Chris Waters - Sky proves not to be the limit for cricket supporters

WOULD you Adam and Eve it?
England captain Joe Root was just 14 the last time Test match cricket was shown free-to-air on Channel 4, a certain Ashes series in the summer of 2005. Picture: Danny Reuben/ECBEngland captain Joe Root was just 14 the last time Test match cricket was shown free-to-air on Channel 4, a certain Ashes series in the summer of 2005. Picture: Danny Reuben/ECB
England captain Joe Root was just 14 the last time Test match cricket was shown free-to-air on Channel 4, a certain Ashes series in the summer of 2005. Picture: Danny Reuben/ECB

Just when some of us were really looking forward to a repeat episode of Fifteen to One at 4.10am on Channel 4 this Friday, closely followed by a repeat episode of Countdown at 5.50am, the station goes and rips up its schedule by putting Test cricket back on terrestrial television for the first time in 16 years.

Truly, you couldn’t make it up.

Now we will never know whether Mavis Whatchamacallit from Clitheroe was going to pick “one number from the top row, please, and any other five” in Countdown’s Numbers Game, or whether she would have gone for a different combination.

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Quite frankly, lovers of (very) early-morning quiz shows have had their plans ruined.

Still, and levity aside, it’s great news that the Test series between India and England is on free-to-air television, with the first Test starting in Chennai at 4am.

Sixteen years is an awful long time (16 years, if my maths is right), since when a generation of potential Test cricket fans has been lost to a sport that has only been available to watch – highlights excepted – on subscription TV in the five-day form.

Why, as Yorkshire’s Joe Root prepares to celebrate the magnificent achievement of playing 100 Test matches, people may finally get to find out what he actually looks like.

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Root was 14 when the last ball of live Test cricket was screened in this country on free-to-air – also on Channel 4, when a certain Ashes series in the summer of 2005 captured our hearts.

Back then, Freddie Flintoff was a household name in every household – not just in those households with access to Sky.

Michael Vaughan, Matthew Hoggard, Kevin Pietersen et al were as recognisable as today’s England players have been comparatively invisible, the oxygen of exposure raising 
their profiles and that of the game.

When the sport then disappeared behind Sky’s paywall, with the England and Wales Cricket Board deciding to prioritise money over exposure, English cricket basically sold its soul and forgot the basic principle that mass publicity is better than limited publicity.

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It is estimated that 22.6m people watched at least 30 minutes of live cricket during that 2005 series, one that featured so many twists and turns that one is still liable to come over all faint just thinking about them all.

In contrast, the next home Ashes series, in 2009, had a peak of just under 2m viewers, with English cricket missing its chance to capitalise on the success of Vaughan and his colleagues.

It might be wondered – specifically by those who fork out for its service – why this India Test series is not on Sky, and why they have apparently not made more of an effort to get it.

Apparently, the word is that Sky want to keep their wallet dry for the Ashes series this winter (they lost the last one Down Under to BT Sport), but still it seems a bit rich from a subscriber’s point of view, particularly when Sky has a dedicated cricket channel.

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Still, the benefits of greater exposure far outweigh all other considerations for those with the interests of cricket at heart.

We saw as recently as 2019 what a bit of free-to-air can do for the game in this country when Sky and Channel 4 simultaneously broadcast the 50-over World Cup final when England beat New Zealand.

That the sport has been unable to build on that great day as it would have wished is, of course, through no fault of its own and the result of the global crisis.

Whether the momentum of 2019, let alone that of 2005, can be fully recaptured remains to be seen, but the return of Test cricket to free-to-air is one heck of a start and, perhaps, signals a change in mindset by the terrestrial broadcasters who, in this case, no doubt sensed a clear commercial opportunity with so many people currently stuck at home.

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As Ian Katz, Channel 4’s chief content officer, put it: “What better antidote to the lockdown blues than an England Test series in sunny India.”

Although the 4am start-time is not ideal for English viewers, the third Test in the four-match series is a day/night affair and so will start at the friendlier time here of 9am.

The lockdown should certainly push up viewing figures considerably, while the white-ball leg of the tour – featuring five T20s and three one-day internationals – could prove especially popular if, as expected, it is also snapped up by Channel 4.

For now, let us simply celebrate the fact that Test cricket can be seen again without a subscription for what promises to be an intriguing series between two fine teams.

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The achievements of Joe Root and his players deserve greater exposure.

Let us hope that this is just the beginning.

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