A Guide To The County Championship

01/05/2024 09:00 Share

As the football season moves closer to its conclusion, the 2024 cricket season is already in full swing with the opening four rounds of the County Championship having now been completed.

In 2024, Vertu Motors continues to support three teams across the two divisions, with Somerset and Nottinghamshire both chasing success in Division 1 and Yorkshire bidding to try and gain promotion from Division 2.

But what is the County Championship?

The Format:

The County Championship is the oldest and most historic first-class competition in the country, dating back to the early 1890s when the first eight county sides came together.

Now, a total of 18 clubs are involved split across two divisions, with a system of promotion and relegation in place each season. The bottom two teams in Division 1 are relegated at the end of the season, and are replaced by the leading two teams in Division 2.

Ten teams compete in Division 1, with the remaining eight doing battle in Division 2.

At a time when shorter forms of the game, such as the T20 Blast and The Hundred, are becoming increasingly popular, the County Championship caters more for the cricketing ‘purists’ – with games played over four days and comprising of two innings per side.

Teams play each other twice during the season with fixtures both home and away, and the team with the most points at the end of the campaign is the one that will ultimately finish on top.

The Team:

Games are played between teams of eleven players, who roughly fit into one of four different categories.

At the top of the order are the specialist batsmen, those who are expected to score the lion’s share of the runs for a team during a game.

At the bottom of the order are the bowlers, who aren’t expected to contribute as many runs but are instead there to try and bowl out the opposition. Bowlers fall under two broad categories, with fast bowlers aiming to bowl as quickly as possible and swing the ball, and spinners bowling slower balls that will turn more to try and outwit the batsman.

In between the two on the batting order is where you will find those classed as all-rounders – who can both bat and bowl – and also a single wicket-keeper who is placed behind the wickets to try and take any short catches, and also to stop any ball that has beaten the batsman.

When it comes to the make-up of the team for each game, counties are able to select a maximum of two overseas players in the matchday squad, whilst up to four overseas players can be registered for the season as a whole.

That decision was taken to ensure that a team was able to have specialist players within the squad for both red ball cricket – as in the County Championship – and white ball cricket in shorter forms of the game.

The Scoring System:

Batsmen score runs for each time they run to the opposite end of the pitch between the two wickets after playing a shot, with the batsman needing to ground their bat in the crease (the area in front of the wicket).

A shot that reaches the boundary having bounced en-route is awarded four runs, with a shot that clears the boundary worth six. Additional extra runs can be awarded in the event of a no-ball or a wide being bowled by the bowler, or a bye when the batsman hasn’t stuck the ball.

Batsman can be out in a number of ways, including being bowled, caught by a fielder, stumped outside their crease by the wicket-keeper or run out – when they attempt a run by the bails are dislodged before they have grounded their bat in the crease.

A team bats until ten of the eleven batsmen have been dismissed to leave one batsman alone in the centre, although a team can elect to declare its innings early.

The team batting first can win the game by scoring the most runs, whilst the team batting second can win by reaching the target set by the opposition with wickets still in hand.

The Points System:

The way in which points are scored is slightly more convoluted that the simple three points for a win system found in football.

Victory in a match earns the winning team a minimum of 16 points, with a tie being worth eight points and a drawn match – a match where a result can’t be secured within the allotted time - being worth five.

If the scores are level in a drawn match where play has taken place, the side batting in the fourth innings will score eight points, with the opposing side picking up five points.

An abandoned match results in five points per side.

On top of any points scored through the result of the match, the County Championship also operates a bonus point system related to the first 110 overs of the opening innings.

That system, as detailed below, awards anything up to eight further points, which are retained regardless of the end result.

Batting Points