Quote:
Originally Posted by windymiller
The downside of this decision, and it's a big downside, is that the ECB wont get anything like the money for the rights from terrestrial channels than they would get from the pay TV companies. (we assume SKY would be the highest bidder) Therefore there would be a dramatic cut in the funding for grassroots cricket in England and Wales. This will be hugely detrimental in terms of facilities and the quality of coaching for young players and we could see the England side return to the doldrums of world cricket. I hate Murdoch and everything he stands for, I think most of us do. But I have to admit that SKYs cricket coverage is excellent, much better than the snorefest that used to be served up by the BBC.
The ECB just cant afford to go along with this decision and I wont be surprised if we see this end up going through the courts.
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I agree that the Sky coverage is really high quality. However, Channel 4 did a very good job, far better than the BBC, plus they didn't keep changing the time slot as the BBC were always doing. The one thing I really miss about the BBC is Richie Benaud's sane and very knowledgeable commentary, and he had retired anyway. After some initial crass gimmicks, Channel 5 settled down to providing very good no-nonsense coverage as well. I thought Michael Vaughan said it all yesterday when he pointed out that the 2005 Ashes series drew audiences typically around 7.7 million, enormous in today's multi-channel world; the 2009 Ashes series regularly drew 1.5-1.8 million. That's an awful lot of kids, the potential future of the game, who were watching something else or playing with their XBox instead. Millions of kids watching England in a fierce, closely matched contest against Australia, who will always be
the team to beat, that is going to be of more lasting benefit to grassroots cricket than Murdoch's cash, spent on Lord knows what.
On this specific matter, the government are right and the EBC were wrong. But IMHO it is not the province of HM Government to manage the affairs of cricket. If they do, ultimately they will make a worse job even than the ECB. Who knows what else they will meddle with, screw up, then walk away from, leaving ordinary joes to salvage whatever they can from the mess? The British motor industry perhaps, or the steel industry...