England and Wales Cricket Board's (ECB) much-anticipated tournament 'The Hundred' has ended after a three-week-long tenure. Southern Brave, led by James Vince won the Hundred on Saturday and imprinted the name as the inaugural champions of the new tournament. They defeated Birmingham Pheonix by 32 runs.
The Hundred managed to spark some excitement among the fan around the world as the cricket matches were being played in a new and shorter format in this league. The format was shorter than T20, and as the name of the tournament suggests, each innings was reduced to 100 balls on either side, where each bowler could bowl up to 20 balls. The Hundred made the cricket format shorer and much more entertaining.
In the Final, Southern Brave batted first and scored 168 runs in 100 balls. Quinton de Kock, their star batsman failed but Paul Sterling stepper up, and along with him, Ross Whiteley also provided some finishing touches. Birmingham Pheonix, with all their superpower in batting, could not win the match. There was Moeen Ali, Liam Livingstone, among others in the mix for Birmingham, still, they did not manage to chase down the huge total.
Many exciting players played in the league. Liam Livingstone was one cricketer who impressed everyone with his batting in the tournament. He was also awarded the man of the tournament award. The Hundred was a success in some ways. It managed to attract some eyeballs.
Critics maintained that there was no need to shorten the T20 format even further, but the ECB did and did it quite well. Players like Glenn Phillips got noticed due to Hundred and were later picked in the Rajasthan Royals side as replacement of Joss Buttler.
We will have to wait and see how far this format f the game can go. What do you think, will we someday have a 'Hundred' World Cup?