The 2012 Friends Life t20 was the third season of the

Friends Life t20 The T20 Blast, currently named the Vitality Blast for sponsorship reasons, is a professional Twenty20 cricket competition for English and Welsh first-class counties. The competition was established by the England and Wales Cricket Board (E ...

, England's premier domestic

Twenty20 Twenty20 (T20) is a shortened game format of cricket. At the professional level, it was introduced by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) in 2003 for the inter-county competition. In a Twenty20 game, the two teams have a single innin ...

competition. The competition ran from 12 June to 25 August 2012. The teams in the tournament remained the same as the previous season. The schedule of the tournament had been widely criticised the previous season and the ECB had decided to reduce the minimum number of days in which a county would play from 92 to 86 for 2012. This meant a change in format from 2 groups of 9, from which the top 4 would qualify to the quarter-finals, to an arrangement with 3 groups of 6. The format of the knock-out rounds (quarter-finals) remain unchanged. This reduces the number of matches in the competition from 151 to 97 in a return to the format of the

2008 File:2008 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Lehman Brothers went bankrupt following the Subprime mortgage crisis; Cyclone Nargis killed more than 138,000 in Myanmar; A scene from the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing; ...

and

2009 File:2009 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: The vertical stabilizer of Air France Flight 447 is pulled out from the Atlantic Ocean; Barack Obama becomes the first African American to become President of the United States; 2009 Iran ...

editions of the

Twenty20 Cup The T20 Blast, currently named the Vitality Blast for sponsorship reasons, is a professional Twenty20 cricket competition for English and Welsh first-class counties. The competition was established by the England and Wales Cricket Board (E ...

. Finals Day was at the

SWALEC Stadium The Cardiff Wales Stadium, which is part of Sophia Gardens Cardiff ( ; cy, Gerddi Soffia Caerdydd), is a cricket stadium in Cardiff, Wales. It is located in Sophia Gardens on the River Taff. It is home to Glamorgan County Cricket Club and is lis ...

Cardiff Cardiff (; cy, Caerdydd ) is the capital and largest city of Wales. It forms a principal area, officially known as the City and County of Cardiff ( cy, Dinas a Sir Caerdydd, links=no), and the city is the eleventh-largest in the United Kingd ...

for the first time. Hampshire Royals and

Yorkshire Carnegie Leeds Tykes (formerly Leeds RUFC, Leeds Carnegie and Yorkshire Carnegie) is an English rugby union club in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, playing in the National League 1. The club was founded as Headingley FC, but renamed in 1991 when it j ...

, as the winners and runners-up of the tournament respectively, qualified for the

2012 Champions League Twenty20 The 2012 Champions League Twenty20 (CLT20) was the fourth edition of the Champions League Twenty20, an international Twenty20 cricket tournament. It was held in South Africa from 9 to 28 October 2012. This edition was significant for being the fi ...

. In the quarter-final match between Sussex and Gloucestershire,

Scott Styris Scott may refer to: Places Canada * Scott, Quebec, municipality in the Nouvelle-Beauce regional municipality in Quebec * Scott, Saskatchewan, a town in the Rural Municipality of Tramping Lake No. 380 * Rural Municipality of Scott No. 98, Sask ...

scored the equal third-fastest century in T20 history, after making 100 not out from 37 balls. In the same match, Gloucestershire's James Fuller conceded 38 runs from one over.

Format

The 18 teams are divided into three groups of six and each group plays a double

round-robin tournament A round-robin tournament (or all-go-away-tournament) is a competition Competition is a rivalry where two or more parties strive for a common goal which cannot be shared: where one's gain is the other's loss (an example of which is a zero ...

. The top two teams from each group and the top two third-placed teams qualify for the knockout stage: a three-round

single-elimination tournament A single-elimination, knockout, or sudden death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of each match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final matc ...

. The top team from each group and the best second-placed team will each play in a different quarter-final at their home ground. A free draw determines the placement of the remaining four teams and the semi-final and final match-ups.

Teams

Group stage

Midlands/Wales/West Division

Table

Results

Fixtures

North Division

Table

Results

Fixtures

South Division

Table

Results

Fixtures

:1. Game moved from

Nevill Ground The Nevill Ground is a cricket ground at Royal Tunbridge Wells in the English county of Kent. It is owned by Tunbridge Wells Borough Council and is used by Tunbridge Wells Cricket Club in the summer months and by Tunbridge Wells Hockey Club in t ...

Royal Tunbridge Wells Royal Tunbridge Wells is a town in Kent, England, southeast of central London. It lies close to the border with East Sussex on the northern edge of the High Weald, whose sandstone geology is exemplified by the rock formation High Rocks. ...

due to flooding.

Knockout stage

Quarter-finals

---- ---- ----

Semi-finals

----

Final

Statistics

Highest team totals

The following table lists the five highest team scores in the season.

Most runs

The top five highest run scorers (total runs) in the season are included in this table.

Highest scores

This table contains the top five highest scores of the season made by a batsman in a single innings.

Most wickets

The following table contains the six leading wicket-takers of the season.

Best bowling figures

This table lists the top five players with the best bowling figures in the season.

References

External links

Tournament Site – CricinfoFriends Life t20 Microsite
{{2012 English cricket season

2012 File:2012 Events Collage V3.png, From left, clockwise: The passenger cruise ship Costa Concordia lies capsized after the Costa Concordia disaster; Damage to Casino Pier in Seaside Heights, New Jersey as a result of Hurricane Sandy; People gather ...