Battrick is a free online cricket management game in which you compete against teams managed by other users from all over the world. You have complete control over your club, from ground preparation to team selection, from finances to coaching, and from buying and selling players to hiring and firing backroom staff.
With trials and tribulations lying ahead in one day league, first class league and cup competitions, can you make your club the best there is?
Please take the time to read the following guide; they will help you get a firm grounding in the ways of Battrick.
Special thanks go to Antman for his assistance with the refinement of this guide.
The application process is fairly quick and simple. Simply follow the link on the home page and fill in the details as required.
We do ask for your honesty in the application though:
If you will be accessing your team from a computer used by a fellow Battrick user then please contact us, naming your application and all individuals involved. While you are most welcome to play Battrick in that situation, any transfers between these teams and your own will be in breach of the rules and severely punished.
Teams are almost always available for you to take over immediately, although there may be rare occasions when the leagues are completely full. In this case you will be added to a waiting list and allocated a team when the league is most probably expanded at the end of the season.
When you take over a side, the only thing that you will inherit will be its league position. All the old players are cleared out and you are given a new squad, existing debts and credits are cleared and a starting balance is put into your account, and the team will be renamed as you requested.
Only teams in the lowest 2 divisions of both the FC & OD league pyramids are allocated to new users, so there will be some work for you to do to climb through the ranks!
We also ask you to read the Personal Behaviour section of the Rules before you begin playing the game.
Battrick is pretty self explanatory as to finding your way about. There are a series of drop down menus at the top of the site that will get you to most of the pages that you need to get to, and the links from these pages will take you everywhere else. Some of these pages are discussed in more detail below, but the best way to learn the basics is to simply explore and familiarise yourself with all the pages.
You can also get answers to many of your questions on the Newbie Sledging Board.
This is the first page that you will see every time you log in to Battrick. Here you can see general news about game developments, announcements and anything else that the Battrick team want to let you know about. You should check the news fairly frequently to make sure you don’t miss anything important, particularly when you believe you have just discovered an issue!
Also here is a link to your own news section, where you will be notified of such things as being outbid on players, fans leaving or joining your club and sometimes messages from the admin staff.
This is where you can change your user information. It is highly recommended that you visit this page immediately after first logging in to change your password to something you are more likely to remember! You can also edit your username and e-mail address here, and specify a homepage (a link to which will appear on your Pavillion page).
Users who have signed up to our Membership program also have some of their options here:
Clearly your club’s most important asset, you must have a minimum of fourteen (14) players in your squad at all times. Each player has seven main skills that determine their ability. They are:
Stamina - A players stamina is arguably his most important attribute. As a game goes on, players will tire. No matter how high his stamina skill, he will experience some reduction in his performance, but the extent to which his tiring is going to affect his performance will depend totally on his stamina. The higher the players stamina, the lower the tiring effect.
Not only does stamina have an effect on a players performance during a game, but also his recovery off the pitch. Players with higher levels of stamina will be able to carry more workload before their Personnel Fitness Level (PFL - discussed further on) drops, and their PFL will also recover quicker.
There is a limit to how high a players stamina can be though. Once he reaches superb stamina, no matter how hard he trains at his fitness, it will never go higher. There are limits to human performance!
Batting - Important for all players that are going to bat. This is the primary skill for determining a batsman’s overall skill.
Bowling - Important for all players that are going to bowl. This is the primary skill for determining a bowler’s overall skill.
Wicket Keeping - This skill is important for wicket keepers only. It will help to have a good wicket keeper as he will tend to hold on to a lot of chances for catches and make more stumpings. He will also be responsible for keeping byes and leg-byes down to a minimum. It is not the only skill that decides how well a player performs behind the stumps however.
Concentration - This is an important skill for batsmen. The importance of this will be larger for First Class games than for one day games, although it is valuable in both forms of the game. A batsman may be very well endowed in batting skill, but if he can’t concentrate then he is likely to make a silly mistake and get out earlier than he would have otherwise. It also has an effect on an individuals fielding and wicketkeeping ability; you need to stay alert in the field or risk missing that chance for a catch!
Consistency - This is an important skill for bowlers. The importance of this is larger for First Class games than for one day games, although it is valuable in both forms of the game. A bowler may have a great amount of bowling skill, but if he can’t consistently put the ball in the same areas then he is likely to find himself disappearing to all areas of the park more often than he otherwise would. It also has an effect on a players ability to field and wicketkeep; the more consistent the individual, the more likely they are to hold their catches and save runs.
Fielding - Important for all your players. They do say that catches win matches, and if your team’s fielding is not up to scratch, then you will not catch those catches. It also has a small effect on a player WK ability. As has been mentioned above however, this is not the lone skill in determining a players fielding ability.
All of these abilities can be improved by giving your player individual training. As in real life, generally you will see your younger players improving their skills faster than older ones, although there are two exceptions (concentration & consistency). Read the ’Nets’ section to find out more about this.
There are also other aspects to your players that you need to pay attention to:
Age - As a player gets older he finds it more and more difficult to improve in the physical skills, although their increased maturity does aid them in improving their psychological skills. (Concentration and consistency)
Ultimately a veteran player will struggle to maintain his physical performance and you will see his stamina fall away. However, while youth can be a blessing, age does bring…
Players all age on the same day, at the very start of the new season before the first training session.
Experience - An inexperienced player will not know what to do in certain situations (eg hog the strike with a better batsman left at the other end) and may well make stupid mistakes that a more seasoned player would not. An experienced captain is a particularly valuable commodity.
Aggression - This gives an indication of what is the player’s natural approach to playing. The more aggressive a player, the more likely he is to score runs quickly as a batsman, but he will be more likely to get out. For a bowler, he is more likely to get wickets, but also more likely to be expensive. This can be tempered by individual orders though.
Leadership - An important skill for your captain only. He will have various decisions to make throughout a game, and may have to lift a depressed side when things are not going well. This combined with his experience will determine how effective he is as a captain. The highest leadership a player can possess is superb.
Form - A sad fact of life is that players go in and out of form. The same is true in Battrick. However you can help a players chance of improving or maintaining their form in two way.
Firstly an individual playing regularly will have a better chance of staying in touch than a player who merely carries the drinks and lose the feel of being out in the middle. Equally a player who is receiving coaching in a net session has a better chance of increasing his form. A players form has a significant impact on his performance. You may well be better off picking a worse batsman who is in better form, than your star player who is in worse form.
Form is split into Batting and Bowling to show how a players form can fluctuate in each discipline. A players wicket keeping ability is affected by his bowling form.
Personnel Fitness Level (PFL) - While there are no injuries in BT per se, you cannot continually play an individual non-stop without him feeling some effects on his body. An individuals PFL has a major effect on his performance and is lost during his exertions both on and off the field.
Factors involved in a players loss of PFL are:
The players recovery of PFL is governed by their level of stamina. Age is not currently a factor in a players PFL recovery and there are no immediate plans to make it one. PFL is updated daily at the, aptly named, daily updates.
At the lowest levels of PFL a player will be barely able to perform.
In your club info, you can find details of all your backroom staff. You are able to hire or fire these staff at your discretion from here. Before you do though, it may be useful to understand what each one will do for you.
The following are involved in improving the physical attributes and technical skills of your players (Stamina, Batting, Bowling, Keeping and Fielding). You can read more on how training is organised in the Nets section.
Bowling Coaches are specialist coaches for bowlers. Each bowling coach will provide you with one bowling training spot for the week.
Batting Coaches are specialist coaches for batsmen. Each batting coach will provide you with one batting training spot for the week.
Fielding Coaches are specialist coaches for fielding. Each fielding coach will provide you with one fielding training spot for the week.
Keeping Coaches are specialist coaches for wicket keepers. Each keeping coach will provide you with one keeping training spot for the week.
Fitness Coaches are specialist coaches for all player’s stamina. Each fitness coach will provide you with one fitness training spot for the week.
There is no limit as to how many of each of these coaches you can hire, but there is a limit as to their effectiveness.
As there are only 10 training spots available each week it would be pointless to hire more than a total of 10 of the five types of coaches listed above. If you do you are only able to use the first 10 hired, the remainder merely sitting around to collect their wages!
Generally coaches with be as effective as each other, but there is a situation where this isn’t the case. Again you can read about this in the Nets section.
The other types of staff you can recruit are as follows:
Sports Psychologists - multipurpose specialists. They will help with your teams morale, keeping it up even when you are losing. They are also used in conjunction with the bowling, batting and fielding coaches to help improve the concentration and consistency of your players being trained.
Every sports psychologist you hire attends every net where a player can receive training in concentration and/or consistency. For more details see the Nets section.
PR Officers - these chaps (and chapesses) are the voice of your club. They will woo the sponsors and help keep your club high profile, all with the intention of improving the mood of your sponsors, simply so that they give you more money.
Financial Advisers - they can help you with the management of your club finances. If you are in debt, they can help arrange a lower interest rate. Similarly, if you have money in the bank, Financial Advisers will invest it wisely (and safely!) and you will receive interest.
For these staff members, the more you hire, the less effective the additional staff will be. (ie the second coach hired will not add as much benefit as the first, nor the third as much as the second, and so on.)
In terms of cost, coaches will collect a salary of £2,500 each per week, whilst the others will only ask for £1,500 each per week.
Finally, if you decide you have too many of any of these fellows around, then you are free to terminate their contract, although you will have to give them a redundancy payment to the value of a weeks wages.
However when in debt, the bank will allow you to fire coaches as they see this as down-sizing your company thus saving money in the long-term. But they will not allow you to hire any coaches even if you will be in credit after the next financial update. They do not take current sales into consideration. If you do try to hire coaches during these times then there will be a diary entry, but they will not arrive nor will you be charged the £1,500/£2,500 respective.
Your club, being the responsible community centre that it is, runs a youth academy where it will give schooling to promising local young cricketers.
The condition of this building will need some looking after, and will deteriorate over time. You can make repairs to bring the standard back up again. The maximum condition that the building can be is superb. Everyone’s academy will deteriorate at the same rate, and there is nothing that you can do to help stop that, apart from keeping an eye on it and making sure that repairs are carried out when required.
On top of this each week, you can invest in intensive training sessions. For every £2,000 that you invest into the academy in this way (up to a limit of £20,000 per week, earning you 10 sessions), you will receive an additional intensive training session. This investment will have no impact on the quality of your youth academy building.
Your weeks investment to ITS will show up in your club page after each economic update. You will then, at a point of your choosing, be able to allocate these sessions to your new youth academy player. The player already possess a degree of natural talent, but the level and distribution of this is completely random and will remain a mystery to you until the ITS and promotion process is completed. You can store up to a maximum of 100 ITS. Any subsequent payments will not be taken from your finances until you are under the 100 limit.
The total sessions that you can use on one player is limited by the condition of the Youth Academy building and the age of the player. You can allocate these sessions in any way that you want, but you cannot assign any more than 12 sessions to one skill. After you are happy with the session allocation you can promote the player to the senior squad. As he joins your squad, you will see the benefits of the intensive training sessions as well as his initial natural talent, making up his overall skills. This does sound complicated, but the Youth Academy page will make it very straightforward for you.
We recognise that you as the team owner are more au fait with the tactical and business side of the game, so we have given you the opportunity to hire specialist coaches to help you to improve your player’s skills. There are five different types of specialist coaches that you can hire: bowling, batting, fielding, wicket keeping and fitness coaches. All of these coaches can be hired from within the club info page. (You can read more about them individually in the Backroom Staff section).
Once you have hired at least one specialist coach, you can start to allocate a player to each of these coaches for the week within the nets area. Each coach will add one more available coaching session, the benefits of which are seen after Monday’s weekly training update. (See Global > Country Details > League Dates for the exact time in your league)
There are some limitations though. Due to the limited time and space available, you can only have 10 coaching sessions each week. If you have more specialist coaches than that, then you are simply paying them to sit around each week. Even if you do allocate a player to them, he will never get the chance to train as the net space will never be available.
Secondly, although each player can be allocated to more than one specialist coach, the effectiveness of the sessions will reduce with every duplication.
For example, if you allocate Botham to two batting sessions, he will get the full benefit from the first session, but due to the amount of work he has already done in that session, the amount he can possibly gain from the second session is much less. If he was allocated to a third batting session, he would receive again even less training. A fourth training session would only provide negligible benefit.
However, if Botham was told to also go to a bowling session as well as the batting ones, he would still get the full benefit from the first bowling session. Again, any subsequent sessions would also see a reduction in training received.
As the days pass, your players fitness will rise during each daily update at a rate depending on their stamina and the teams training intensity. If you train too hard, it will tire the player rather than improve his fitness, whilst if you don’t train hard enough his fitness will not improve as quickly as it might otherwise. The training intensity level will affect all players, not just those receiving net sessions.
Playing in a match will also have a detrimental effect on his fitness, although club friendlies will only have 1/3 of the impact as other matches. If he bowls lots of overs, his fitness would drop more than if he had not batted and only appeared in the field. Also if a player gets to 100 his fitness after the game will have dropped by more than a player who got a duck. A players fitness level will have a significant effect on his performance, so you will have to judge when to rest players and when to play them. Giving a player too many net sessions will cause him to be tired for a couple of days after nets and may not recover in time for matches.
There is also another kind of specialist that you can get some benefit from; sports psychologists. While employing these specialists will help your team with any morale issues you may be experiencing, they can also help your players with the more mental skills: concentration and consistency. Your psychologists will attend all but the fitness coaching sessions, and will be passing on helpful hints to the players while they are being coached. The more psychologists you have, the more advice can be dished out, although the law of diminishing returns does apply here too with each additional psychologist providing fewer words of wisdom than the one before.
Sports psychologists will only attend the first net of a type per player per day. So your bowling trainee with 3 bowling nets only sees the sports psychologists in the first net and the sports psychologists are not available to him in the subsequent bowling nets. If he had a fielding net as well, they would also attend that session. All psychologists will attend each net for which any would qualify, so have 10 different players being trained one session of batting each and all psychologists will attend all 10 sessions.
Finally, form. All players that are trained by specialists are more likely to see a rise in their form that week, as are the players who play in a match, regardless of whether they actually bowl or bat, so be careful about leaving too many players just sitting on the side lines!
Remember to check that the players are allocated correctly prior to the training updates as hiring more coaches can lead to confusion and the wrong player may end up with the wrong coach. You have been warned!
Finally, note that younger players, being hungrier and keen to learn, will train their technical skills quicker - whilst older players (being more mature) will be able to improve their concentration and consistency quicker.
Stamina increases at the same rate, whatever the age.
The finance page lets you keep track of how you are spending and making money each week.
Each week, there is a financial update where the monies owed to you, and the monies that you are due to pay, are credited to and debited from your account. The balance shown at the top is how much money you had in the bank immediately after the last financial update, while the figure in brackets is the amount of money you will have in your account after the next financial update if you make no more transactions before then.
All transactions that take place during the week are added to the profit/loss account shown and the balance figure in brackets is updated accordingly.
This is what each of the areas of the profit/loss sheet contain:
Income from Gate Receipts - Any income due from matches played during the week. See the Ground section for details of how this is calculated.
Income from Sponsors - This amount will depend on how good your relations with your sponsors are, your position within the league, and how high your league is.
Income from Interest - If you have money in the bank at the last financial update, and you have hired a financial advisor, you can earn interest. You can increase the rate of interest by hiring more financial advisors. There is a maximum of £80,000 per week that you can receive in interest.
Income from Miscellaneous - Simply contains everything else that you can gain money from such as sales of players (less 5% sales tax) and prize money.
Costs for Ground Maintenance - Although your groundsman will only take a small salary, he will have costs for the week and not only in the preparation of the wicket, but to maintain the spectator areas. Details of spectator area costs are given in the ground section.
Costs for Salaries - All your players and backroom staff need to be paid, and this is where that cost will show.
Costs for Interest - Like with good interest, if you had an overdraft at the last financial update, then you will have to pay interest on that money. Any financial advisors may be able to help get a better rate though.
Costs for Youth Academy - Showing the level of investment into your youth academy.
Costs for Miscellaneous - Any other costs that incurred during the week show up here, including firing backroom staff, promoting from the academy and buying players.
The bank will give you an overdraft facility up to £350,000. If you exceed that level at the time of your countries weekly financial update then the Bank will give you 5 logins to get back below the threshold. It is advisable not to use all these logins immediately as the bank will only reconsider your debt once a week during the financial updates.
If you are still in debt after you have used your 5 logins your account stays locked, your team declared bankrupt and you lose your team. If you are financially stable after the next financial update your account re-opens. So be very, very careful with debt.
Members please note: Battrick Membership does not protect you from bankruptcy. Should a Member go bankrupt and fail to bring their team out of debt before they use all five logins then their team will remain locked until it becomes a bot, as with any other user. Should this happen then you will lose your team like anyone else.
Although there is the large overdraft facility available, you can only use the first £150,000 to buy players with. Once below that level, you will not be allowed to buy players. When determining your balance for this purpose, the bank will be looking not only at the state your balance will be in come the next finance update; they will also take into account any players that you currently have bids on and/or players that you are selling and have received offers for.
Your pride and joy, this is where all the action takes place. There are 2 aspects to the ground that you need to pay particular attention to: The playing surface and spectator facilities.
You have a groundsman that will prepare the playing surface for you. All you have to do is tell him what sort of pitch you would like to have prepared for the next match. The time it will take for this change to take place will depend on his skill, as will the ability of him to actually meet your requirements!
There are 7 different types of pitch surface that he can prepare for you with each pitch condition favouring a different sort of player:
| Pitch Type | Favoured |
|---|---|
| Uneven | Seam Bowlers |
| Cracked | Seam Bowlers |
| Hard and Fast | Batsmen |
| Green | Seam Bowlers |
| Flat | Batsmen |
| Dusty | Spin Bowlers |
| Slow | All Bowlers |
Please note that, while some pitches may appear to behave similarly, some do have more effect or greater leanings than others!
On the spectator side, you start off with a ground that can hold 6,500 spectators. There are four types of viewing areas that you can have at the ground. Each will cost a different amount to maintain, a different amount to build, and also command a different ticket price for the public to use. As such, each type of seat will attract a different type of punter, and in differing quantities. The details of all this are shown in the table below. All amounts shown are per space.
| Type | Building Cost | Maintenance Cost | Income |
|---|---|---|---|
| Standing Room | £15.00 | £1.00 | £5.00 |
| Uncovered Seats | £25.00 | £1.60 | £7.50 |
| Covered Seats | £30.00 | £2.20 | £10.00 |
| Members Seats | £100.00 | £5.00 | £25.00 |
When building new places, there is also a fixed cost of £20,000 that will be charged irrespective of how much work is being done. You can get a quote for any development without committing to anything unless you accept an offer.
Gate Receipts
When a match has finished, you will be able to see how many people came to watch. The proceeds from the gates will be paid out depending on what type of match was being played. In a league match (both FC and OD), the home team will receive the full amount. In a cup game, the home team receives 2/3 of the amount, the away team getting 1/3, while for both friendly and Play-Off games the receipts are split 50/50.
All these options can be found at your Ground page.
These are two important aspects of the game that will have a large bearing on how successful your club is financially, as the majority of your income will come from either your sponsors or gate receipts. You can follow their mood in the finance page.
Fans are particularly fickle. If you are winning games they are happy, but if you are losing, then their mood can quickly change for the worse. When success is in the air more people will be willing to part with their cash to bask in your hard earned success, while on the flipside pretty much only the diehard fans will turn out for games if you are on a poor run.
These fans are your club members, who have paid up as a show of loyalty to your club and will turn out to support you through thick and thin. The amount of club members you have is a good indicator as to how many supporters you are likely to see turning up to your matches. But even these members will come and go depending on your successes in the middle.
Sponsors are more concerned with the image of the club. This has more to do with how good a job your PR officers and how high up the league structure your club is. Keep the sponsors happy, and the money will keep coming in.
Morale will have an effect on your teams performance. You can only change this by winning and losing matches; win and it goes up, lose and it goes down.
Currently there are four competitions in Battrick, a First Class league, two involving the fifty over version of the game, and the other a twenty over cup competition.
The First Class League
You will play fourteen games in total, split home and away with seven other teams for promotion, relegation or ultimately, your national title.
The points system is as shown below:
There are also bonus points awarded for the performances of each side in each first Innings. These are awarded as follow:
First class matches operate on a pyramidal league system. In each country there is one top level division, four 2nd level divisions, sixteen 3rd divisions and so on in multiples of four until we reach the sixth division if a countries grows to the size that is this is necessary.
Your division will be called something like III.9. The roman numeral (III = 3) is the level of your division while the 9 is the division number.
At the end of a season the team ranked first in the division is declared the division winner. The top team in this division is promoted automatically.
The teams ranked second, third and fourth will remain as they are in exactly the same division for the next season.
The teams ranked fifth to eighth will be relegated.
In the event of team’s having equal number of points the tiebreakers are (in order of importance) - most wins, fewest loses, most wickets, most runs.
Reaching a result
To achieve a result in First Class matches (win or loss) there must be a minimum of 3 innings. Team A bats and scores runs until either they are all out or Declare. Team B bats and scores until they also are all out or declare. Team A then have their 2nd innings to either increase their lead or to catch team B’s 1st innings score and pass it. If they achieve this then team B will have to bat again to win the match. If team A do not manage to amass enough runs to beat team B’s 1st innings score then team A lose.
If team A are not given the chance to play their 2nd innings (ie. team B bat for the rest of the match and score an incredible 4 figure number of runs!) then the match is a Draw as no result has been achieved. The same result for if team A never complete their 2nd innings.
If both teams have been bowled all-out after their 2 innings and the scores after both team’s innings are the same, a Tie is given as the result. A very seldom achieved result!
The OD League
You will play fourteen games in total, split home and away with seven other teams for promotion or, ultimately, your national title. Four points are awarded for a win, two for a tie, and none for a loss. As a separator Net Run Rate (Net RR) is used, an explanation of which can be found later in the rules.
Battrick operates a pyramidal league system. In each country there is one top level division, four 2nd level divisions, sixteen 3rd divisions and so on in multiples of four until we reach the sixth division (1024 of those) if a countries grows to the size that is this is necessary.
Your division will be called something like III.9, the exceptions being the top division in each country which are named individually. The roman numeral (III = 3) is the level of your division while the 9 is the division number.
At the end of a season the team ranked first in the division is declared the division winner. If this division is the not the top level (i.e. our example III.9) then this team will appear in the "Promotion Table" where all the winners of divisions in that level will be ranked by the number of points (and then net run rate) they have achieved in their respective division.
So in level III we have sixteen divisions and so sixteen first place teams. The top half of this list are promoted automatically, replacing the 7th and 8th teams in the divisions in the level above. (So in III, the top eight replace the 7th & 8th placed teams in divisions II.1 to II.4)
The lower half of the promotion table will play a play off match away to either a fifth or sixth placed team (depending on their exact position in the promotion table). A win will see them promote and replace their opponent in their division, while a loss will result in the team remaining in exactly the same division.
The teams ranked second, third and fourth will remain as they are in exactly the same division for the next season.
The teams ranked fifth and sixth will play off against teams ranked in the lower half of the level below’s promotion table. If they win their play off they will remain in exactly the same division for another season, but if they lose they will replace their opponent in their lower level division.
The seventh and eighth placed teams are automatically relegated to divisions in the level below.
Play Offs are played in Week 16 at the time usually allotted to the OD League Games and the team from the higher league will be the home team.
The OD Cup
The Cup competition is a straight knockout tournament. The number of teams in the competition depends on the number of levels in the country:
| Levels | Teams in Country | Teams in Cup | Rounds |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | 40 | 32 | 5 |
| 3 | 168 | 128 | 7 |
| 4 | 680 | 512 | 9 |
| 5 | 2728 | 2048 | 11 |
Seeding is based upon the previous seasons league placing so the reigning league champions are top seed. Once seeding reaches II all teams who finished in each position (i.e. all 1st place, all 2nd place,) in each division are compared in terms of points gained and Net RR if required. So the highest Series II winners is seed 9, the lowest 12. The highest second place is seeded 13 and the lowest 16, while the highest III winner is ranked 41, and so on until we reach the last team to fill the quota.
The first round cup draw is done simply by putting the highest seed against the lowest, the second against the next lowest and so on. If the highest seeded teams wins then they will play the lowest remaining seed in the next round.
If however, they lose, then the lowest seed still is the lowest seed; the seeding is fixed for the whole competition and so it doesn’t take the seeding of the league champion. Therefore they will play the highest remaining seed in the next round.
However the tie will always be played at the lower seeds ground.
The Twenty20 Cup
The Twenty20 (also known as BT20) Cup competition is a global tournament that takes place at the end of each season. Every team that is managed by a real user, ie not bot controlled, at the end of the domestic league season is entered automatically into the cup. Matches in the BT20 tournament are not affected by Team Morale, although Team Fitness and individual Player Fitness Levels (PFLs) will be vital factors.
The first round of the cup is a round robin where you play against 3 other teams from your own country with only the top team going through to the next stage, which is a global knockout. The group winner is determined by points then net run rate.
As there are likely to be a strange number of teams left in the competition, there will be some byes awarded in the next round, but after that, it’s a straight knockout to find the world BT20 champion team.
There is NO seeding in this competition at all. Each round is drawn on a random basis.
The rest of the playing conditions are very similar to the 50 over version apart from there are only 6 overs of fielding restrictions at the start of the match, bowlers can only bowl 4 overs each and you will not be able to select a bowling strategy at this point. All teams will use the same strategy which is set out as below:
| Over | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 |
| Bowler No | 1 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 5 | 3 | 5 | 3 | 5 | 4 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 2 |
Friendlies
If you are knocked out of a cup then your players needn’t sit the second matchday out. Instead you can challenge any team (including foreign sides) who are also no longer involved in their countries cup to a home or away friendly. Simply go to such a teams Pavilion page and the option is the bottom right hand corner. You cannot challenge teams still in the cup or who already have a friendly arranged. Additionally friendlies against teams from outside your own BT country can only be arranged once all countries friendlies have finished.
On the other hand you can accept challenges from other teams by going to the Challenges page in the pavilion drop down menu where all applications are listed for you to accept or reject.
International friendlies can only be arranged from Tuesday through to Saturday, and all domestic challenges must be accepted before the matchday (Sunday). Any challenges accepted on the Sunday will be booked for the following week.
If you have played a friendly, then you cannot accept challenges, or challenge other sides until after the Monday update.
Obviously a friendly match doesn’t attract such a large crowd as a competitive match, nor provide the same level of experience to players due to the lower stakes, but it will help keep them in good touch.
Reaching a Result
In either the cup competition or in a play off match, where an outright result must be reached, in the event of a tie the first decider called upon is wickets remaining, the team with the greater number remaining being the winner. If this is unable to decide matters, then the scores after 15 overs are compared for runs, and then wickets as well.
Prize Money
The OD League
Teams finishing 1st down to 4th are awarded Prize Money at the end of the season as follows:
| Level | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | £250,000 | £180,000 | £125,000 | £75,000 |
| 2 | £180,000 | £125,000 | £75,000 | £50,000 |
| 3 | £125,000 | £75,000 | £50,000 | £35,000 |
| 4 | £75,000 | £50,000 | £35,000 | £25,000 |
| 5 | £50,000 | £35,000 | £25,000 | £20,000 |
| 6 | £35,000 | £25,000 | £20,000 | £15,000 |
The FC League
Teams finishing 1st down to 4th are awarded Prize Money at the end of the season as follows:
| Level | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | £500,000 | £360,000 | £250,000 | £150,000 |
| 2 | £360,000 | £250,000 | £150,000 | £100,000 |
| 3 | £250,000 | £150,000 | £100,000 | £70,000 |
| 4 | £150,000 | £100,000 | £70,000 | £50,000 |
| 5 | £100,000 | £70,000 | £50,000 | £40,000 |
| 6 | £70,000 | £50,000 | £40,000 | £30,000 |
The OD Cup
The cup winners and runners up will also receive prize money, £250,000 and £100,000 respectively. This money is awarded at the end of the season, not at the end of the cup.
Finally onto the nitty gritty of competition now. Before you play a match, it is up to you to pick your side and give the players your orders.
In your clubs fixture page, it will show you the games you have played, any matches that you have currently ongoing, and also the next few games to play. For each of the games to play, you can use the orders link to submit your match orders for that game.
ONE DAY MATCHES
Select a line up - The first thing that you need to do is decide which eleven players you want to play in the match and then enter them in the order in which you want them to bat. Generally people will bat the better batsmen at the top of the order, and the bowlers with less batting skill at the bottom, but it is entirely up to you.
Select captain and wicket keeper - Use the buttons to select the teams wicket keeper and captain.
Select bowlers - You must select 5 bowlers for a one day match. Each bowler will bowl 10 overs. The player you select as bowler 1 (b1) will bowl first, b2 will bowl second, b3 will come on first change and so on.
Individual orders - The next step is to give the players individual orders if you so wish. You can give instructions to each batsman as to how to approach his innings: attacking, normal or defensive. Similarly, you can give the same choice of orders to each of your 5 bowlers that you have nominated. Although the batsman and bowlers will generally follow this order, they may deviate if the situation requires it. They are more likely to do this if their experience is high.
Select bowling tactics - There are some preset tactics that determine which order the bowlers bowl in, and for how long. Each one has plus points and negative points, you must select the one that you think is most appropriate for the match.
The Toss - An important part of the game. If you are the away side, you will be asked what you want to call for the toss. Everyone must then declare what they intend to do first if they win the toss, bat or bowl. This will not be shown to the opposition prior to the match.
Finally, you can give your team an overall order of how to approach the match. These orders will affect the fitness level (PFL) of the players that play in the game - it will not affect any players not involved in the game. They can either:
Take it Easy - The players will conserve energy and so not perform on the day to their potential, but their personal fitness level will go down less then normal.
Play as Normal - The players will play to their natural ability, with a standard change to their personal fitness level.
Go For It - The players will run themselves into the ground trying to win the game, and will feel the effects afterward resulting in their personal fitness level falling more then normal.
It is up to you to decide which the game merits.
These orders must be set prior to the start of a game. If for whatever reason you forget to change the orders, the team will resort to the default match orders. You can change the current orders to the default by selecting the check box at the bottom of the orders screen prior to submitting your orders.
FIRST CLASS MATCHES
Select a line up - The first thing that you need to do is decide which eleven players you want to play in the match and then enter them in the order in which you want them to bat. Generally people will bat the better batsmen at the top of the order, and the bowlers with less batting skill at the bottom, but it is entirely up to you.
Select wicket keeper - Use the button to select the team’s wicket keeper.
Select captain - Use the button to select the team’s captain. Your captain in First Class matches is a very important member of the team as he will be responsible for decision making on the field with regard to how the bowlers are rotated. Try to pick a captain with good captaincy skills and some experience.
Select bowlers - You can select as many bowlers as you want in first class matches, all players except for the wicket keeper may be selected to bowl although you should think twice before selecting your opening batsman with worthless bowling to turn his arm over!
Select bowling tactics - Unlike the one day games there are no preset patterns that determine which order the bowlers bowl in. You set the priority and other settings and your captain makes decisions on the field of play based on how your bowlers are performing. Priority 1 and 2 open the bowling. Under the bowling options you have four decisions to make.
1. Priority - Select the priority that you wish your captain to give to each bowler.
2. Max overs/spell - This is the maximum amount of overs that you want this bowler to bowl in an individual spell. Your captain may override this setting dependant on the performance of your bowlers.
3. Min overs/spell - This is the minimum amount of overs that you want this bowler to bowl in an individual spell. Your captain may override this setting dependant on the performance of your bowlers.
4. Max RR/spell - This is guidance for your captain as to the maximum run rate that your bowler should go for before he is taken off. Your captain may override this setting dependant on the performance of your bowlers.
Individual orders - The next step is to give the players individual orders if you so wish. You can give instructions to each batsman as to how to approach his innings: attacking, normal or defensive. Similarly, you can give the same choice of orders to each of the bowlers that you have nominated. Although the batsman and bowlers will generally follow this order, they may deviate if the situation requires it. They are more likely to do this if their experience is high.
The Toss - An important part of the game. If you are the away side, you will be asked what you want to call for the toss. Everyone must then declare what they intend to do first if they win the toss, bat or bowl. This will not be shown to the opposition prior to the match.
Declarations - You can declare in both your first and second innings in the match.
First Innings Declaration target - The minimum declaration total of runs scored in the first innings is 200.
Second Innings Declaration target - In the second innings you must score a minimum of 100 runs before you can declare. However if this leaves your opponent with a target of less than 100, then the captain will override the instruction and bat on until you lead by at least 100 runs. The figure that you enter for your second innings declaration target is the figure that you want to score in your second innings before your captain declares.
Following on - You have the option to enforce the follow on, select the Yes option if you want to make your opponent bat again. If you have batted first and your opponent is 150 runs or more behind after both teams have completed their first innings, you have the option to tell the opponent to "follow on". This means you can tell the other team to bat again even though they’ve just finished their first innings. This potentially means that you might not need to bat again if they get bowled out a second time and not be in the lead.
Changing orders overnight - At the end of the day’s play you have the option to change the following for the next day’s play:
Add or amend declaration targets.
Amend follow on instructions.
Amend your bowler selections, you can add or remove bowlers, change their priority and individual settings.
You cannot change the batting order.
Selling a player during a game - If you sell a player at any point during the match (including the twenty minutes before the start on day one when orders are locked) he will not be replaced in your team and will play the whole game.
TIE/PAN/GFI - the Take It Easy, Play As Normal and Go For It options are not available for First Class matches.
Regions and Weather
When you register you are asked to select a region to play in. The only effect that this has on the game is the weather. On the region page you will get a weather forecast for today and the next 5 days. Unfortunately Battrick forecasters are as bad as the rest of them, so it can change from day to day. The chances of getting any sort of weather is exactly the same in every region. One of the main advantages of playing cricket in Battrick is that it will never rain, so no umbrellas or running back to the pavilion here!!
The weather can have a large impact on your matches. Certain types of player will flourish in certain weather conditions although may suffer in others.
Also the weather will affect the match attendance to a degree.
Each country in Battrick is represented by a national squad and an U19 squad. Every season, the usership of the country get to decide who will take charge of their National teams for the coming 18 weeks by way of an election, (see below for election rules). The games are currently limited to One Day Internationals (ODI) and are played on a Wednesday.
While only players that are 19 or younger are able to represent the U-19 side, any player is eligible to play for his national side. The national manger will be able to see all of a players skills once he has been added to the squad, but only while he is in the squad. There is a limit of 18 players to the squad size so the manager will have to choose carefully to ensure that he has the right players in the right form at the right time. When players are dropped or called up to the side, the national team morale will suffer as players become anxious about their places.
When a player is called up to the national side, he will spend Mondays to Wednesdays, inclusive, with the national squad. This means that they will take a fitness hit from both games at the same time if playing in FC matches as well (they can play in both using the secret ultrasonic jets that BT uses). Any of your players playing in a national squad will still receive training as normal and will receive a subsidy towards their wages for any week in which they play in a representative game.
Although all ODIs played outside of a world cup are classed as friendlies, they count as full international matches and will count towards a teams ranking points. At the start of Battrick, all teams had the same ranking points. As more games have been played, these points have changed to show who is the leading International side. The ranking will be used to seed teams for the World Cup.
International players who belong to unmanaged teams will be eligible for release after they have played three games for their current international side (i.e. 3 games for the under 19’s does not make a player eligible for release if he is in the full side) and only at the request of their current international manager (who must contact the game staff).
We have been investigating the birth certificates of all player’s parents and grandparents, and it turns out that some players have a second nation that they are eligible to play for apart from their nation of birth. This will show up in their page under second nationality. Additionally, we have decreed that if a player spends five seasons in a country he will become eligible to play for that country in International matches. This will automatically show up on a player’s page as an adopted nation. However, when a player has played an International match for either the U19 or full national sides of any of his eligible countries, he will only be eligible to play for that country.
Election rules
All election candidates must abide by the following rules:
From the Monday that elections begin each season, (usually week 2 of a season) you may start a thread in your national Sledging forum advertising your candidacy. Please start the thread title with [Elec] to ensure it is clearly shown as an election thread.
1) No Spamming
Soliciting votes via BT-mail is absolutely forbidden. Doing so may lead to disqualification for candidates.
2) No Thread Bumping
If your thread is falling from prominence, tough. Try to make a good impression while it lasts.
3) No Cross-Thread Campaigning
Campaigning in another candidate’s election thread, or barracking for a rival candidate you support, is forbidden. Messages will be deleted and the perpetrators may be banned from Sledging.
Candidates would be advised to avoid posting in rivals’ threads at all. Should you do so, be careful that your post is polite, and a relevant enquiry rather than self-promotion in whatever guise. The judgement of the Admin Team is final.
Regarding non-candidates:
1. No commentary on threads. Either ask a question of the candidate, or don’t post.
2. No bumping your "preferred" candidates thread with meaningless posts saying you like them or such.
3. Keep the comments relevant to the person whose thread you are posting in. Do not comment on other candidates in their thread.
How to vote
Votes can be placed by going to Global>Country Details>Elections and entering the userID/teamID of whomever you wish to vote for. We ask you to vote sensibly as the winner will be responsible for your national or U19 team for the next two seasons.
Tied election
Should the two or more candidates tie for first place in election, then the user who has been playing Battrick for the longest will be declared the winner. In the unlikely event that two managers joined on the same day, then the user with the lowest teamID will win.
As is now common in world one day cricket, Battrick uses some called Net Run Rate (NRR) to separate sides level on points in our OD league competition:
The following is how it is described within the rules of the actual game:
A team’s net run rate is calculated by deducting from the average runs per over scored by that team, the average runs per over scored against that team.
In the event of a team being all out in less than its full quota of overs, the calculation of its net run rate shall be based on the full quota of overs to which it would have been entitled and not on the number of overs in which the team was dismissed.
Back with us? Good! Now let’s try and explain that with a slightly more step by step approach.
A teams run rate is their total number of runs divided by overs faced. Now as an over is six balls if an over isn’t completed then you need to do a little calculation to find what to divide by.
For example: 40.1 is actual 40 overs and one sixth of an over. Thus, for the purpose of the runrate calculation, the teams has faced 40 + 1/6 = 40.167 (3 d.p.) overs.
If another ball is bowled, they have now faced 40 + 2/6 = 40.333 (3 d.p.) overs. After the next ball (40.3 in normal terms) it’s the more user friendly 40.5 as we’re halfway through the over.
So if a team scores 250 runs off 50 overs then their runrate is 250/50 = 5. If they got that same score off 47.3 overs, there RR would be 250 / 47.5
Net Run Rate simply involves taking your opponents final runrate away from your own total runrate. The only slight exception is that now, if a team is bowled out, it is not the balls faced which their score is divided by; instead the full fifty over quota is used.
Here are a few scenarios:
1. Side that bats first wins
2. Side that bats second wins
3. Side that bats first is bowled out. Side batting second wins.
Side that bats second is bowled out. Side batting first wins.
5. Both sides are bowled out, the team batting first therefore taking the points.
Obviously in a tied game the teams runrates are equal and so the teams NRR for that season would be unaffected.
Please Note: The Battrick engine stores run rate and net run rate figures to many more decimal places than used here in these examples.
The Transfer Market is where you can buy and sell players. Maybe you’ve trained a young star and want to reap the cash rewards for your efforts. Or maybe you need an all important batsman to secure your cup or league ambitions and bolster your team in weaker areas.
Buying Players
To buy a player you must have sufficient funds in your bank account. Whilst the bank lends up to £350 000 in an overdraft facility, they will only allow up to £150 000 of the overdraft to finance a new player for your team.
The transfer market on Battrick is a global run society with hundreds of players available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. You can narrow your search down by using the separate skill search boxes to help find that all important new player. He may not always be on the market but keep trying every few days and maybe a player will match your criteria.
Using the searches is also a valuable way to compare prices for your own players and to find out how much a certain player is likely to cost if you were to sell them. Look for players on the market with similar skills and follow their transfer closely. This is a very efficient way for Player Valuations.
Once you have bought a player, his contract tells him and you that he must be a part of your team for 42 days before he can be re-sold.
Please note: When buying players on a Monday morning to quickly put them into nets, check which country they are travelling from. Players who are arriving from a country who have already had their training updates will not benefit from any nets given to them with their new team.
ie: Player A currently plays in Australia and is listed for a Monday 9.00am deadline. User B from England buys him. Player A has already received his training updates from his Australian team and won’t be available for nets with his new England team until the following week. You may be able to select him for nets straight after his transfer, but he won’t benefit from them.
Selling Players
When you finally decide that you no longer need a player then you can list him on the transfer market. Currently there is no charge to place a player on the market but upon selling a player 5% of the final sales price is taken away from the proceeds to cover the player’s agent fees.
When you list your player, there is a confirmation box. Once you confirm this and accept to place your player on the market that is it, this cannot be undone. Your player will be on the Transfer Market for 3 days (72 hours from listing) for him to generate interest and have bids placed on him.
The bidding system on Battrick works like this: The highest bidder when the bidding time has elapsed wins the player. Any bids within the last 3 minutes of the players transfer time increases the bidding time by three minutes so it is not always worthwhile jumping in at the last moment to try and win with a late bid. If a team raises your bid, there will be a new note on the Main -> News. It is very important to keep an eye on this when trying to buy a player.
Your Behaviour
From time to time the Admin team may have cause to cancel, reverse or adjust transfers or act in individual ways which are appropriate to individual cases.
The Admin team keep a watchful eye on the Transfer Market to make sure that all users benefit from the market equally. If we believe that some users are taking advantage of other users then the Admin team will intervene, Battrick does not allow over-priced transfers and these can be amended or reversed. Nor is it permitted to BT-mail any other user advertising players, this is regarded as Spam which can lead to punishments.
If any users think they have spotted anything they think needs alerting then please notify the Admin team through the correct channels.
Please also note that you are not allowed to use the BT-Mail system to send unsolicited mails to any user regarding players you may be selling or that you may wish to sell. We regard this as spam and you are very likely to recieve a fine when caught.
Please also note that you are the manager of your team. No-one else is allowed to access it, not even close friends or family. We also do not allow managers to buy players from teams which share computers or IP addresses. If you are accessing your team from a computer used by a fellow Battrick user then please contact us, naming all individuals involved. While you are most welcome to play Battrick in that situation, any transfers between these teams and your own will be in breach of the rules and severely punished.
Over-inflated sales will be thoroughly checked by the Admin team and may be adjusted after they complete.
If for whatever reason you do wish to leave the game, it is not permitted to hand your team over to anyone else as this would be unfair to users who are on the waiting list waiting for a team. Simply stop logging into the game and after seven weeks of inactivity your team will be deleted.
Battrick reserves the right to refuse applications or to remove users from the game. Reasons for removal include:
In addition, you may not navigate Battrick via any means other than using a web browser or WAP/cellphone to click the links within the site. Changing URLs in the address field of your browser is forbidden, as is using other programs to scan Battrick, change information or navigate through data.
However we do not limit our reasons for removing users to these criteria and reserve the right to adapt them as circumstances dictate. Decisions to remove users from the game are not taken lightly and are discussed among several members of the GM team who are regulated to ensure that they act responsibly.
The Admin team may also penalise teams or users for minor offences such as BT-Mail spam, misuse of Press Releases, Guestbook entries and offensive ground/team names etc., advertising items or services you wish to buy/sell/trade in real life, accusing other users of cheating, (contact the GMs instead) or discussing decisions taken by GMs and/or moderators and these penalties include, (but are not restricted to) official warnings, Sledging bans and monetary fines.
You are asked to:
Battrick wish to assure users that it is the duty of the Admin Team to ensure that this remains a fun and fair game for users of all ages, nationalities and backgrounds and punishments are only handed out in circumstances where individuals are not respecting that.
Here is a complete list of the denominations for all the skill levels that are used in Battrick. Remember that each level represents a range of ability, not an absolute.