English cricket needs to react as world game continues to shift – Andrew Strauss

Sir Andrew Strauss has warned that English cricket needs to be ready to react as the “tectonic plates” of the world game continue to shift.

Speaking ahead of this week’s Lord’s Test against South Africa, during which the home of cricket will once again turn ‘red for Ruth’ in honour of the former England captain’s late wife and the foundation he set up in her name, Strauss acknowledged the established order was under threat.

With Twenty20 leagues demanding more and more time in the calendar, Test cricket’s primacy on the wane outside of the so-called ‘big three’ of England, India and Australia and players increasingly being forced to choose a path, the outlook is altering rapidly.

And Strauss, who is chairing a high-performance review at the England and Wales Cricket Board in his role as strategic advisor, accepts the governing body has work to do the protect its status.

“The game of cricket has changed and evolved and developed since the beginning of time but it definitely feels like, right at the moment, the rate of change is increasing,” he said.

“The proliferation of T20 leagues and the shifting tectonic plates is a very live issue – the cricket world around us is changing unbelievably quickly.

“Every day, every week, every month, we’re seeing a new example of how that world is changing around us. And I suppose one thing that we’re having to ask ourselves the questions of in this country is, where does our game fit into all of that?

The game of cricket has changed and evolved and developed since the beginning of time but it definitely feels like, right at the moment, the rate of change is increasing.- Sir Andrew Strauss

“I think one of the things that we need to be conscious of in the game in this country is we have