Birmingham Bears get the Full Treatment!

The 2014 Natwest t20 Blast Champions and 2015 Semi-Finalists have become the first team to have a full squad created in t20 Dream Team.

Its not just the squad though, as you can see there's also the coach Dougie Brown, Edgbaston and the new-for-2016 logo.

The Birmingham Bears launch their 2016 Natwest Blast campaign away at he Notts Outlaws on Friday 20th May.

t20 Dream Team Update

First of all, if you’re reading this it probably means you’re a fan of t20 Dream Team on Facebook. In which case, thank you.

This is basically an update on a few things. Firstly, the Team of the Week is proving to be great fun putting together. There aren’t any rules but merely some guidelines I like to follow, most notably a maximum of 2 players per team. This is only really possible in the Natwest Blast or when there’s more than 1 league up for selection. This lead to the creation of 12^th man. There won’t always be a 12^th man nor does there have to be. It’s for the great performance that can’t be squeezed into Team of the Week.

Unlike EA Sports, I only choose 11 players per week. It’s worth noting EA have hundreds of games to choose from. I have about 10. A player who scores 52 off 33 will be more likely to get in TotW than a player who scores 55 off 29 in a defeat. However this is not set in stone. See Michael Klinger for example (2 hundreds in a week both in a losing cause).

Secondly, there will be a small tweak for TotW at the end of July. Team of the Week 15 will take place on 23^rd July. This will be followed by a Team of the Final Round of Group Games from the Blast (TotFR). Team of the Week will resume the following Thursday but with the Royal London One Day Cup. The t20 Blast Quarter Finals will have a TotQF. There will also be Team of Finals Day. Team of Finals Day will include 3 hero cards, one for each game, as well as any record breakers from the day (if any).

Thirdly, record breakers. If Klinger or anyone else for that matter beats Jason Roy’s record of 677 runs in the tournament for example they will have a record breaker card. This will be as follows:

-          If it is broken with a none TotW contribution the RB card will be standalone

-          If it is broken with a TotW contribution the RB card will be in TotW

-          If the record is broken on Finals Day the RB card will appear in ToFD if the contribution is worthy. If not it will be in Team of the Season if the player warrants a place there.

Lastly, Paul Collingwood is closing in on 50 Durham wickets to go with 500 runs in t20 cricket. When he passes that milestone he will be rewarded with a hero card.

Blast Off!

The changes to the domestic t20 game for 2014 were initially greeted with a mixed reception. Personally I wasn’t too fussed by the name (Natwest t20 Blast) and I especially like the “Friday night is t20 night” vibe coming from the ECB. However whether or not the new two groups of nine proves more successful than three groups of six remains to be seen.

I got my first taste of the new look t20 competition at Lord’s where Middlesex took on Essex and then Sussex in a double header. The two games were unbelievably contrasting. Firstly Essex, led by Mark Pettini’s 95*, superbly chased down 180. The pitch took a dramatic turn between games and Sussex ended up defending a modest 128.

As is the way with t20 these days, the Cricket is accompanied by other novelties. The music, part of t20 since the early days, has been kept up to date with present hits (a.k.a songs I don’t know!) with the old classics (Chelsea Dagger for example) still getting a spin. Flamethrowers shoot into the air with every boundary and wicket, while drummers provide piece of the pre-game entertainment. During the match “Blast breaks” now take place. In essence, volunteers throw t-shirts into the crowd between certain overs.

So far then, the Natwest t20 Blast has left a good first impression on me. Next stop: Northampton on Friday.

Team of the Week

There were some impressive performances over the first weekend of action. Here is my FIFA Ultimate Team style team of the week...
Dawid Malan (Middlesex) 86* vs Essex

Mark Pettini (Essex) 95* vs Middlesex

Calum MacLeod (Durham) 80 vs Worcestershire

Scott Styris (Leicestershire) 63 vs Derbyshire

Paul Collingwood (Durham) 62 & 3-29 vs Worcestershire

Samit Patel (Notts) 56 & 2-25 vs Lancashire

Ben Duckett (Northants) 39* vs Yorkshire (wk)

Ian Butler (Northants) 4-25 vs Yorkshire

Will Owen (Glamorgan) 3-32 vs Hampshire

Steffan Piolet  (Sussex) 4-0-15-2 vs Middlesex

Dirk Nannes (Somerset) 4-21 vs Gloucestershire

The argument against franchises

It’s good to see the ECB haven’t bowed down to franchises for the domestic t20 competition. Here are two arguments against franchises;
1) The current format allows people to get to a t20 game straight after work and be home in good time. If you had, for example, 8 franchises each based at 8 major grounds (Lord’s, Oval, Edgbaston, Old Trafford, Headingley, Trent Bridge, Ageas Bowl and the SWALEC Stadium) you’d lose that convenience factor. If the ECB went to 8 major franchises, how could Joe Soap  who works 20 odd miles away from Taunton get down to a t20 game after work if his nearest teams were based in Wales and Southampton!?

2) The IPL may be full of superstar players, but none of the teams in it can call themselves underdogs. Let’s not forget, humble Northants are the defending t20 in England and their victory last year was a true underdog story.

Final Over

For t20 Cricket, an IPL game seems to take forever to get through. A seemingly unnecessary amount of time is taken between consecutive deliveries being bowled. I don’t understand why there has to be two Strategic Timeouts in an innings. They seem to slow the game down. Why the IPL doesn’t have a 1 hour 20 minute timeframe for an innings is beyond me. Then again, it is a competition derived by the BCCI!