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Lights out at St Lawrence Ground

Kent

Kent will not be playing any matches under floodlights at the St Lawrence Ground in Canterbury next season.

The club's temporary lights have had to be taken down during a couple of matches over the last two years because of windy conditions.

"It's not an easy decision as we know how much people love floodlit cricket," Kent's director of business development Jamie Clifford told BBC Radio Kent.

"But it's for one season and we're considering what we do in the future."

Clifford added: "It's difficult because it rains, and anybody in cricket accepts that. But if it's high winds that cause a game to be curtailed, it doesn't feel right.

"People are going home when the sun's shining. It's windy and the lights can't go up. They go home not having had the cricket that they thought they were coming to see.

Despite the popularity of day/night Twenty20 matches, Clifford said he does not think the decision will have any affect on the club's revenue from ticket sales.

"We do get big crowds, but there are some changes in the fixture programme anyway so we've got more Friday nights and Sunday afternoons for the Twenty20 and a return to the Sunday League.

"The structure of the season has changed slightly anyway so revenues shouldn't suffer.

"It just means that the one-off night that people have come to expect won't be in the calendar - and that's a shame.

"But there's plenty of other cricket that is on, and a lot of it very exciting."



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see also
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