Geoffrey Boycott has issued a stark warning that Andrew Strauss 's proposed reforms of county cricket will kill it and "not produce more quality England cricketers".
Strauss was tasked by the ECB to produce a high performance review following England's disastrous 4-0 loss to Australia in the Ashes and the ex-England captain has suggested a radical overhaul of the domestic game. Among those proposed changes are making the County Championship three divisions, and reducing the amount of Championship and T20 Blast games each county plays.
His ideas have not gone down well with the majority of counties and Boycott believes Strauss has not grasped all the ramifications of his review being passed. In a column for the Telegraph, the former England opener warned: "If the counties vote for the Sir Andrew Strauss report it will not produce more quality England cricketers and it will be the death of county cricket.
"What a crime that would be - especially after what we saw on the final day of this season, with Warwickshire surviving by the skin of their teeth and my old club, Yorkshire, being relegated. I fear Andrew has not grasped all the ramifications of his review being passed.
There are a number of ways our cricket is played and organised that need to change and I wish Andrew had talked to more of the players who played county and Test matches in previous eras as they just might have had some interesting observations for him." While Boycott praised Strauss as "a good bloke", he is highly critical of the ECB and believes plans to cut the amount of County Championship games is "too simple".
He added: "Andrew and Rob [Key, Managing Director of England Men's cricket] must be aware that their ECB bosses have long wanted the counties to play less red ball cricket because in their view county cricket doesn’t make any money. The people that run our cricket just want more and more white ball, crash-bang-wallop cricket because they believe that brings in big gate receipts and TV money.
"That is why they created the Hundred. It is too simple to say cut down the amount of four-day matches to give players more rest and make sure the matches are more competitive.
"I have never seen sportsmen and women improve sitting on their arse! At the moment our Test squad have numerous preparation days whereby they practise in the morning and play golf in the afternoons and this year they have had more days off for rest and golf."
However, England white ball captain Jos Buttler has suggested the reforms could help improve the international side, telling the BBC's Sports Desk podcast : "I do feel a reduction in games would allow players to prepare properly, recover properly and put a lot more emphasis on those games. The pressure on those games would be a lot higher and I think the standard could potentially be higher for that. I can see how that would see more high performance, in that sense."
