Does the Sheffield Shield need to go to 5 days?

Oct 12, 2007
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With the struggles of our batsmen it seems to me that it is time to make the Sheffield Shield 5 days for a number of reasons.

1. To teach our batsmen to bat time and value their wicket rather than rush towards an expected declaration.

2. It might incentivise the groundsman to leave a bit more green on the wicket day 1 to stop it breaking up too much helping our bats practice with a steaming ball

3. It will help our bats get better at batting on a day 5 wicket that is breaking up and turning.

I feel like this might help us better prepare our batsmen for test cricket and help state teams pick more likely test players rather than focusing so much on quick scoring.


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corbies

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With the struggles of our batsmen it seems to me that it is time to make the Sheffield Shield 5 days for a number of reasons.

1. To teach our batsmen to bat time and value their wicket rather than rush towards an expected declaration.

2. It might incentivise the groundsman to leave a bit more green on the wicket day 1 to stop it breaking up too much helping our bats practice with a steaming ball

3. It will help our bats get better at batting on a day 5 wicket that is breaking up and turning.

I feel like this might help us better prepare our batsmen for test cricket and help state teams pick more likely test players rather than focusing so much on quick scoring.


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Have you watched the shield? The pitches are pretty juiced up already.
 
Aug 27, 2014
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With the struggles of our batsmen it seems to me that it is time to make the Sheffield Shield 5 days for a number of reasons.
Why ? We played 4 day matches for eons and were the strongest Test nation. The current issue is a combination of just a bad era of batsmen made worse as the experiement of Big Bash overtaking summer is coming home to roost at cost of Shield games not played enough whilst Test series happening.
 
I'd be more inclined to got the other way and make Tests over 4 days. How often does a match go past 400 overs and not finish in a draw?

No thanks. I'd rather curators do their job and produce a good wicket- look at Adelaide.
 
I'd be more inclined to got the other way and make Tests over 4 days.

You'd get more interesting wickets across the whole match, and by going to 100 over days you're really only losing about a session and a half of cricket.

It's already a struggle to play 90 overs most of the time.
 
Jan 14, 2012
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Nope. We do need to change the fixturing of games asap though.

Oct-Jan - Shield
Nov-Jan - Test
Jan - ODI'S
Feb - Big Bash

Might even have to start the Shield season in September and play games up north to fit it all in. Play thedomesric one day games in between shield like we used to

We can't continue to break up the shield season like we do and we need players pushing for selection able to play FC when test spots are up for grabs.

It won't fix everything but it's a great start.
 
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I'd be more inclined to got the other way and make Tests over 4 days.

You'd get more interesting wickets across the whole match, and by going to 100 over days you're really only losing about a session and a half of cricket.
Day night Test matches should be 4 day Tests. Instead of 6 hours in day it should be 7 and a half hours each day with last session under lights like we do for second part of day night one dayers.

6-45 pn to 10-15 pm should be last session under lights for Day/Night Test matches. Start Thursday 1-30 pm. first session 2 hours then 20 minutes break Second session 2 hours and then a nice long tea break to set up night session and players go at it for 3..5 hours under lights with 3 drinks breaks in last session.

Normal Test matches in day the normal 6 hours each day spread over 5 days.
 
Apr 19, 2013
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Nope. We do need to change the fixturing of games asap though.

Oct-Jan - Shield
Nov-Jan - Test
Jan - ODI'S
Feb - Big Bash

Might even have to start the Shield season in September and play games up north to fit it all in. Play thedomesric one day games in between shield like we used to

We can't continue to break up the shield season like we do and we need players pushing for selection able to play FC when test spots are up for grabs.

It won't fix everything but it's a great start.
Problem with Feb fixtures is competition for fields with WBBL, BBL, AFL, AFLX, WAFL, A League
 
May 5, 2006
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What was wrong with the old system of the Shield and ODD comp overlapping?

WA team flies to Melbourne, plays a 4 day Shield game and a one day game then flies home. Etc.

The JLT Cup is completely useless as a standalone comp running from mid September to mid October. And why did we play 3 ODIs and a T20I against South Africa and 3 T20Is against India as a lead in to the tests? Now we play India in ODIs and the last ODD game was nearly 3 months ago.
 

red+black

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First class cricket is not played over 5 days. There is a push to play Test cricket over 4 days.

From me it is an emphatic and obvious no.
 

Admiral Byng

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BBL has to be during summer holidays. There is a game on every day, sometimes two, most of which finish 10.15pm east coast time. If you shift the BBL to Feb the kids will be back to school by then, so most of them will miss out on a school night. Crowds would plummet. It does need to be in that immediate pre-Christmas through January school holidays period. Without kids you won't have those big BBL crowds.
 
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BBL has to be during summer holidays. There is a game on every day, sometimes two, most of which finish 10.15pm east coast time. If you shift the BBL to Feb the kids will be back to school by then, so most of them will miss out on a school night. Crowds would plummet. It does need to be in that immediate pre-Christmas through January school holidays period. Without kids you won't have those big BBL crowds.

They already have about 2-3 weeks outside the holidays this year with their stupid expanded competition. If it’s about the kids, why play the big games outside holidays?
 

Admiral Byng

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They already have about 2-3 weeks outside the holidays this year with their stupid expanded competition. If it’s about the kids, why play the big games outside holidays?

There is one weekend in Feb of Thurs, Fri, Sat (x2), Sun.
The the finals are Thurs, Fri and Sun the following week.

I guess the Thursday games are stretching it, but they've abandoned Mon, Tues & Wed at least.
 

Bomberboyokay

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Long term, 20 years from now BBL ambition would be to have it start in October and end in March.
 
Jan 14, 2012
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BBL has to be during summer holidays. There is a game on every day, sometimes two, most of which finish 10.15pm east coast time. If you shift the BBL to Feb the kids will be back to school by then, so most of them will miss out on a school night. Crowds would plummet. It does need to be in that immediate pre-Christmas through January school holidays period. Without kids you won't have those big BBL crowds.
There is one weekend in Feb of Thurs, Fri, Sat (x2), Sun.
The the finals are Thurs, Fri and Sun the following week.

I guess the Thursday games are stretching it, but they've abandoned Mon, Tues & Wed at least.
Cut the comp down to 5 weeks. Play the majority of games Thursday to Sunday with the odd mid week game. As I said, the crowds might not be quite as big for those games, but the TV ratings would still be there.

We can't let Big Bash dictate our schedule or we'll stay where we are. The way it is structured now means the standard of the Big Bash suffers and so does FC cricket.

Allow our test batsmen to play more BB and improve the poor standard of the comp and allow those pushing for test cricket able to play when they should be.
 
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