THE England and Wales Cricket Board have committed themselves to a two-division Twenty20 tournament starting next summer as their alternative to the lucrative and successful Indian Premier League.

The ECB Board voted today for the extended format following research conducted by a working party chaired by Essex chairman Nigel Hilliard, despite criticism it would provoke an overload of Twenty20 cricket in a domestic season which will also include the Twenty20 Cup.

The format will include two divisions of nine teams with three teams being promoted and relegated and the top three teams from each area group of this summer's Twenty20 Cup qualifying for the top division.

"I wish to thank Nigel Hilliard and his working party for all the hard work they have put into the framework of this competition," said ECB chairman Giles Clarke. "I'm sure it will be another exciting development in the domestic cricket season."

Their decision to go for the two division format follows the ECB's rejection of another city-based franchise tournament based on the Indian model favoured by some of the county chairman and MCC chief executive Keith Bradshaw.

That city-based style of competition also had support of England all-rounder Andrew Flintoff, who experienced briefly in South Africa recently playing for Chennai Super Kings in this year's IPL before he returned home to undergo knee surgery.

Asked about the city-style format, Flintoff said recently: "There is a good argument for that. You could base them in Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham and London and get many of the world's best players involved."

Smaller counties were resistant to that idea because they believed that only the Test match grounds would be able to exploit the opportunities for cashing in on the popularity of Twenty20 cricket.

The new tournament, which will be called the P20 and will have the extra incentive of qualification for the Champions League, will be held in June next year when the ECB hope they will be able to attract many of the world's leading players but discussions about the amount of overseas players and playing conditions will be discussed at a further Board meeting.

By then the Board hope to have a female representative having agreed to appoint special advisors and are now investigating the constitutional changes necessary to accommodate this move.