In the Monster Mash, the corpse rises from the bed in the lab and does a groovy dance. England’s men just fell off the bed.

When is the next ODI series?

Well, England did get Monstered…

I hear the Women’s Ashes is now called The Washes. Does this mean we’ve just finished The Mashes?

All excellent ideas, APW, but I fear that few if any of them will see the light of day. At one time KC wrote a dystopian fantasy series about an ECB gone MBA/marketing strategy berserk. Presumably still available on this site if I tried hard enough to find it. Sadly, dystopian fact has overtaken dystopian fiction in the Tom Harrison instantiation of the ECB.

For the benefit of King Cricket readers beset by similar difficult correspondence from the Antipodes, here is my reply in full:

“My understanding is that the series starts this coming week, Graeme…. https://www.espncricinfo.com/series/women-s-ashes-2021-22-1263566
…unless you are by chance talking about men’s cricket, in which case the series is not due until the summer of 2023. 😎”

So, here are some semi-coherent thoughts about What We Could Do About This Sort Of Thing:

Split the County Championship into three divisions with promotion and relegation

Use the space freed up in the domestic calendar to play games throughout the season in different conditions and with England players available for more matches

Allow teams in the top division to have an additional overseas player or two, partly subsidised by the ECB, raising the standard and providing a potential financial incentive (in the form of ticket sales) for teams to gain promotion

Make The Hundred an ‘every other year’ event, scheduled for a time that doesn’t clash with a T20 World Cup or the IPL

Play either the domestic T20 competition or the domestic 50 over competition in the ‘off’ year only

Account for all of the above in a new financial agreement with Counties that guarantees their survival as long as they meet certain criteria (including in their internal governance).

Set a maximum on the number of ODIs and T20Is played in a tour at 3 each, and schedule at least one ‘proper’ warm-up game before each Test series.

Every time a Test team is selected without a recognised spinner, those responsible for the selection have to spend 24 continuous hours listening to, alternately, ‘Baby Shark’ and Australian press conferences about ‘Elite Mateship’.

Harmanpreet corn
Joe Beetroot
Tomatony Lewis
Celerian Bell
Saladam Hollioake
Graeme GarlHick