Cricket - Hants dodge relegation after all?

[Weybridge]

Looks like Hants will stay in Div One after all, due to Durham's £4m debt and ECB bailout.

Just waiting on confirmation.

[Earl Grey]

I knew about the points deduction thing but I never thought they'd deduct enough points to actually dig Hants out of the brown stuff but it was a whopping 46 points in the end....enough to effect a Hampshire escape.

Plus they start next years campaign 48 points light!

I guess it's rude to celebrate too extravagantly in view of the fact it's at Durham's expense but - what the hell - yippeee!!!

Now the boys have to sort themselves out because we're no longer a threat to anyone in either the short or long forms of the game and that's sad.

[pompeygunner]

The really strange thing is that this from Jonathan Agnew could so easily have been Hants epitaph just a few years ago.
""Durham's is a sad and salutary tale. Ambition and enviable cricketing infrastructure, that produced eight Test players, but also over-ambition in that the county had its head turned by the foolish central policy of encouraging all to stage Test cricket.

"By overextending financially to fulfil their dream, this was the undoing of Durham, who have now lost the right to host Tests."

Hants very nearly went bankrupt iirc & only by selling the ground to Eastliegh Borough Council did they stay out of the sticky brown stuff. If I've got that wrong then I apologise & my memory is playing tricks but thats how I recall it.
Bransgrove got absolutely fixated on getting Ashes tests & it won't ever happen barring something disastrous @ Lords & The Oval. Bransgrove was basically asking the ECB to hand 3 out of 5 Tests to the south of England-never ever going to happen & as we've seen with the last Test there the ground was some way short of capacity.
Anyway its all immaterial except to say that Hants need some real quality in the bowling dept otherwise this will just postpone relelgation for a season. They must find a way of bowling teams out twice.

[Earl Grey]

Can't believe Kent are still going to push for a place in Division One of the CC by seeking independent arbitration.

From the BBC site:

Kent say the governing body's stance is "wrong, procedurally flawed and in breach of fundamental legal principles".
George Kennedy, chairman of the Canterbury-based club, said the issue had left him considering his position.

I just cannot get my head around why a system agreed before the season began where one club gets promoted from Div 2 and two relegated from Div 1 should suddenly be changed to 2 up 3 down because Durham had some points deducted that put them just below Hampshire.

Can anyone understand their thinking?

[... and chips]

Here in the north east cricket fans are furious. The ECB's mechanism for handing out tests is stupid, and seen as the main culprit.