What Is The T20 Blast?
You’ll be seeing plenty on our newsroom over the next few months about the T20 Blast competition as our various cricketing partners take part in the 2024 edition of the one-day series.
Somerset are bidding to defend their title, with both Nottinghamshire and Yorkshire amongst those looking to wrestle the crown away from them.
But what exactly is the Blast, and how does it sit alongside the traditional four-day games as seen in the County Championship?
The Blast emerged from the ashes of the Benson & Hedges Cup, which has been a one-day competition that ran from the early 1970s through to 2002 when the ban on tobacco advertising and subsequent end of the sponsorship deal saw it come to an end.
The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) was left looking at alternative options for a one-day competition and settled on a new format of the game that was aimed at boosting the popularity of the sport – leading to the formation of the Twenty20 (or T20) format.
Rather than another, longer limited overs game of 50 overs a side as a direct replacement, the ECB came up with the idea of a shorter game of 20 overs a side that would be much shorter and therefore more attractive for both fans and broadcasters alike.
The Competition Format:
The Twenty20 Cup – which is the competition now known as the Blast – was launched in 2003 and would proved to be popular with fans, who came through the gates in their thousands to catch the action.
Surrey would prove to be the first winners of the Blast, thumping Warwickshire by nine wickets at Trent Bridge in the first domestic final in England to be played under lights.
The format of the tournament has remained roughly the same through the years, with a group stage taking place before the top teams progress to a knock-out phase.
The 18 first class county teams are split geographically across two groups, with nine teams in the North Group and nine teams in the South Group. Those teams then compete across a total of 14 group games each, with seven at home and seven away to determine who makes it through to the next stage.
The top four from each group progress to quarter finals to fight for a spot on Finals Day – which comprises of the two semi-finals and then the final itself – providing a full day of activities for the watching fans at the Edgbaston ground in Birmingham.
The Match Format:
The T20 Blast runs to the traditional rules of cricket in many respects, although there are understandable tweaks in certain areas to account for the shorter format of the game.
For example, bowlers are restricted to a maximum of one fifth of the overs available – so four from 20 in a full game without interruptions – whilst bowling a no-ball results in two runs being scored and, if the delivery is for an overstep, sees the next delivery become a free hit, where the batsman cannot be bowled our or trapped LBW.
Extra runs are given to the batting side if the 20th over hasn’t been started within 75 minutes of the innings getting underway, whilst there are also various fielding restrictions that encourage the batting team to hit out – such as a limit on the number of fielders outside a 30 yard circle at any time.
Competition Records:
- Highest Team Total: Somerset, 265/5 – v Derbyshire, 2022
- Lowest Team Total: Glamorgan, 44 – v Surrey, 2019
- Biggest Winning Margin: 191 runs – Somerset v Derbyshire, 2022
- Highest Player Score: Adam Lyth, 161 – Yorkshire v Northants, 2017
- Highest Partnership: Joe Denly & Daniel Bell-Drummond, 207 – Kent v Essex, 2017
- Best Bowling: Colin Ackermann, 7/18 – Leicestershire v Birmingham (Warwickshire), 2019