After a successful inaugural season last year, England and Wales Cricket Board’s (ECB) The Hundred is all set to begin from August 3 where the 100-ball cricket competition will see eight women’s and men’s teams from major English and Welsh cities compete across 60 matches over five weeks.
FanCode, India’s premier digital sports fan destination, signed a 4-year exclusive media rights deal with England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) in 2021; and will be the only platform to exclusively live-stream the tournament in India through the FanCode app (Android, iOS, TV) and www.fancode.com.
The Hundred is an entirely new cricket format that was developed by the ECB, and has been hailed for its unique format of only 100 balls per innings with the batsmen attempting to score as many runs as they can. The eight city-based teams are Birmingham Phoenix (Edgbaston), London Spirit (Lord’s), Manchester Originals (Emirates Old Trafford), Northern Superchargers (Emerald Headingley), Oval Invincibles (Kia Oval), Southern Brave (Ageas Bowl), Trent Rockets (Trent Bridge) and Welsh Fire (Sophia Gardens).
Each of the eight squads have 15 players with a maximum of three overseas stars.
The men’s competition will feature some of the biggest superstars including Kieron Pollard, Glenn Maxwell, Andre Russell, Eoin Morgan, Jos Buttler, Liam Livingstone, Faf du Plessis, Dwayne Bravo, Sunil Narine, Rashid Khan, Joe Root, Moeen Ali and Quinton de Kock among others.
All eyes will be on the swashbuckler Jos Buttler, who will join his team Manchester Originals on the back of a successful IPL stint, where he smashed a total of 824 runs. Another batter who is all set to grab attention is Quinton de Kock, who scored a total of 502 runs with a strike rate 149 and an average of 38.61 for his new team, Lucknow Super Giants.
Two of the leading Indian star performers, Smriti Mandhana and Jemimah Rodrigues, have been retained by Southern Brave and Northern Superchargers respectively and will continue to showcase their prowess in the women’s competition. Indian opening batter Smriti Mandhana contributed significantly to the success of the Southern Brave in the Women’s Hundred with 167 runs in seven innings at an average of 27.83, whereas Jemimah Rodrigues emerged as one of Hundred’s leading run scorers for Northern Superchargers.
Additionally, Deepti Sharma has been roped in as a wildcard for Birmingham Phoenix. During the maiden season of the tournament, Deepti took over the mantle of London Spirit’s key all-rounder and scored 77 runs along with an overall 10 wicket haul during her 8 appearances.