202, and were 15-0 in reply.
PHOTOGRAPHS
I have a bumper photo gallery, particularly notable for the variety of butterflies featured…
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