It is hard to believe the England and Wales Cricket Board will be silly enough this week to endorse a series of crackpot proposals for an overhaul in the domestic game.

Diplomatically described so far as 'radical' in the national press, the plans as reported could be more accurately said to veer from the cosmetic and irrelevant to the nonsensical.

Into the former category falls the projected meddling with the county championship - three regional divisions with an as-yet unspecified new fixture format.

The intention apparently is to thin out the amount of four, or possibly three-day cricket - and to make the game more spectator-friendly.

It is a mystery, though, how a reduction in first-class matches should be to the benefit of county cricketers whose ultimate hope is to one day prove they are good enough to play in five-day Tests for their country.

Their opportunity to do that must come in two-innings time cricket - because that is the only competition which approximates what could lie ahead for the most successful of them.

The availability of 16 matches, home and away, against their peers - with ample time for practice in between - is as good a shop window and training ground as any.

As for any suggestion that swapping around fixtures may significantly increase crowds, that is to ignore one of the most basic facts of life in this or any other civilised country.

Between the ages of five and 65, the vast majority of the population is required to be elsewhere other than at a sporting event for the seven hours a day during which county championship matches have to be played.

Weekend cricket is unsurprisingly better attended - be it 20, 40 or 50 overs per side, or 96 in the day - by people who are legitimately able to do so.

Try doing the same thing every Monday to Friday too, and the chances are you will be either sacked or expelled.

This is an inevitability first-class cricket has had to 'work' around for more than 100 years so far, and that is not going to change because someone tinkers with the structure.

Most short-sighted of all, though, would be if the ECB were to follow through the brainwave someone somewhere has had to turn the 40-over National League into a hybrid Twenty20 - with two innings per side in the space of an afternoon.

There is no rational argument against a modest augmentation of the existing Twenty20 tournament, given the huge commercial success it has had so far and its potential to bring in more money.

Neither can the ECB be blamed for trying to arrange a copycat of the Indian Premier League, to maximise revenue and interest in their sport in this country - via the attention which has been grabbed by the newest and shortest form of cricket. But what does no-one any credit is the on-message, 'word-to-the-wise' consensus that Twenty20 cricket is not only a massive money-spinner for all concerned but is also busy refining outstanding talents by creating new, previously unconsidered match situations.

That is an expedient falsehood.

Twenty20 does not refine; it simply condenses, as its name and format imply.

Because of that, many who would not be remotely inclined to sit through a five-day Test - or even one of those pesky, maligned 50-over ODIs - will be switched on; others, apparently of smaller numbers, will be switched off.

Twenty20 lacks most of the thought processes necessary in longer games - but makes up in part with instinctive thrills and spills, made all the more obvious by the sneaky onset of ever shorter boundaries and better bats.

Loss of wickets is a debilitating factor which alters gameplans over 50 overs or more, forcing teams to adapt to the erosion of their initial resources.

In Twenty20, batsmen are almost entirely dispensable - following one another in and out in a frenzy of swishes, hits and misses.

This is what used to be dismissed snobbishly and universally as 'Mickey Mouse' cricket.

It is a little more than that, of course.But just because it is now being played - in India and soon the Caribbean - for 'Disney' money and is expected to create huge wealth for cricket as well as cricketers does not mean Twenty20 should be held up as the paragon of all that is good for the sport that spawned it.

Pundits have queued up to expound - like the worst 'right-on' schoolteachers, out to demonstrate at all costs their natural empathy with youth - how Twenty20 has revitalised cricket.

But they, and the ECB, should beware the short-term attraction of a fool's gold.

If the gloss should wear off, cricket could be left with a product which no longer pulls the crowds yet dominates the calendar and compromises the best talents - all because no one stopped to think things through.

More news from SportingLife.com

Live scorecards from SportingLife.com