English Country Cricket Championship Starting
By Qasim Hussian
Last week was the start of the 122nd English County Cricket Championship (ECCC for short). The ECCC is a first class cricket tournament that has been played since 1890, and is played between 18 English counties (states/provinces). The championship will be played in three groups, with six teams in each group. Each team will play a total of 10 matches in the group phase. Then the championship will move into the division phase. This is when the top teams from each group form one division, the worst teams from each group will form one division, and the average teams will form one division. These positions though are not finalized and if a team wins or loses enough times they could either be moved up or down a division. The winner of the championship is the team that is at the top of division 1 (the division for the best teams) at the end of the tournament. The favorite for this year's tournament is Lancashire who have arguably one of the top bowling attacks of all of the counties. Though Lancashire are the favorites of this year's tournament, there are many other teams that have astounding players that can get them the trophy. These chances are further amplified by the amount of international players that have come for the year's season. Some of the more prominent international players that will be playing are wicketkeeper Mohammad Rizwan, batsman Azhar Ali, batsman Cheteshwar Pujara, fast bowler Naseem Shah, medium fast bowler Mohammad Abbas, batsman Marnus Labuschagne, allrounder Faheem Ashraf, and fast bowler Shaheen Shah Afridi, who according to Pleasant Valley Junior High student Dhruv Patil “Is one of the best and most accurate fast bowlers currently playing worldwide,”. There are a few big names that will not be playing in the tournament though as many players have overlooked the ECCC and have instead been attracted to the higher paying contracts of the Indian Premier League (IPL) which also started last week and will continue to May 29th.