Jack Simmons has revealed his revolutionary plans for changes to domestic cricket were devised as a solution to Duncan Fletcher's complaints about the amount of county cricket.

The former Lancashire spinner and chairman, now chairman of the England and Wales Cricket Board's cricket committee, has been linked with plans to cut championship cricket down to three-day matches to make room for more Twenty20 matches in the cricket calendar.

But Simmons confirmed that his plans were at least two years old and were designed after Duncan Fletcher, who was then the England coach, complained about players being forced to play too much county cricket.

Fletcher had wanted to reduce the number of championship games in a season, but Simmons devised a compromise to reduce the four-day matches to three days with slightly longer hours to incorporate 120 overs a day.

Simmons believed his plan would encourage teams to play more spinners, who at the time seemed to be going through a barren period in the game - but was dropped because the ECB believed the regulations had already undergone major changes.

"The reason I suggested this was nothing to do with Twenty20 cricket," stressed Simmons. "My idea was to bring more spinners into the game.

"Monty Panesar hadn't quite broken through then and I was worried about the opportunities for spinners in first class cricket.

"At the time Duncan wanted a big reduction in the amount of cricket so this was a compromise which I thought would help spin bowling.

"If teams had to bowl 120 overs a day, there's no way they could do that with four seamers because each one of them would have to bowl at least 30 overs so it would encourage teams to play one or maybe even two spinners to help with the workload."

Simmons conceded his plan could become viable again once the England and Wales Cricket Board and Texan millionaire Sir Allen Stanford finalise the details behind a proposed England Premier League.

He conceded: "It's pointless even considering it until we know what's going to happen with Twenty20 cricket in this country.

"But it could be the way forward if we decide we're going to be playing more Twenty20 cricket.

"The England players would not want to do it, but nor would they have to because very few of them play many games in county cricket anyway because of their international commitments."

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