M Parkinson: Sky's the limit for cricket (29 Jun 1998)

29 June 1998

Sky's the limit for cricket

By Michael Parkinson

A BLOKE came up to me in a restaurant and said: "How dare you hand cricket to Rupert Murdoch?" He was clearly agitated by the news that on the recommendation of an advisory group of which I was a member, the Government had decided to allow all television companies to bid for coverage of home Test matches. I said: "Supposing it's as simple as that - and it's not - but supposing Sky television did take over the coverage of Test matches, what are you frightened of?"

He looked at me as if he had met a simpleton. "It's obvious, isn't it? The game will die on its backside."

I said: "What is obvious, is that in spite of the game being shown on BBC for the past 50 years it is already in terminal decline." He wasn't convinced, and he is not alone. For many people the link between BBC TV and cricket is a reaffirmation of summer's ritual, part of John Major's dream of a Britain where cricketers flit o'er village greens and bobbies ride bikes, and nothing is heard but the sound of Jonners, Arlott and Benaud. I liked it better then too. But now it's different and unless cricket changes and is given the means of change it will warrant only a passing glance by a new generation caring little for tradition.

It will be interesting to see how cricket fares in the competitive world it now finds itself. For the first time it will be able to gauge its desirability as a commercial product. I don't imagine people will be trampled in the rush. The assumption Mr Murdoch will immediately make the ECB an offer it can't refuse is easily made but unlikely to be forthcoming. There is a feeling BSkyB's deal with football's Premier League achieved everything required in terms of building a foundation for the station's overall ambitions and that future investment might concentrate on areas other than sport. Certainly Elizabeth Murdoch, the company's new chief executive, has a different agenda from her predecessor Sam Chisholm. Cricket is unlikely to be top of her shopping list.

It might be Sky bid aggressively for one or two Test matches but I'd be surprised if they made a serious claim on the whole caboodle. In any event we on the advisory group took seriously the pledge by the ECB that they would be aware of their responsibility to what might be called the traditional television audience for cricket and would not simply sell rights to the highest bidder.

As I see it, the biggest problem facing cricket is how to sell what is a very ordinary package. How much are we bid for a Test team who last won a significant series 11 years ago? How much is a team devoid of success, glamour and superstars worth? Why should anyone invest in a game which, faced with a series of disasters, decides nothing is wrong and carries on much as it ever did?

Cricket does need extra funds. What it doesn't need is more money to give to county chairmen who vote against change. The proposals for next season, particularly the Super Cup for the top eight in the county championship, are unlikely to appeal to sponsors, spectators or players. Which reminds me, if the players themselves think the present system is second rate how can their bosses possibly know better?

The schemes for funding the base of the pyramid and improving the accessibility of the game and the standard of coaching are necessary for the long term. Nothing better demonstrates the chasms in our cricket than the annual slaughter of the innocents which is the first round of the NatWest Trophy. Every year the majority of the minor counties are put to the sword demonstrating the huge gap between what might be termed the first and second layers of cricket. In Australia, a select XI from the premier club sides in any state you care to mention would have a fair chance of beating the state side. Cricketers playing second and third grade cricket in Australia are more often than not as good as, if not better than, our very best club players. In the long term, we have to improve our system. But straight away and most urgently the game must be radical and imaginative in tackling the problem of a negative county set-up and a losing Test team. It is a miserable picture made all the more pathetic by the way cricket is so easily shoved aside by football, Wimbledon or any other alternative.

It is easy nowadays to be dismissive of cricket. Look at the sports pages in the tabloids and you will see what I mean. The game is like some sickly, bed-ridden relative shunted off to a nursing home, living on memories and borrowed time. In the final analysis it really doesn't matter if the game is shown on BBC or the shopping channel. Television companies won't solve cricket's problems. That is down to the people who run the game and that's the worry.

I WANT YOU to imagine England are hosting the World Cup in 2006. Fat chance, but humour me. The French are based in Leeds and during the preliminary rounds their fans destroy Huddersfield town centre, close all the pubs in Barnsley and bring the riot police on to the streets of Sheffield. There are more than 200 arrests and damage to property runs to tens of thousands of pounds.

Having qualified for the knockout stage, the French Football Association and their Minister of Sport, Monsieur Antoine Banques - who have already criticised the way the English authorities have dealt with the situation (indeed one French politician said the French thugs were not criminals but ghosts of Napoleon's army) - complain that their fans have not received a fair allocation of tickets for the next round.

Having imagined thus far, patient reader, then what do you reckon our tabloids, Tony Banks, Mr Blair, Graham Kelly, the phone-in pundits, Jimmy Hill and Alan Clark would be saying? You can be sure they would be telling the French to "frog off" (or some such similar phrase) and think themselves lucky they had any tickets at all because in a less tolerant society their fans would all have been locked up and sent home.

Am I being unduly fanciful or letting my imagination run riot? I think not. Those dorks bellyaching about unfair treatment should understand the loathing and contempt felt for English fans in France and be grateful the French have been patient and good-natured hosts.

The argument that decent people have their fun spoilt by a violent minority doesn't wash. What 'decent' person with even half a brain would want to cross the Channel to be associated with the drongos we see on our television screens. They should remember the old adage about people who lie with dogs catching fleas. Rabies more like with that lot.

No matter how well the England team perform - and against Colombia they played with style and brio - we must not allow their success to become a smokescreen for the behaviour of their supporters. Instead of griping about the fans not having tickets, the FA should be concentrating on why the game they are responsible for is the chosen favourite of the sediment of our society.

GOING TO Wimbledon was the antidote to the World Cup. Proper as a pin-stripe, good-natured as a strawberry, it remains resolutely in pre-Lager Age England. The tennis wasn't bad either.

Pete Sampras is one of the all-time greats. The only way his critics can knock him is to allege he is boring, which means he doesn't kick the furniture or abuse officials. They had better cast their eyes across the Channel to see the consequences of celebrating that kind of hero.

My enjoyment of the day was sealed by the company of Dickie Bird. A fire in a nearby building sent black smoke billowing over Wimbledon and caused much speculation. Umpire Bird looked at it wondering, no doubt, if he should bring the players off. "Do you reckon it's a chip pan fire?" he said.

Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)