So what did you think? Yesterday the BBC showed their first live cricket match since 1999. It was just the second live game broadcast on terrestrial television since 2005.
There was therefore quite a lot resting on this particular broadcast. How would they present the game to a new audience – one which was either returning to cricket or stumbling upon cricket for the first time?
Personally I thought they did well. It wasn’t crusty and old hat; nor was it too eager to be all new and shiny. It was just cricket with a little more colour and life. And the Beeb was fortunately blessed with a very good game too. My Mrs was quite happy to watch for the duration of England’s run chase.
Whether the BBC’s coverage resonated with a large audience I do not know. I can only give my impression. And overall I think they did a pretty good job.
Isa Guha is a good presenter. She’s young, looks the part, and freshens things up without trying too hard. She’s also relaxed but professional. And this is the ideal personality type to represent the game in the modern world. My initial fear was that the BBC might choose someone artificially whacky and far too energetic. Nothing looks more desperate than someone actively trying to get down with the kids.
The rest of the BBC team did fine too. I though the addition of Aatif Nawaz, the stand up comic, was a masterstroke. He really livened things up and talked with huge enthusiasm about Pakistan cricket. I hope they repeat this idea for all visiting teams in the future. It was also good to see Andy Zaltzman in the stats box. He’s a real character and always worth listening to.
It was also a good idea to get some current players involved. Jimmy Anderson is a lot more comfortable on camera than he used to be, and Shan Masood looked pretty dapper in his linen jacket. I know a lot of people have mixed feelings about Michael Vaughan these days but I think he’s a perfectly decent commentator. Phil Tufnell is also entertaining enough. He’s old school without being too crusty.
The game itself was a run-fest from start to finish. Pakistan’s batsmen took our bowling to the cleaners. Babar Azam showed his class and Mohammad Hafeez was awesome – not bad for a bloke approaching his 40th birthday.
Sadly I was pretty unimpressed with all England’s bowlers. Saqib Mahmood has talent but he looks more suited to red ball cricket from what I’ve seen (even though his record suggests otherwise). His current T20I economy rate is considerably worse than Jade Dernbach’s. I also thought that Chris Jordan and Tom Curran had off-days. I expect more from the latter.
It didn’t matter in the end, however, because England’s batsmen played a blinder. Tom Banton continues to impress and Jonny Bairstow is obviously a world class player in white ball cricket these days. Our opening pair set up Pakistan’s pins and Morgan and Malan knocked them over.
Eoin Morgan was in amazing form. I sometimes forget just how good he is because he’s surrounded by so many other superb players. Yesterday he was the clear standout.
Dawid Malan was also absolute class. He’s such a good white ball player. It’s amazing that someone this good isn’t a shoo-in for his country in both T20s and ODIs. He’s versatile, paces his innings brilliantly, and has a great temperament too. No wonder he’s in the top 10 in the ICC T20 rankings.
England’s problem, of course, is that we’ve got more world class white ball batsmen than Cameron Bancroft has sheets of sandpaper in his garage. It’s almost impossible to fit them all into the line-up. It seems absurd that someone as good as Malan might miss out when the T20 World Cup finally comes along. But then the thought of an England team without the likes of Roy, Stokes, and Buttler is also pretty insane.
Basically, for the first time in my lifetime, I think England could easily enter an ‘A Team’ in the T20 World Cup and still have a shot at winning the thing. Our reserves are almost as good as the first team.
My hope, of course, is that the broader public enjoyed watching these exciting players. Nothing sparks interest like success. It’s a bit like the Olympics where random athletes in random sports achieve a cult following for a week or two. If the nation’s triathletes, canoeists, and horse dancers can become household names then why not our cricketers? And unlike dressage, cricket is actually a bloody good sport.
I just hope that the BBC’s viewing figures were good enough to encourage terrestrial channels to show more cricket in the future.
* Update – apparently the Beeb’s coverage attracted a peak time audience of 2.7 million and an average of 1.7 million. Sky’s coverage attracted a peak audience of approximately 700,000 and an average of 420,000. So basically the BBC attracted 4 times as many viewers. These statistics say it all really. And naturally the BBC coverage attracted these additional viewers without the need for a gimmicking Hundred ball format. Hopefully Ian Watmore sees these figures and realises that a 4th format of the game simply isn’t needed.
James Morgan
Can we stop getting excited about the Beeb showing a T20 match.
Until we get test matches back in full on FTA, then cricket will not attract any new viewers and certainly no attendees at Championship matches.
With regard to the programme, although I did’t see it, I have been disappointed by the way the test match highlights have been shown; far too much chat, statistics and not enough of the actual cricket. In one hour’s show only about 80 deliveries were shown from a FULL day’s play. Sorry, not good enough.
Oh dear. You really should watch to make an opinion, the highlights have been superb, shown in prime time, Good viewing figures, well presented and every episode I’ve watched has had brief cheery introduction, chilled interviews at end, in meantime back to back cricket, programs hour long with no adverts. Even on days when barely any cricket played they’ve shown plenty of it. It’s step by step, we have to be realistic, we live in a different world now. Much as I’d love to see back to back day long live coverage on tests on BBC it’s not happening. As for it being T20. I got pulled into cricket by Sunday league 40 over cricket, from that I became aware of crickets existence, started to get to know players and then became more inquisitive which led to my now 35 year obsession with red ball cricket. But without that shop window of 40 overs on TV, I’d never have become the lifelong fan I am.
If I’m watching highights, that’s what want to see, not inane chat or interviews.
I’m pleased you transformed to red ball cricket and hope the BBC will get back to showing some more meaningful cricket rather than just this bish bosh bash.
Well said Rob. I also came to cricket with the John Player 40 over stuff. I still think of all the limited over formats it was the best balanced. So many people deride one day cricket as a lesser form but it has its own equally valid skill set. My only issue with it today is that it’s structured too far in favour of the batsman, especially with the nature of pitches and the introduction of the white ball, allowing technically flawed batsmen like Roy to score runs with impunity. How many T20 innings are completed with the loss of few wickets these days. When you take a bowler’s Prime weapon away from their remit it produces defensive cricket against the original spirit of the one day game. Great shots often score few runs whilst edges fly around for boundaries.
England (or team Courage, Respect, Unity – this is what Morgan says the team is based on, not nationality which makes them effectively a franchise) won comfortably turning out an XI somewhere between their 2nd and 3rd team. Nobody who wants to watch a contest with some jeopardy is going to follow this for very long.
As for the BBC, they said they wanted the programme to stand up as entertainment independent of the actual cricket which makes them ideal strategic partners for the ECB. Perhaps we could have a talk show with some comedy interludes and do away with the incumbence of the game?
Although it’s positive that the beeb have shown a live cricket match it was only a t20 which means nothing to me and plenty of other cricket fans. It’s a shame they didn’t bid for some live Bob Willis Trophy action which could have been shown on BBC4 without upsetting anyone (except Sky and the ECB!).
If that T20 match didn’t encourage Auntie to cover more cricket nothing will.
I thought the BBC coverage was excellent. Isa Guha is an excellent presenter, relaxed but very funny. I just wish that Michael Vaughan would wear proper shoes with his jacket and trousers. He looks very sloppy in his trainers and looks like an over age school boy.
The BBC aren’t interested in showing live Test cricket not least because it rarely finishes on time and so disrupts their evening schedule.
I was thinking about this recently. Couldn’t they just go to the news at 6pm and continue coverage on the red button? They manage pretty well during Wimbledon when matches overrun. If there’s a will etc.
Good game under the circumstances, a number of players not having played much competitive cricket recently. It’s always tougher for bowlers to get into a rythmn than batsmen, so I wouldn’t read too much into the fact that both sides batted better than they bowled. It’s also tougher to play T20 for them as there’s so little margin for error these days. In test matches you can get away with bad deliveries as they are often left alone and bowlers get more overs to find a rythmn. This never happens in T20, you need to be on the money straight away.
As to the presentation it was refreshingly low key, if a bit on the bland side with, as you say, none of the ‘whacky’ Sky brigade to dumb things down. Without ‘Bumble’ to divert things a bit it would be difficult to remember anything much that was said. With the Lakers and Benauds of this world you felt there was something insightful behind the words, here it just seems window dressing. You need something more opinionated. Take a leaf from the guys who do premiership rugby, they know how to present interesting and provocative analysis and make it entertaining with a bit of reparte.
The BBC coverage attracted over 5x (2.7m to 0.5m) the viewership of Sky so in that sense it was a success.
Had mixed feelings. Was certainly glad it was back on terrestrial telly and there wasn’t a rush to squeeze in an advert once a wicket fell before even showing a replay as C4 used to do. (I could never understand this, particularly in test cricket when you could be waiting and waiting, then as soon as something exciting happened, it was straight over to a car advert).
People will always quibble about commentators and summarisers. Simon Mann and Vic Marks are two masters of the trade that are criminally underused, in my opinion. Wasn’t overly impressed with Michael “And he’s away!” Vaughan as lead commentator because he tended to hyperbolise. There was also barely a second of silence. Maybe everyone was too excited and/or still finding their feet in the very different medium that is live television rather than highlights (or radio). The chats with Andy Zaltzman in the stats box indicated the struggles of the commentary team to lift themselves away from the TMS style of reportage.
Having an explainer about the T20 format and the fielding restrictions was very useful and something that I’ve often thought the BBC website should have on its pages. (On a related note, one gripe of mine is, no matter how well-intentioned, TMS commentators tend to describe the fielding placements so quickly that it is hard to visualise beyond how many slips there are).
The extra summariser was somewhat wasted, but that may have been because they were physically sat at the back, out of the line of sight of the lead commentator and summariser.
While I would change some of the graphics and ask the commentary team to relax a bit and let the cricket do the talking, it was good to see the game back on the BBC.
It was great to see live cricket back on BBC. It’s also so refreshing to watch cricket without ad breaks.
More of this type of thing!
I watched the Sky coverage most of the time. I’m not overly keen on Bumble’s waffling but it beats Michael Vaughan anyday. I’ll get excited as and when BBC show a Test match (not holding my breathe).