Hampshire County Cricket Club begun on Hampshire's long-awaited new ground. The realisation of this move almost led the club to financial ruin, as encouragement from financial partners Sport England and the hiring of architect Sir Michael Hopkins had led the then part-time voluntary committee running the club to lose control of the budget. In 2000 Australian great Shane Warne was signed as the club's overseas player. The 2000 County Championship was to be the last season that Hampshire would play at the County Ground Southampton before they moved in 2001 to the new Rose Bowl ground just outside Southampton. 2001 also saw current club
Warne–Muralidaran Trophy been four tours each in each country. Out of the 18 tests Australia had won 11 times while Sri Lanka had won only once, in 1999, and 6 Tests had been drawn. The following were all regular, not Warne-Muralidaran Tests between the two countries: Shane Warne retired from cricket in 2007 with 708 wickets against his name and Muttiah Muralitharan played the 2007–2008 series eight wickets short of Warne's tally at the start of the series. Ricky Ponting stated that he was determined to deny Murali from getting the nine wickets required to surpass Warne as the highest wicket taker