Counties opt for a two-division Championship
THE LV Insurance County Championship will return to two divisions from next summer following a vote by the first-class counties.
Ten counties will compete in Division One and Derbyshire will be among the eight in Division Two, with a two-up, two-down promotion and relegation system.
After a Covid-affected 2020, when the Championship was not contested, the competition switched to a three groups of six format last season.
The first-class counties were asked at the end of the season by the England and Wales Cricket Board when and how they would like to see a return to two divisions and the decision was to go straight back to the structure they had agreed to adopt for the 2020 season.
Each county will play 14 County Championship matches.
The divisions have been drawn up as they would have looked if the 2020 Championship season had taken place.
That means the three counties promoted from Division Two in 2019 – Lancashire, Northamptonshire and Gloucestershire – will get their chance to compete in the top division, while the lastplaced Division
One county in 2019, Nottinghamshire, have not escaped relegation.
Results from the 2020 Bob Willis Trophy and the 2021 County Championship had no bearing on the drawing up of the divisions for next season.
It is possible the Bob Willis Trophy will remain in some capacity, with the ECB unwilling to abandon it totally, but it is unlikely there will be an end-of-season showpiece match as seen in the last two years.
This week’s vote also considered the option to play one further year of the seeded group structure staged this summer.
Although there was support for that from counties, there was not the two-thirds majority required under the ECB articles.
Division One: Essex, Gloucestershire, Hampshire, Kent, Lancashire, Northamptonshire, Somerset, Surrey, Warwickshire, Yorkshire.
Division Two: Durham, Derbyshire, Glamorgan, Leicestershire, Middlesex, Nottinghamshire, Sussex, Worcestershire.