TNT turn to cycling and rugby commentators for UK Ashes coverage

TNT Sports will rely on rugby union and cycling specialists to lead their Ashes coverage from the UK in an unusual hybrid commentary model which will also involve a team of pundits in Australia.

The subscription broadcaster, formerly BT Sport, also covered the 2021-22 Ashes but, on that occasion, it relied primarily on the world feed provided by Fox Sports, supplemented by a studio team in the UK. This time, Alastair Cook, Steven Finn and Graeme Swann will work as on-site pundits in Australia but Alastair Eykyn and Rob Hatch, two TNT regulars, will lead commentary from home.

TNT will also send presenter Becky Ives to Australia for the duration of the series, while Ebony Rainford-Brent will be part of their commentary team from the UK. Their coverage will also include daily highlights shows and a review programme called The Edge after each Test in a primetime slot.

Scott Young, executive vice president at Warner Bros Discovery Sports Europe (which owns TNT), said that Eykyn and Hatch are "huge cricket fans" despite their limited professional experience in the sport. "They will not try to pretend they are part of cricket history," Young said. "They are great commentators in their own right… who can really drive a narrative."

He added that WDB ruled out the prospect of using the world feed commentary soon after securing the rights, and said that TNT's coverage should appeal to more general sports fans: "The Ashes is a step above that. TNT Sports is a step above that… Nothing against the world feed, which will be a great production. But we needed to talk about what the Ashes meant to our audience, to TNT Sports.

"That's why we're bringing many of our sports broadcasters into the fold. It's about bringing the football, rugby, even fight-sports fan-base, and making them aware of the Ashes as a moment in time. This is not just a cricket Test, it's the Ashes. If we can get people who are not normally going to watch cricket for a day or a Test, then that's very much part of the TNT Sports ethos."

Last year, TNT sent Cook, Finn and presenter Kate Mason to Sweden to cover England's Test series in India remotely, citing a lack of availability of studio space in London. The unusual arrangement came after they secured the UK rights at such short notice that Matt Floyd presented their coverage on his own for the first Test, without studio guests.

TNT has gradually expanded its rights portfolio to the extent that it will broadcast all three England men's bilateral tours this winter, with white-ball series in New Zealand and Sri Lanka either side of the Ashes. However, Sky Sports remains the exclusive UK rights-holder to broadcast England's home internationals and ICC events.

Young also claimed that viewers "won't know" where commentators are during live action, even if they are 10,000 miles away from one another. "There are different ways we will do it," he said. "Our play-by-play team will be here. The pundits will be here, or on-site. The way it works is that you won't know where they are, the way the commentary booths are set up."

Cook and Finn are both regulars on the BBC's Test Match Special but have signed exclusive deals with TNT for the series, so will not appear on radio coverage. At the launch of TNT's coverage at The Oval on Tuesday, Cook said that England have "a really good chance" of winning the series if "a few things" go their way.

"Certainly, they've got more chance than sides previously going down," he said. "I think we'd all be naive to say that Australia aren't favourites, just with the history of the sides and the fact that [England] haven't won a Test match [in Australia] since 2011. However, you start looking at the way this England side play, and you actually think, 'Yeah, they've got a really good chance.'

"I won't say they're fearful of England, but everyone who plays England now knows that if you're not on it for every minute, this side has the ability - which not many other sides have - to change games in an hour or two, and make such a big impact. That's the way that [Ben] Stokes and [Brendon] McCullum want to play, and they've got the players which are capable of doing it."

Cook believes that England's hopes rest on making a strong start to the series, citing their resilience in the drawn Brisbane Test during their 2010-11 triumph in Australia. "[The fans] started respecting how we played cricket and how good that team was and it definitely helped, and they put Australia under pressure.

"Remember, Australia don't lose many Ashes series at home. If England can be in this series after three games, that pressure switches massively onto Australia… The challenge is can they stay in it well enough, and play good enough early on, that they start making Australia doubt their style, and getting their public to doubt their team?"

The traditional media phoney war has stepped up in recent days. David Warner joked on Monday that England are playing for "a moral victory" and predicted a 4-0 Australia win, to which his old nemesis Stuart Broad responded that Australia's side is the weakest it has been since England's victory in 2010-11.