CAW Country Week draw almost finalised with new format for 2021 edition

Bushfire smoke plagued the tournament last summer and organisers have altered the format, with games to be played across two Sundays and Mondays, starting on January 10 and 11, before the finals take place on Thursday, January 31.

Cricket Albury-Wodonga junior coordinator David Nichols hopes the change will allow the players to have less interruptions.

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"We've split it up because of all the fires last year and the smoke, so we won't be having five days straight where you'll probably run into a 40-degree day somewhere," he said.

"Last year got wrecked by fires and smoke and we all know what happened during winter with COVID.

"We don't know that it's the best way of doing it, but we're trying to come up with a way of doing it to maximize it for the kids, so we thought we'd give it a crack and see if it works this way."

CAW has locked in coaches for all but one of its 19 teams, with the association still on the hunt for someone to take the reins of the CAW Country under-16 girls.

The CAW under-17 team is a combination of players from all three CAW competitions (Provincial, District and Hume), while other age groups are broken down into locations.

CAW sides include the Victorian-based clubs, CAW Country is for players at Albury clubs and Howlong, while CAW Hume includes clubs from that competition, as well as Corowa.