The total attendance across the country is a few thousand down on the equivalent stage last year, just over one-third of the way through the Hundred. Crowds have not been helped by changes to team names and brands, and there have been notable dips at Headingley and the Utilita Bowl, two venues where new IPL owners have changed the home team’s colours.

The ECB are projecting ticket sales to be slightly lower than 2025 by the end of this season, and believe that the substantial operational change since they handed control of the eight franchises to counties and new owners – described by Hundred managing director Vikram Banerjee as “unprecedented” in any major sports league – as the biggest factor.

Duckett, the tournament’s leading run-scorer this season, said the number of empty seats did not match the quality on show. “You look at every side, and it’s just world-class opponents,” he told Cricinfo. “I’m so surprised that the crowds have been what they have, because I’d be desperate to watch some of these guys play cricket. They’ve not been great.”

The Hundred’s crowds have previously been stronger in years when the tournament has followed a men’s Test series against either Australia or India, which tend to increase cricket’s profile among casual followers. The total attendances in 2023 and 2025 were both around 580,000, compared to 500,000 in 2022 and 540,000 in 2024.

The attendance at Sophia Gardens for Rockets’ nine-wicket win over Welsh Fire – one of only three midweek, daytime men’s fixtures in the season – was 7,399. Glamorgan officials had anticipated a lower turnout for the 3pm start after a record 11,796 fans came to the Fire’s opening matchday against MI London on Saturday night.

Duckett described the Rockets’ first crowd at Trent Bridge – 11,699 for their narrow win over London Spirit on Sunday night – as “pretty awesome”. But he said that he could not square the dip in attendances with what he believes is a higher quality of cricket this year, citing the introduction of a fourth overseas player in each XI.

“Just looking around the grounds, there must be a reason for it, so I’m not having a go at the fans or anything,” he said. “I mean, this is a Wednesday at 3pm – it’s probably never going to be a packed house. But yeah, the standard of cricket this year has been awesome. I’ve been watching every game [on TV].

“There’s a reason why I struggled with that new ball: you’ve got [Marco] Jansen, Chris Woakes, Lockie Ferguson. Sam Cook didn’t even bowl in the powerplay. Everywhere you look, there’s not many weaknesses at all.”

Duckett said that he had struggled for rhythm on a used pitch after his 43-ball half-century but leaned on his experience at Sophia Gardens picked up across two seasons playing for the Fire. He has started this Hundred campaign with scores of 49, 75 and 52 not out, and has already scored more runs for the Rockets this year than he did in eight matches for Birmingham Phoenix last year.

“I’m very happy we won,” he said. “We came here with one job, and that was to win the game. I just struggled out there: it was tough. I’ve been a bit ill in bed for the last couple of days, so I’d have probably taken it at the start of the day, but it wasn’t the fluent best I’d like… I was a lot more fluent at Trent Bridge.”

The Rockets, who have recovered from defeat to the Phoenix with back-to-back wins, now travel to Manchester to take on the Super Giants, who lost for the first time this season against Sunrisers Leeds on Tuesday. “If we can beat Manchester away on Friday, I think we’ll be in a great spot,” Duckett added. “They lost their last game, so we’re the ones going in with form.”