2023 County Championship: Surrey and Lancashire top captains’ poll

Surrey and Lancashire are the most likely winners of the 2023 County Championship according to a survey of team captains ahead of the season starting on Thursday.

The ECB asked all 18 first-class county captains to make a series of pre-season predictions to provide fans with an insight into how the game’s on-field decision-makers thought this summer will play out.

The results have provided interesting reading, most significantly in the race for the Division One title where Surrey and Lancashire could not be split.

Surrey are the 3/1 favourites in Coral’s County Championship betting odds and six captains picked them to retain their title.

Another six predicted that 11/2 shots Lancashire can go one better than last year under the leadership of new skipper Keaton Jennings, who got the most captain votes to be the top-flight’s leading run scorer.

The poll adds extra interest to the opening round of matches when Lancashire host Surrey at Old Trafford in a match to be broadcast on Sky Sports.

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— LV= Insurance County Championship (@CountyChamp) April 3, 2023

The County Championship betting odds suggest the title race is hardly expected to be a two-horse race and that was backed up by the poll.

Hampshire are joint-second favourites at 9/2 and three captains predicted that a well-balanced outfit will end their 50-year title drought, while two captains believe newly-promoted Nottinghamshire will immediately make their mark and they look good value at 9/1 on that basis.

Essex are also 9/2 but were not selected by any of the captains, while Somerset (8/1) were another of the leading contenders to be overlooked.

Yorkshire are the clear favourites in the County Championship Division Two betting at 7/4 and 13 captains predicted the White Rose will make an immediate return to Division One.

Gloucestershire, who also went down last summer, and Durham were the next-most favoured to go up (six votes each) and are 7/1 and 9/1 respectively in the outright odds, while five captains believe the Mickey Arthur revolution at Derbyshire can see the 12/1 shots go up for the first time since 2012.

An overwhelming majority of the county captains believe that England men’s red-ball revolution will secure Ashes success this summer while the majority of captains have also predicted that England Women will win back the Ashes in the multi-format series.

2023 County Championship betting odds

Division One

3/1 Surrey

9/2 Hampshire, Essex

11/2 Lancashire

8/1 Somerset

9/1 Nottinghamshire

12/1 Warwickshire

16/1 Kent

18/1 Middlesex

25/1 Northamptonshire

Division Two

7/4 Yorkshire

4/1 Sussex

11/2 Glamorgan

7/1 Gloucestershire

8/1 Worcestershire

9/1 Durham

12/1 Derbyshire

20/1 Leicestershire

View the latest cricket odds

All odds and markets correct as of date of publication