Changes afresh for Shell series?
By
R. T. BRITTENDEN
Since Shell Series cricket began four years ago, there has been considerable satisfaction with the extension of the first-class season that the sponsorship made possible, but some unhappiness about the format for the series, which has changed, season by season.
The Cricket Council’s board of control will soon announce its decisions on how the 1979-80 series will be conducted. There are likely to be further changes, and further room for debate. There are two separate areas for discussion.' The first is the duration of matches and how, after each team has met each of the others, the last part of the season should be used. Until now, the competition has been designed to provide a winner of the Shell Cup, for the first round, and of the Shell Trophy, for which there has been a final, with the finalists
decided by methods which have varied. The second is the conduct of the matches — whether the first-innings overs should be limited, at what stage the new ball should be available, and the award of batting and bowling performance points. Changes have been made there too.
It seems likely that the board will retain three-day matches in the corning season, although there is a strong body of feeling which argues a return to the four days of the original Plunket Shield matches.
There is little doubt that the limitation of overs in first innings has achieved little. One of its appeals was the interest provided
for the public in teams hitting out to get another point or two before their overs ran out.
But it has not done much for the development of middle-order batsmen, who regularly sacrifice their wickets in pursuit of quick runs, or of bowlers, Spinners have been penalised, seamers have had to look for economy. In the four-day matches before the Second World War. the scoring rates were vastly higher than they are today — but if the recession can be attributed to tighter bowling methods and less, generous field placings, there is no reason to believe that they would decline even further if fOur-day matches were
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Press, 14 April 1979, Page 22
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357Changes afresh for Shell series? Press, 14 April 1979, Page 22
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