Welcome back to the TFT. I hope you had a marvellous weekend. There are a few subjects I’d like to touch on today so I’ve gone for a bit of a mishmash approach.
The first thing we should talk about is the appointment of Ian Watmore as the ECB’s new chairman. This one rather took me by surprise. In fact, I’d never heard of the bloke last week. At first I thought they’d appointed Dav Whatmore – which would’ve been rather odd. However, at least old Dav actually has some cricket experience.
So what do we know about our next Lord and Master who will take the reins when Darth Graves hangs up his red lightsaber later this year? Well, not a fat lot to be honest. I know he was briefly FA chairman a few years ago, but as I don’t really follow football as closely as I used to I’m afraid I can’t add much insight. All I’ve read is that he resigned in a hurry because he got frustrated with the pace of change at the organisation. Why a job at the ECB appeals is therefore something of a mystery.
Other than his stint at the FA, we know that Watmore was also a big wig at consultancy firm Accenture for several years; therefore he should find the ECB’s corporate bullshit tone of voice easy to embrace. Who knows, maybe he’ll be able to add a few more management cliche’s to the lexicon? We can all look forward to that.
Significantly Watmore was also a senior civil servant for years. This means he should find navigating the ECB’s political mazes a cinch too. In fact, I can already imagine him talking to Tom Harrison like Sir Humphrey from Yes Minister. Although I doubt he has Nigel Hawthorne’s exquisite timing.
As with all these things, time will tell what kind of ECB chairman Watmore becomes. I remember being delighted when Giles Clarke stepped down because I didn’t think anyone could be as odious. Obviously I had no idea at the time that Colin Graves would turn out to be just as divisive. Let’s hope that Watmore ends up being a change for the better rather than a “what … more?” of the same candidate.
The next item on the agenda are the interesting rumours that rugby union is about to follow in the same foolish footsteps as cricket by hiding one of its showpiece events behind a paywall. These rumours are unconfirmed – although apparently all options are on the table.
Whilst domestic rugby has been shown on Sky and then BT Sport for a number of years now, union’s saving grace was that the Six Nations and World Cup remained very accessible on terrestrial TV. This balanced seemed to work fairly well. The Premiership isn’t a massive league (attendances are generally between the 8k to 18k mark depending on the size of the club) so the cash injection from the pay broadcasters was welcome.
The big sellers (a bit like cricket I suppose) have always been the international fixtures. England, for example, always sell out the 80k Twickenham stadium during the Six Nations, so these games plus the Autumn Internationals tend to be the RFU’s money spinners.
It will be interesting to see what effect any move to satellite has on rugby participation levels. Cricket participation declined significantly after the move to Sky in 2006 so one can probably expect a similar decline. The good news for rugby, however, is that I assume the World Cup will still be shown on free-to-air television.
Sometimes I find the world of professional sport bewildering. Why do sports always seem to shoot themselves in the foot so willingly? Golf made the move a couple of years ago and now rugby. It’s all very sad.
So what can we expect if the game’s profile does gradually diminish? Presumably we’ll get some some bizarre attempt to breathe new life into the sport by attracting a new audience who love meat pies and Guinness. As they already have 7s in rugby (which is somewhat akin to T20 in terms of relative length and points scored) perhaps the RFU will invent a new ‘super 5s’ tournament.
I can see it now – five players per team, five minutes per half, extra cheerleaders, and some new franchises. Wasps will become the Coventry Hornets, London Irish the Reading Bare Knuckle Boxers, and Saracens the Barnet Bastards. It’s bound to be a winner.
The final thing I’d like to mention is India’s demise in New Zealand. A couple of weeks ago Kohli’s team had a real opportunity to cement themselves as the undisputed No.1 Test team in the world. But it’s all unravelled very quickly indeed. In fact, one wonders whether India’s batsmen did this deliberately just to make Friday’s article about the Kookaburra ball producing high-scoring borefests a tad ridiculous. Yeah thanks for that, Virat.
Although it’s nice to see everyone’s second favourite Test side beat India and recover some pride after that shellacking in Australia, the dominance of home sides in Test cricket is getting a little tedious now.
What can we do to make things more interesting? Although some people have suggested that the away side should automatically ‘win the toss’ and decide whether to bat or bowl first, it’s worth pointing out that the ECB plan to abandon uncontested tosses in the county championship. Meanwhile, others argue that it’s a positive thing for the game that winning away from home is so difficult.
Would you make a change yourself or do you think things are fine as they are? I suppose we should remember that winning overseas IS possible if you play well. England won against Sri Lanka last year and we’ve just beaten South Africa too – although both these sides were clearly in a state of flux and transition at the time.
James Morgan
One small point regarding tosses: the situation in the championship was that the away team could dispense with the toss only if they wished to bowl first – if they fancied getting their runs in the board they had to toss up for the right to do so, so it was not a free choice for away sides. It is difficult to do much about home sides having an advantage, although South Africa were very obliging in that regard for England’s recent visit!
Looks like Mr Watmore has a habit of jumping ship or getting booted out quite quickly. Perhaps he’s doing a Putin and keeping the seat warm for a Graves second coming?
As for away trips, maybe more meaningful preparation is the answer. But that would require decluttering schedules. Would be an indicator of how seriously the Test championship is taken.
Thank heavens the sport’s governors decided to eviscerate teams that could compete abroad like Pakistan and SA and throw all the money at India whose brainlessness in Tests outside Asia is exceeded only by their gutlessness.
The Christchurch pitch was a shocker, one of those that starts damp and small pits made by deliveries on the first day harden into unevenness (both Bumrah and Southee gave away four byes with bouncers that hit the ridges of these pits and went away at almost 45 degrees giving the keepers no chance). However a country that served up that Nagpur turd of a pitch that started the race to the bottom by home teams deserves no sympathy. India’s batsmen, Pujara and Vihari somewhat excepted were dreadful. Some might notice Shaw making a fifty and think he’s also a partial exception but he was bounced out twice (by Southee!) in two Tests. India’s seamers let the NZ tail recover in the first innings and bowled too short and/or too wide in the second – an almost England-tastic performance!
NZ have improved since playing England with Blundell and Jamieson considerable upgrades on what they had before. However a side that should be winning Tests in eight sessions they are not.
Not only that, the RFU have just taken the brainless decision to slash funding to the Championship thus endangering the whole structure of rugby development through lower divisions. All the resources are to be focussed on the top of the pyramid and screw the rest. Sound familiar?
I was shocked when I read about the championship funding. Where will the next Exeter and Worcester come from? I imagine there will be some kind of ring-fencing enforced soon.
I think the potential problems for rugby are even greater than they were for cricket. At least quite a lot of the Sky cricket money did reach the grass roots of the game – although whether that compensated for the loss of terrestrial coverage is debatable. In the case of rugby, however, the Club game is already in danger of emasculation with the massive reduction in funding from everyone outside the Premiership. The big clubs no longer see lower division clubs as breeding grounds for future PL players, preferring to recruit them themselves, and see no reason to support them financially. Loss of terrestrial coverage will seriously damage the Club game, as the money will stay with the PLclubs and the unions, none of whom – in England at any rate – has any intention of investing in the lower levels of the game.
I have been impressed with the links between Premiership and junior clubs in rugby. My local club (only two XV’s but a massive thriving mini section) had both May and Jones drop in on Sunday morning training sessions. There is a very clear connection/pathway for young players. At U13 clubs and schools nominate boys to trial for the DPP which is basically a squad that are trained (no matches) until they reach age for academy (16??) – Much closer than the haphazard nature of cricket scouting!
Kudos to the ‘Telegraph’ headline-writer here:
“After an unsuccessful stint at the FA, the new ECB chairman faces enormous challenges” — https://www.telegraph.co.uk/cricket/2020/03/02/unsuccessful-stint-fa-new-ecb-chairman-faces-enormous-challenges/
He problem cricket has which no other sport seems to be complicated by are the various formats the game is played under. You can’t use the the word ‘cricket’ in the blanket way Rugby and Soccer are used, as when we talk about the effect on ‘The Game’ of any media involvement, in cricketing terms we don’t know what that implies. In almost all other major sports the rules and formats remain pretty much the same whatever he competition. In cricket we could be talking about Test or County red ball or ODI or T20 white ball. Each has its fans and detractors and all claim to be cricket lovers, as can be sampled on this blog every day.
Totally agree about Sky’s arrogant assumption that their ‘blanker’ monopoly will automatically raise profiles. As can be shown by the Women’s World Cup last summer terrestrial TV still has the greater pull as it attracts a more general audience and not just the specialist sports fan.
Not sure what the ECB want from their new head honcho as Whatmore hasn’t exactly covered himself with glory wherever he’s gone. He just seems like another frustrated suit to me. Maybe he comes cheap.
On the subject of professional sports willingly shooting themselves in the foot I’ve just read that there are no reserve days for upcoming Women’s T20 world cup semi finals. So England could be eliminated here without a ball being bowled!
I’d like to say that I find it incredible that, given reserve days were factored in for the semi finals of the men’s 50 over world cup last year, nothing similar has been planned for the women’s T20 world cup. Sadly it just seems like a routine misjudgement!
And England bow out without bowling a ball in the semis.
If history teaches us anything about cricket it is that’s the weather has a habit of disrupting matches the world over. It always seems amazing to me that every international match doesn’t have an allocated extra day just in case. I can’t think of another major sport similarly affected.