The Hundred invented a new cricket format to win new fans
Cricket already had Tests, one-day games and Twenty20 when England's cricket board decided to try something stranger: each side gets exactly 100 balls. The Hundred remains the only league anywhere using that format, squeezing a match into about two and a half hours during the summer holidays.
The England and Wales Cricket Board first floated a new city-based Twenty20 tournament in September 2016, and its members voted 38–3 in April 2017 to go ahead. The twist came later that year, when commercial chief Sanjay Patel argued in a private meeting that a hundred-ball game would be easier for newcomers to follow than the established format. The pandemic delayed the launch by a year. Statisticians still file it under Twenty20.
Eight city teams, seven in England and one in Wales, play in July and August. Almost every fixture is a double-header, with the women's and men's matches at the same ground on the same day and one ticket covering both. Men earn four times what women do, though prize money is equal. Each innings normally runs 65 minutes with a 15-minute break, and the league winner goes straight to the final while second and third meet in an eliminator. Some matches air free on the BBC, and a tie-in with Marvel in the third season put characters such as Hulk and Black Panther alongside players.
Money has been contentious. A 2016 Deloitte forecast promised around £27m profit a year; the ECB reported an £11.8m profit in 2022, while a 2023 analysis found a £9m loss over the first two years, before counting payments promised to the counties.
Then came private capital. In 2024 the ECB handed 51% of each franchise to its host county, or MCC for London Spirit, and offered its remaining 49% to investors, having turned down a £400m bid for three-quarters of the competition. Sales in 2025 drew an extraordinary cast: a group including Tom Brady bought into Birmingham Phoenix, the Ambani family took a stake in Oval Invincibles, and tech billionaires led by Nikesh Arora paid £145m for 49% of London Spirit.
Source: The Hundred (cricket)
