Oh no, we Brits love it. This summer has seen a massive resurgence in popularity of the traditional British summer sport. For the first time in what seems like living memory cricket has dominated the back pages of British newspapers, pushing the underachieving footballers out. The final day of the final Ashes test saw Channel 4 draw an audience of 7.4million viewers, the highest in the channel’s history. The online stats also demonstrate a massive rise in the number of people interested in cricket with Hitwise recording more cricket than football hits for the first time and traffic to cricket sites rising 10% overall.
But is this a flash in the pan or a genuine recovery? Well PR companies seem to think it’s the latter, with Andrew Flintoff (England’s star player) being talked of as the most marketable cricketer ever with a value of £3million. Cricket has been on the up with Channel 4’s excellent coverage over the past few years and interesting innovations such as Twenty 20 cricket. However, The game may have dealt itself a critical blow by selling out and moving onto pay-per-view television at Sky where only a limited number of people can partake. And can a game with such complicated rules, such long periods of play maintain it’s current popularity and keep the recent converts?
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Nice article Henry - watching from NYC, I am amazed by all the UK press coverage for the sport. When I phone someone in the UK, they ask if I can phone them back later. I ask when. they say about 5 or six hours, as long as it’s not when the cricket’s on.
!
September 14th, 2005 at 5:53 pm
I’m a welshboy so cricket has never been on my ‘radar’ but even I got into following the English boys (then again they did get a HUGE help in the opening tests from the Welsh Simon Jones).
September 14th, 2005 at 6:02 pm
Thanks P. The press have gone completely Ashes bonkers. I think it’s probably because we’ve been so badly let down by our other sports teams since we won the Rugby World Cup. This year has really captured the imagination but I think it will be a miracle if interest lasts as test cricket moves onto Sky, the papers start the inevitable backlash and we move into World Cup year.
September 14th, 2005 at 6:03 pm
It wasn’t just the Welsh helping us out we had Pietersen of SA too! Apologies to the Welsh, Scots and Irish for whom the ‘English’ cricket team may not set their world alight and whom I labelled ‘Brits’.
More on the Sky deal here: http://sport.guardian.co.uk/cricket/story/0,10069,1569360,00.html
September 14th, 2005 at 6:12 pm
Channel 4 still have their amazingly fun cricket game still up on their site: http://www.channel4.com/sport/microsites/B/bringiton/bringiton.html
Go on, give the convicts a bashing!
September 14th, 2005 at 9:01 pm
We’re doing our best stand up for England over at the IDLC Collective. Back us.
October 7th, 2006 at 6:19 am