County Championship set to scrap Kookaburra ball, reaction, video

England is considering scrapping use of the Kookaburra ball in the County Championship after three seasons, with directors of cricket reportedly agreeing to ditch the controversial experiment.

The Kookaburra’s introduction, recommended in a 2022 high performance review led by former Test captain Andrew Strauss, was designed to mimic foreign conditions and better equip English seamers for future overseas tours, most notably the 2025/26 Ashes tour of Australia.

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The machine-made Kookaburra — used in Test matches in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa — has a less ­pronounced seam and goes softer earlier, moving less extravagantly through the air and off the pitch, while the hand-stitched Dukes — used for Tests in the United Kingdom — has a tendency for greater lateral movement. The two balls are coated in a different type of lacquer, further distinguishing their behaviour.

Kookaburra balls were used during the first two rounds of the 2023 County Championship before it was expanded to four rounds in 2024 and 2025. However, as first reported by The Telegraph, the experiment is likely to be scrapped following a post-season meeting between directors of cricket.

The England and Wales Cricket Board’s professional game committee — which has the authority to remove the Kookaburra — will make a final decision on the matter next month.

County Championship matches featuring the Kookaburra featured plenty of dull, batter-dominated contests — last year, 17 of the first 18 matches using the Australian-made ball ended as a draw.

This season, Surrey posted a club-record score of 9-820 in a Kookaburra clash against Durham in London, while during the same round Warwickshire declared on 7-679 while facing Hampshire. There were 59 centuries during the first two rounds of Kookaburra matches of this year’s County Championship, with an average first-innings total of 430.

“The ball goes very soft very quickly and there’s no competition between bat and ball when it’s a good wicket with a Kookaburra early season in England,” Middlesex coach Richard Johnson said last year.

“Hopefully it’s an experiment we don’t carry on with.”

Surrey’s former Director of Cricket Alec Stewart called the Kookaburra ball’s introduction “the worst decision ever”, while Yorkshire head coach Anthony McGrath said he was “not sure why we are using it”. Asked for his thoughts on the matter, Somerset captain Lewis Gregory replied: “Can I swear?”

Last year, managing director of the England men’s cricket Rob Key hailed the Kookaburra’s implementation as a success, arguing it had forced pace bowlers to find methods of taking wickets in unhelpful conditions.

“I would use the Kookaburra all the time. English cricket would be much better off for it,” Key said at the time.

“Teams need to find quicker bowlers or ones who will force a wicket. You can’t just keep running up bowling at 75mph. And in terms of those guys who are not express, you really work out who can bowl.

“I want us to be the best team in the world for a generation; this will be one way to do that.”

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