South Africa's batsman JP Duminy. Monday March 2, 2009. AP Photo/Themba Hadebe
I have watched live Test cricket since 1952 (Bombay Test between India and England remembered for centuries by Tom Graveney and my childhood hero Vijay Hazare) and televised Test cricket since 1970 (the Perth Ashes Test when Greg Chappell scored a century on debut).
Both have been experiences to cherish.
But since 1970, television coverage has made gigantic strides, especially when Channel 9 took over during the Packer years and thereafter.
Oh, for colour clothes on colour TV, the slow-mo instant replays, the on-screen on-field interviews of players!
Over the years, the snicko-metre, hawk eye, hot spots and replays from different angles have made life more enjoyable for the viewers and at times more unbearable for the umpires.
Every four, every six, every dot ball is represented in different hues and dimensions.
I wonder why people purchase expensive tickets and wait in long queues to see live matches when they can watch it all and more on TV at home or in pubs – perhaps with a mute button pressed as they listen to the wisdom of radio commentators and a guffaw or four from Kerry (O’Keeffe not Packer).
Also during live matches, I’ve seen spectators watch the replays on TV screens and mouth their opinions like experts.
TV cricket has converted us all into mega-experts.
My only criticism is: why do TV shows the action always from the same angle? Why do we always see the back of the bowler bowling to the batsman?
The batsman is always facing us, the bowler always backing us during a delivery.
There is no indication on TV whether Mitchell Johnson, for instance, is bowling from the Paddington end or the Randwick end at the SCG. I often get disoriented when watching cricket on Channel 9 and on Foxtel.
Do you?
Why not show the action from both ends? Have only one camera for routine presentation.
Then we can realise on TV that Johnson is bowling to Mohammad Yousuf from the Randwick end. And after that Doug Bollinger is bowling to Umar Akmal, for instance, from the Paddington end.
You can distinguish this if you are watching a match live, but not on TV. I would like to see how it feels to face a bowler and the next over to see it from the bowler’s line of vision.
In tennis, you see action from both ends on TV, just as you see it live.
Roger Federer serves from side X then he receives from Rafael Nadal also from side X. After a brief rest break, it is the other way round.
TV viewers see action from both angles in tennis but not in cricket.
Same is the case in football and rugby codes as in tennis. The action is from right to left for Parramatta (for example) before the interval and from left to right for them after the break.
But in TV cricket, it is always a bowler to a batsman. You never see the batsman’s back, except in replays.
The summing up of the Oz-Windies and the Oz-Pak series by Channel 9 after the Hobart Test was won by Ponting’s men was brilliant. Especially Chris Gayle’s contrasting centuries, Shane Watson and Simon Katich’s nervous nineties and Doug Bollinger’s ballistic bowling – all set to music.
Well done, Channel 9.
But do you think the commentators Mark Nicholas, Ian Healy and Michael Slater mixed up the MCG and SCG Tests at one stage?
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