The wait is over and Kent Cricket fans can start to make their plans for next summer after the 2024 fixtures were announced.

Kent will start the season on Friday April 5^th when they welcome Somerset to Canterbury in the County Championship before travelling to Chelmsford the following Friday to face Essex.  

Kent then welcome Champions Surrey to Canterbury before a week off to end April. Into May, and a trip to Old Trafford to play Lancashire, Worcestershire then come to Canterbury before Kent go to Taunton and finish the month with four days against Essex at the Spitfire Ground.

The first eight rounds of Championship cricket all start on a Friday providing the probability of weekend cricket! 

The Vitality Blast starts with a trip to Chelmsford but to face Middlesex and not Essex – on Friday May 31^st before a trip to the Ageas Bowl on the following Sunday to face the Hampshire Hawks. Canterbury’s first taste of T20 cricket is on Friday June 7^th with the visit of holders Somerset. 

Of Kent’s seven home games, only the game with Glamorgan isn’t to be played at a weekend – Tuesday July 16^th – and there are two “double headers” of sorts as on Sunday 9^th June, the afternoon home game with Middlesex will be preceded in the morning by the ladies encounter between SE Stars and the Central Sparks in the Charlotte Edwards Cup, and then with the ladies T20 international between England and New Zealand on Thursday 11^th July, the latest chapter in the “War of the Weald” will be played the following evening when the Sussex Sharks are the visitors. 

The “Friday Finale” to the qualifying pool is on Friday 19^th of June when Surrey come to Canterbury, and for the record the other home game sees the visit of Gloucestershire on Sunday June 16^th. 

In the middle of all the T20 action, there is a four-day game at Canterbury which will start on Sunday 23^rd June against Lancashire that along with the Essex home game the previous Friday in the Blast will form Canterbury Cricket Week. 

In the Metro Bank One Day Cup, home games with Hampshire and Middlesex will be played at Beckenham on July 31^st and August 4^th respectively, whilst the Spitfires will finish their qualifying campaign at Canterbury against Durham and Northants on August 11^th and 14^th. 

The season will end as 2023 did with four Championship games – a trip to Edgbaston to face Warwickshire for the only time in the competition across the August Bank Holiday weekend.

Indeed, three of these final four games are the only time Matt Walker’s side will face the opposition as after Hampshire come to Canterbury on September 9^th, Notts come to Canterbury the following week and it all ends with the longest trip of the season to the Riverside in Durham for the final four days of the campaign from Thursday 26^th September. 

Other dates (hopefully) of interest will be the Blast Quarter Finals played between September 3^rd and 6^th, whilst bizarrely the One Day Cup Quarter Finals will be played on the 16^th and 18^th of August. 

Blast Finals Day is back at Edgbaston on Saturday 14^th September with the Final of the Metro Bank One Day Cup returning to Trent Bridge the following weekend on Sunday 22^nd September. 

Five domestic trophies are set to be decided in September while the Vitality Blast will be staged almost entirely on Thursday nights, Friday nights and at weekends following the release of the 2024 domestic schedule.

The ECB has confirmed the men’s county and women’s regional domestic fixtures for next summer, which also includes 22 men’s and women’s T20 double headers, while the Charlotte Edwards Cup has been expanded to include 10 group-stage matches for each team.

The County Championship will be played in each month of the season – including back-to-back rounds in June and July ahead of the England Men’s Test summer – with champions Surrey facing a tough first-up test away to Lancashire when the season begins on Friday, 5 April.

The format of Charlotte Edwards Cup Finals Day will for the first time mirror Vitality Blast Finals Day – with two semi-finals and a final to be staged at the Incora County Ground in Derby on Saturday, 22 June.

The remaining five trophies – across men’s county, regional women’s and disability competitions – are then set to be decided in September with the Vitality Blast quarter-finals kick-starting the month before sold-out Finals Day at Edgbaston on Saturday, 14 September.

The final of the ground-breaking Disability Premier League, which returns for a third season with a fresh new logo, is also set to be staged in September with full fixtures to be confirmed.

Both women’s and men’s 50-over finals will be played on the same weekend in the East Midlands, with the Uptonsteel County Ground in Leicester staging the Rachael Heyhoe Flint final (Saturday, 21 September) before Trent Bridge plays host to the Metro Bank One-Day Cup final the next day. The final round of the County Championship will begin on Thursday, 26 September.

T20 competitions

More than 850,000 people attended domestic T20 competitions last summer and next year’s Vitality Blast schedule has been tailored so that 121 of 126 group-stages matches will be played on Thursday nights, Friday nights and at weekends – an increase from 93 matches in those timeslots last season. Twenty-two Vitality Blast-Charlotte Edwards Cup double headers will be staged – an increase from 20 last season – across 16 venues.

Vitality Blast Off will feature eight double-headers, while the competition will adopt ‘Rivals Week’ when 10 of county cricket’s closest rivalries will take centre stage to finish the first block of group-stage matches on June 20 and 21. Charlotte Edwards Cup Finals Day will follow the next day, when no other fixtures are scheduled.

The Disability Premier League draft is set to be staged in March with the four-team competition’s successful format set to remain unchanged. Hawks will bid to defend their title, after defeating Pirates in front of the Sky Sports cameras at Derby, with the month-long competition set to run from August into September.

County Championship

The County Championship will begin with eight consecutive rounds played from Friday-Monday each week in April and May, to allow more opportunity for members and fans to attend at weekends.

The County Championship will return with back-to-back rounds in June and July, when each county will play one home match and one away match. The two rounds will provide the opportunity for England Men’s players to prepare ahead of the Test summer, which begin on July 10 against West Indies at Lord’s. There will be two County Championship rounds at the end of August before the title run-in during September.

50-over competitions

The Rachael Heyhoe Flint Trophy begins on Saturday, 20 April. Southern Vipers won the white-ball double last season and begin their summer schedule away to South East Stars.

Leicestershire start the defence of their Metro Bank One-Day Cup title at home to local rivals Notts Outlaws on Wednesday, 24 July. The Foxes, who memorably won their first one-day trophy in 38 years at the Outlaws’ Trent Bridge home in September, have been drawn in Group B.

Group A: Lancashire, Worcestershire, Kent, Middlesex, Durham, Hampshire, Northamptonshire, Somerset, Derbyshire.

Group B: Essex, Leicestershire, Warwickshire, Surrey, Glamorgan, Nottinghamshire, Yorkshire, Gloucestershire, Sussex.