Decent session for the English Bats men

I was speaking about the days before Sky monopolised professional sports the other day. I first got Sky in the late 80's(in the days you had to buy the equipment in Rumbelows) and have subscribed for a massive amount of time since(I did cancel recently, but have it again as I can claim the costs back as I use it for research for my job) but even I miss the times when random football matches and cricket matches would pop up on ITV and BBC.

 

Sky told him...

 

research. Look them up. Theres a site with the attendance between 1997 and 2015 that's quite interesting.

 

I'll not bother....I have a life to live

Didn't cricket exist before 1997 ?

 

But what have the attendances in the 90's got to do with anything today? Don't you think the fact the matches were available to all on terrestrial TV may have had an effect on them? Relying on statistics and records only doesn't tell you the whole story, does it? Sky gave you an example of this yesterday when they focussed on Sir Viv Richards. They showed his career stats, and said that based on the number of runs he scored(I think it was around 8,500, albeit at an average of ~50) he would't be at the top of the top run scorers, but to a man, everyone on the Sky team said he was the best batsmen they ever faced...

 

That was 2001 not nineties, and people didn't go because the match was effectively rained off, going in to day 5 there'd been three solid rain days - but gilchrist (stand in captain as Steve Waugh was injured) and Hussain declared an innings each, as well as a very sporting first innings declaration by gilchrist to set a target and manufacture a result. He thought they'd win, butch won it for England.

The rest of that series had been pretty much sold out. The crowds were there. England had been improving and there was a bigger sense of optimism, which increased again by 05 when we finally beat them.

But don't let the truth get in the way of a good argument, you never normally do.

 

Interesting to see that both M Vaughan and England Captain Joe Root both commentated how good the atmosphere was in the first day night test. https://www.instagram.com/p/BX5-SRQjtf-/

 

seen this lovely comment.

• pommers68First time visiting a TM in the UK for me and my boys (12 & 14) - a fantastic atmosphere and a great day. Well done Root and Cook! The first of many got us all I expect!

 

The crowd sounded great. It really did. The one thing all the players said about the previous DayNight matches was the atmosphere is electric once the lights come on...

Thats not what were saying though. What is being "debated", is a) The match is a complete missmatch, and that if it was a boxing match the ref would have called it off already, and b) the crowd was very sparse for many parts of the game, even more so than most other tests. This could be another consequence of the quality of opposition, and it would be interesting to see what the crowd would be like if they were playing South Africa, India or the Convicts...

The litmus test though will be Saturday and Sunday though(if it goes that far).

 

Okay. It's only going to become more like this though. With Ireland which England or more Ireland will want to play home and away in the next 2/3 years and Afghanistan that could be a test away in the UAE but not really over here if the ECB wanted them to play them in England. Sri lanka look to be on the way down at the moment.

 

With regards to Ireland and the Afgans, I have nothing against playing them. They are both starting from the bottom and trying to build their Test teams from scratch, and the only way they are going to get better is by playing the top teams. Either that or the ICC need to split the Test nations into 2 divisions to allow them to be competitive(but that probably wont happen as at least one of the better teams will have to be grouped with them, which will cost them money).

I think with the West Indies, they were so, so good in the past, and people can see that the team is heavily depleted by the top players chasing the money so a lot of the good will is instantly used up. If their board would incentivise Test cricket more, then they would be a lot stronger and this would be more of a match. As for Sri Lanka, they have been on the way down since the chucker(Murili) retired...

 

Apropos of nothing but I've just bought a ticket for this afternoon. I was told there are still some available for tomorrow and "as many as you want, lovey", for Sunday.

 

Mary Mary, very contrary, oh just how does your garden grow? Do you have cockle shells, and silver bells, are your pretty maids all in a row?

 

The oval tests tend to have full seats, hence why they are aiming to increase capacity in the next 5 years from 23k, to 40k, the only gaps are when corporates are having lunch (lengthy), at the start as people arrive, when people are getting refreshments and maybe at the end if people have to catch a particular train.

I've been to Edgbaston for a t20 finals day when Northants won, and it was rammed. Maybe touts bought all the tickets, or maybe people were hiding under the seats the play was so average. I'll just believe my own eyes, as I'd expect everyone else to do.

Anyway, have a nice day watching it. I'm giving it a miss today.