Cricket

Warwickshire County Cricket Club has named former Premiership Rugby CEO Mark McCafferty as its new Chair.

McCafferty, who has been a member of the club’s Board of Directors in a non-executive role since 2016, was appointed following an interview process after having stepped down from a 14-year spell at Premiership Rugby.

McCafferty is also an advisor to CVC Capital Partnership, which has invested in Premiership Rugby and has also agreed to buy a minority stake in the sport’s PRO14 league.

The ICC has extended its global partnership with Chinese smartphone manufacturer OPPO.

The pair have agreed a three-year extension to their current deal, taking the partnership through to the end of 2023.

OPPO will continue to be the Official Mobile Handset and Headset partner of the ICC and its events, starting with the ICC U19 Cricket World Cup 2020 in South Africa and both the Men’s and Women’s T20 World Cups in Australia next year. 

The Kia Oval says it has experienced record ticket sales ahead of the 2020 England Test matches, in the wake of last summer’s bumper period of cricket.

The first three days of next summer’s England Test match against the West Indies at the ground are sold out, after 44,000 fans entered the annual ballot to buy tickets, which The Kia Oval says is more than entered for the 2019 Ashes series.

More than £2m of tickets to internationals at the south London stadium were bought in the first week of sales, with £1m sold in the first hour of availability.

The fixture list for The Hundred has been announced, taking place between 17th July and 15th August 2020.

The first game of the new league will take place at The Oval in south London and will feature Jason Roy and Sam Billings’ Oval Invincibles take on the Welsh Fire, who picked up Steve Smith and Mitchell Starc in the draft.

Meanwhile, the women’s competition - which will feature the same teams playing in the same grounds as the men’s sides - will kick off on 22nd July, when Georgia Elwiss’s Birmingham Phoenix host Sophie Ecclestone’s Manchester Originals in Worcester.

NatWest has launched a new activation fronted by one of the English cricketing stars of the summer of cricket: Jofra Archer.

The My First Shirt spot takes the England fast-bowler back to Horsham, where he first lived in the country after having moved from Barbados in 2015.

Throughout the spot, Archer reminisces about his experiences and impressions when he first came to Sussex, before going on to speak about wearing his first England shirt and why he wears the number 22 when he plays.

The partnership will focus on promoting physical activity among cricket fans...

The ECB has announced record-breaking engagement generated by the 2019 ICC Cricket World Cup.

On the back of the victorious campaign on home soil, the ECB has released initial data from a project it is undertaking to examine the impact of hosting the tournament.

The ECB has released the details of a new action plan which it hopes will transform women’s and girls’ cricket in England and Wales.

The commitment, part of the ECB’s ‘Inspiring Generations’ strategy for 2020-2024, will see £20m worth of funding invested into women’s cricket over the next two years, while the governing body says it hopes to invest £50m over the five-year period.

The ECB has lent its support to Public Health England’s new mental health campaign Every Mind Matters.

The national cricket governing body will promote the campaign to its staff and supporters and on its social media channels alongside a film featuring various celebrities who have faced mental health issues. The ad will be shown on major UK broadcast networks, and will include former England cricketers Andrew Flintoff and Sarah Taylor, who retired from the England Women’s team in September and has become a recognisable voice on mental health in sport. 

New Balance will supply the kits for all eight The Hundred teams, furthering its already-existing relationship with the ECB.

All of the teams competing in the new competition, which is set to debut in the summer of 2020, will wear New Balance kits, while the ECB has also confirmed that both the men's and women's teams for each of the franchises will wear the same design and says that the soon-to-be-unveiled kits will reflect the identities of the new teams.