ECB members approve new city-based Twenty20 tournament

English cricket’s march towards to the creation of an eight-team Twenty20 tournament for 2020 onwards is unstoppable after the England and Wales Cricket Board received a landslide vote in favour of changing its constitution. A 28-day postal ballot of the ECB’s membership – the 18 first-class counties, MCC, the Minor Counties Association and the 21 non-first-class boards – was instigated at the end of March and returned an overwhelming majority, with 38 of 41 in favour of allowing a new domestic competition with regional sides.

Colin Graves, the ECB chairman, said: “We are delighted that such an overwhelming majority of our members have voted to support the change to the ECB’s articles. In doing so, they have paved the way for an exciting new era for cricket in England and Wales.

“Our clear ambition is that this new competition will sit alongside the Indian Premier League and [Australia’s] Big Bash League as one of the world’s major cricket tournaments. It will certainly increase participation in our game, in conjunction with the new All Stars Cricket programme for five- to eight-year-olds, and provide additional income streams for all our stakeholders.”

These income streams amount to £1.3m a year for each of the 18 first-class counties, who will continue to compete in the existing T20 Blast but will see on average five of their best players join teams based at eight major venues for the 38-day competition at the height of summer while the 50-over cup is taking place.

Tom Harrison, the ECB’s chief executive, has already been speaking to a raft of terrestrial and subscription broadcasters with the rights package set to be put out to tender in May along with those for international and other domestic cricket for 2020 to 2024; overall, the £75m per year Sky pays for the existing rights is expected to be dwarfed.

Middlesex, Essex and Kent voted against the proposal – abstention, in the case of the latter, was considered a no vote – with Surrey, who have been longstanding opponents, relenting. Their chairman, Richard Thompson, told supporters at the club’s AGM on Tuesday that it would have been “utterly futile to have stood against it” despite expressing concerns it would relegate the existing T20 Blast to second-class status.