The Hundred: What are the rules, teams, players, tickets and more

The UK is slowly starting to return to normal as social restriction are eased and, with summer around the corner, that can mean only one thing: cricket.

The County Championship has already roared into life with some scintillating action across the length and breadth of the country, the T20 Blast looms large and the Royal London One Day come is also ready to kick off.

The international summer promises to be simply sublime with a stacked calendar including visits from New Zealand and India.

This summer, however, there will be another brand new tournament for fans to enjoy with the ECB set to finally role out their sparkly new brain-child 'The Hundred'.

The electric-paced, heater-skelter version of the game is aimed at attracting a demographic of fans that would previously have found a game of cricket far from attractive.

So how does it work, what are the team, who is playing in it and when does it begin?

How many teams are there in The Hundred?

There will be eight teams both comprising of a men's and a women's squad. Each squad will be made-up of 15 players with up to three overseas stars allowed.

The teams are:

Oval Invincibles (The Oval, London)
Welsh Fire (Sophia Gardens, Cardiff)
London Spirit (Lords, London)
Manchester Originals (Old Trafford, Manchester)
Northern Superchargers (Headingley, Leeds)
Southern Brave (Ageas Bowl, Southampton)
Trent Rockets (Trent Bridge, Northampton)
Birmingham Phoenix ( Edgbaston, Birmingham)

What are the rules of The Hundred?

The rules, per The Hundred website are as follows:

Each innings will comprise of 100 balls only.

Overs (although it remains to be seen whether they will be called that) can either consist of five consecutive balls or 10, with the captain to decide how long they will go on for.

There will be a change of end after every 10 deliveries with the bowling side allowed one strategic time-out of 2.5 minutes to be used at any point in the innings.

Bowlers will be allowed to bowl no more than 20 balls per innings.

The remainder of the rules remain largely unchanged with the team scoring the most runs crowned the victor.

What is the tournament format for The Hundred?

Each team will play each other once, plus one extra match. Each team will play four home matches and four away matches.

Once the league campaign is done and dusted, the top three teams will progress to a 'Finals Day'.

On that day, the teams finishing second and third in the round-robin will meet in an 'Eiliminator', before the winner takes on the top team in the final.