Loyal fanbase being left behind by cricket's ever-shifting landscape

HUW TURBERVILL: The Hundred's search for a new audience in turn forgets those who have invested in the game for decades. There must be a way to unite them all

Why I love cricket: Richard Osman

Great expectations? The IPL and Hundred cast deep shadow over the longer formats on the eve of the 2021 season

Richard Osman’s comments would have caused more of a stir, I thought. Speaking in The Cricketer, he argued that county cricket should be phased out, with the new Hundred franchises playing all forms.

“I don’t think it’s perfect, but I think The Hundred will be a great thing,” the House of Games and Pointless host – and Sussex fan – told The Cricketer. “I honestly love county cricket. But I don’t see a future for it. If you are paying the rent on the County Ground, and the staff at Sussex, you can’t have a loss-leader, where you have games that no one is coming to.

“I’d reverse-engineer it. I’d say let’s get people excited about The Hundred, and franchises, and have them play first-class cricket. I must stress, this is not what I’d like to happen, just that it might be necessary.

"If you get a whole generation into Test cricket via T20, you could say to youngsters after a few years: ‘Oh by the way, these franchises you love, we are doing a long form of the game now. We are going to do a game that lasts four days.’ And those kids would go: ‘Oh my word, that sounds amazing – like T20, but for four days?’ And you’d go: ‘Yes, yes, yes, it is going to be like that…’ and because they love the players, and the franchises, and because they love cricket – and the stories and soap opera of cricket – suddenly they’d go for it.”

^{For how much longer will first-class cricket be played at venues like Hove?}

Maybe readers thought it was just that bloke on the telly sounding off. But he’s not just a presenter. He devised the formats for those aforementioned quiz shows and was creative director of production company Endemol UK. His first novel, The Thursday Murder Club, has just sold more than 1m copies.

So a) we’ve established he has liked cricket for a long time, and b) he’s no dummy.

Now, I don’t like or agree with his view that I should be watching Southern Brave at the Ageas Bowl in a four-day ‘championship’, rather than Sussex at Hove, where I have spent so many enjoyable days over the last 40 years. But I have to take note of it, for it is the most articulate outline for why The Hundred could work I have heard so far.

Osman has highlighted the big dialectic (I like that word, I learnt it at university)… or schism/battle at the heart of the English (and Welsh) game for the next decade: will it be 18 counties, or the new eight franchises (maybe even more – increasing to 12?)

Because I don’t see both co-existing easily together. 

They are worlds apart.

Have you seen some of the advertising for The Hundred?

^{London Tests remain big-ticket items in the calendar}

Now to me, it is absolutely infantile. But perhaps they are appealing to some. Am I missing something?

The fact of the matter is that many older fans are feeling disenfranchised, and are rather angry about it. As illustrated by attempts to get #OpposeThe100 trending on Twitter.

I was watching a political debate show from the 1970s on YouTube the other day – it was of the mature, intellectual type that puts some of today’s politicians and presenters to shame – and I learnt something. Apparently, when antibiotics were becoming commonplace, some doctors argued that old folk shouldn’t be given them. They believed it would lead to a population explosion.

That such a form of eugenics should even be discussed as recently as 40 to 50 years ago was quite shocking, especially in light of the last 12 months, when society has gone into a series of lockdowns to protect, ostensibly, the old and infirm. 

It reminded me that society then and now leaves a lot to be desired when it comes to respecting the elderly.

The disregard of their views stretches to cricket and in particular the continuing marginalisation of the county game.

Of course, I’m not ignoring market forces. 

I know that more people will attend Blast matches than the Championship. 

I know that the ECB believe that The Hundred will tap into the – allegedly – nine million people in the UK who say they like cricket but don’t attend matches. That is why they allocated mid-summer slots, with the first eight (of 14) Championship matches shoehorned into a bulging schedule before the first weekend in June.

I don’t profess to have a definitive answer as to how to fit in 14 four-day matches, a decent 50-over schedule that reflects England’s status as world champions, a Blast that includes seven lucrative home matches for each county, The Hundred (which the ECB insists we need), and seven Tests and 12 white-ball internationals… but something has to be done, as the red-ball game is being marginalised like never before.

Let it be remembered, Test cricket is still English cricket’s biggest earner. It might not be the case in South Africa or Sri Lanka, but it is here. London Tests sell out, Edgbaston and Trent Bridge Tests do well, and Sky still pays handsomely for the five-day game because it fills valuable airtime.

But if we keep throwing the kitchen sink at these T20-type competitions, and pushing four-day cricket into spring and autumn, England’s Test team will stutter.

Incidentally, the other venue I’ve been to the most to watch county cricket is Chelmsford: like Hove, another ground left behind by time.

Who’s going to win this great civil war, I wonder.

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