Poor crowds 'exceeded budget'

A trio of poor crowds for the early season Twenty20 series between Australia and South Africa has been shrugged off by the Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland, who instead pointed to healthy TV ratings and an unusual summer schedule to dissuade the game's doubters.

The Adelaide Oval assembly of 26,570 filled little more than half the revamped stadium on Wednesday night, but was made to look comparatively bountiful when only 21,538 filed into the 100,000 capacity MCG on Friday. For a time it seemed Sydney's Sunday night attendance would be even less, before late arrivals to Stadium Australia lifted the figure to 24,187 as against 80,000 seats.

Sutherland was in Sydney for Sunday night, and on Monday at the SCG heard Bill Lawry speak of Kerry Packer's despairing efforts to fill the grounds during his World Series Cricket adventure in the late 1970s. Unlike those uncertain days, Sutherland said CA had in fact budgeted for smaller crowds than they eventually witnessed.

"We had reasonable expectations but we got better numbers than we had budgeted for," Sutherland told ESPNcricinfo. "They're pretty good numbers - most grounds around the world would be pretty happy with 25,000 and that's about what we've ended up with across the country for those three games."

Adding further to a more optimistic picture were the television ratings for Nine across the three matches - Adelaide was watched by 1.17 million viewers, while 1.29 million tuned in for the MCG and 1.65 million watched the decider on Sunday - an upward curve that Sutherland hopes to continue.

"One game was a Wednesday night, one a Sunday night, they're school nights and Friday night was in Melbourne in Cup week," he said. "So we knew that at this time of year it was always going to be something where we're launching the season and putting the show on, but it's good to see the TV numbers, and I've got no doubt the crowds will continue to go up as the season goes on. Who knows, by the end of the season we might see 100,000."

Measures of the T20 crowds, and comparisons with larger attendances at A-League football matches in particular, can be balanced by the fact that cricket has seldom if ever gathered large attendances in early November, irrespective of the format.

By contrast, ticket sales for next year's World Cup have been strong, with more than 500,000 already being sold, including a sell out of the match between India and Pakistan at Adelaide Oval. Sutherland has described the tournament as Australia's biggest sporting event since the 2000 Olympics. He is hoping the modest crowds of November are merely the start of a steady build to packed houses in February and March.