Andrew Strauss explains motivation for 100-ball cricket
England director of cricket Andrew Strauss has said the ECB’s proposed 100-ball format has been designed to be “as simple as possible” to appeal to “mums and kids during the summer holidays”.
"What we're trying to do is appeal to a new audience, people that aren't traditional cricket fans," Strauss told BBC Radio 5 Live's Sportsweek programme. "We want to make the game as simple as possible for them to understand.
"T20 has been unbelievably successful and it has established a very strong audience now. We want that audience but a different audience as well, who perhaps would like things slightly different. That's the driver behind this idea."
The former England captain also highlighted thatthe shortened length of the format would make it more suitable for terrestrial TV broadcasters, with the mooted city-based tournament, which had previously been assumed to be a T20 competition, part of a set of domestic and international games which will be shown on the BBC from 2020.
"T20 has become a longer and longer format of the game. It is more than four hours in a lot of parts of the world," Strauss said. "We want kids to be able to go to bed earlier and it is worth saying it is going to be on terrestrial TV. We want the more casual audience."
100-ball cricket – what we know
The ECB, on Thursday 19 April, proposed a unique approach for its new domestic city-based competition, which involves each team facing a maximum of 100 balls.
The eight-team tournament, to start in 2020, is set to feature concurrent competitions for men and women, with each side facing 15 overs of six balls and an additional 10 balls.
It is not yet confirmed how many overs a bowler can bowl, when these additional 10 balls will be delivered, and whether these extra deliveries can be bowled by one bowler or more.
The ECB presented the approach to the chairmen and chief executives of the first-class counties and MCC, and “received overwhelming support” by the board of the new competition.