The Dunedin Cricket Association plans to conduct a competition review in the ''coming months'' to address a drop in playing numbers and a thinning of the senior ranks.
Its management committee met on Tuesday evening to set the senior competition format for 2014-15 and has confirmed University-Grange, as signalled in the Otago Daily Times earlier this week, will skip the second round.
University-Grange has struggled to field teams during the university holiday period in the past and feels it can no longer commit.
Taieri also came close to pulling its senior team out of the competition because of a lack of playing numbers.
It is a serious concern for the game, and DCA chairman George Morris acknowledged finding a solution to what has been a steady decline in numbers over a long period of time presented a big challenge.
''I think we need to look at what we are offering and when we are offering it, and what people want,'' he said.
''We have tried other things in the past. We tried a twenty20 competition for other people on Saturdays which never really took off. There was never really the interest there, even though it was thought that that might be one of the factors in solving the problem of all day Saturday being too long to give up.
''We just don't have the answers. But I don't think cricket is the only sport that is going through this process of finding it difficult or having dwindling numbers to support clubs.''
In 1988, there were 59 men's teams competing across the Dunedin grades. That number dropped to 35 by 2006, and last year there were 33 teams (27 if the school teams are taken out).
Twilight cricket on Monday nights has been an area of significant growth. But that growth has been stymied in recent years because of a lack of venues.
Morris said the committee was ''yet to confirm'' the details of the planned review, but it would be on the agenda at the next meeting.
''We've got to go out and see the clubs and find out why players are playing and why they leave,'' he said.
''We're trying to get some information so we can make a reasonable decision.''
While University-Grange will miss part of the season, it will join Otago Country and the other six senior clubs in the first round, which gets under way early next month. It will then return to the competition for the final round, which starts on February 7.
Otago Boys' High School will contest the second and third rounds.
The absence of University-Grange will create a bye, which the clubs have been keen to avoid in previous seasons.
The short-lived Pelichet Bay club was essentially established to eliminate the bye.
