Festival dates
Middlesex and Hampshire set for College
MIDDLESEX and Hampshire will be Gloucestershire’s fourday opponents at the 2021 Cheltenham Cricket Festival.
The Middlesex game will start on Sunday, July 4, with the Hampshire game beginning a week later, on July 11.
The Championship will return next summer with the opening round of games beginning on Thursday April 8 with Gloucestershire beginning the campaign at home against Surrey at the Bristol County Ground.
Fixtures for the remaining domestic women’s and men’s white-ball competitions are set to be announced in early 2021.
The counties agreed in October to reshape the County Championship structure for next summer only to help mitigate against the possible impact of COVID-19.
Each county has initially been placed into one of three seeded groups of six and has been scheduled to play five home matches and five away matches during the group stage.
Gloucestershire are in a group with Somerset, Surrey, Middlesex, Hampshire and Leicestershire.
The opening nine rounds are to be played on consecutive weeks and all are due to begin on a Thursday with a scheduled Sunday finish.
The group stage will conclude in July with the round 10 and 11 matches to begin on a Sunday.
The top two counties in each group, at the end of the group stage, will progress to Division One, with the other counties moving into Divisions Two and Three, where they will each play a further four matches.
The winner of Division One will be crowned the 2021 County Champions.
The opening round of divisional stage matches will begin on the Bank Holiday Monday, August 30.
The five-day Bob Willis Trophy final will be played between the top two counties in Division One and is scheduled to start on Tuesday September 27.
ECB Managing Director of County Cricket, Neil Snowball said: “Despite the significant hurdles that we faced this year, the domestic game still found a way to play meaningful cricket across men’s and women’s formats while ensuring that our members and supporters were able to remain close to the game through advanced live streaming of matches.
“Once again we have seen an innovative and collaborative approach between the ECB and the 18 counties that has enabled us to plan for 2021 with a new, County Championship structure for 2021 only, that is designed to be both exciting for players and supporters and also flexible to the possible ongoing impact of COVID-19.
“We are also working hard with all 18 counties to ensure that we are able to welcome the return of crowds safely next year and will continue to work closely with Government and all relevant authorities.”