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Huge change coming to cricket later this year as sport booms

A willow shortage driven by high demand for cricket bats has prompted a big change in the sport's rules, which will take effect in October this year

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A huge change is coming to cricket(Image: Getty Images/iStockphoto)

A new sound will soon echo across Britains cricket pitches - leather on laminate. The sport has a willow emergency with demand for bats outstripping supply of the wood used to make them.

That has led to the Marylebone Cricket Club - which drafts the rules of the game - making a massive change. All bats used in adult cricket had to be made from a single piece of willow wood.

But the rocket in demand - particularly from India - means from October the MCC will allow Type D laminated bats.

They are made using up to three pieces of wood bound together with glue.

While the face must be English willow, it may now be backed by cheaper wood to provide weight and ballast.

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The change is coming in October(Image: Getty Images/Image Source)

That could be inferior willow from Kashmir or Serbia - or a different wood such as poplar.

The only requirements are that bats fit size laws introduced in 2017, are made of no more than three pieces and are all wood.

Lamination allows bat makers to use 25% more of the tree. Only the trunk was big enough to make a bat from a single piece.

Bat wood supplier JS Wright & Sons welcomed the move, saying: The traditional requirement for a single-piece cleft of willow meant a significant portion of every tree harvested was deemed illegal' for senior play simply because the pieces were too small.

Cricketers could benefit too as top bats cost 1,000 while laminates are cheaper - and easier to play with, according to tests.

The law change will not extend to professional cricket.

Fraser Stewart, who manages the laws for MCC, said: The whole lens to this has been about the accessibility of cricket.

Speaking on the Wisden Cricket Weekly podcast he said: This all comes from a good news story - that cricket is getting more popular.

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Graham Gooch used laminate bat in amazing innings

The booming economy in India and the subcontinent in general where there are so many cricket fans.

Cricket bats are within financial reach of more households than 10, 15, 20 years ago. That's good. Things like the IPL have also made cricket even more popular.

The effect is that more people want cricket bats.

And cricket bats are not like golf clubs or tennis rackets.

They come from a natural source - the willow trees.

They need to be planted as a 15-year maturation period. We have a lag.

Allowing lamination it won't suddenly solve the problem, or halve cricket bats in price. But it can hopefully stem the tide of constant price increases we are seeing.

The last thing we want is the game to be unaffordable.

It is an expensive sport - bats, pads, gloves. Anything we can do to keep the cost down.

Laminated bats were allowed until 2008.

Englands Graham Gooch used one to hit 333 against India at Lord's in 1990.

But they were banned because - unlike now - there was no need for them.

JS Wright & Sons is trying to solve the wood shortage by planting 40,000 trees last year - four for every one felled.

But experts say it will take up to 20 years for them to be ready to be turned into bats.

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