This column is a little later and more rushed than usual, because I’m sport shifting. And time shifting. I’m preparing to fly out to the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow this weekend.
And I’m knee deep in the World Cup.
Not the World Cup that just finished in Brazil, but the World Cup that finished a little earlier in the Netherlands. For the first time in my career I’ve been assigned to cover hockey.
Sure, there was a one-off occasion back in the mid-eighties when ABCTV had (I think) an interstate match to cover.
It was in the days when I was a sideline reporter for rugby league and that led to me being the default sideline reporter for anything else that moved. I don’t remember much about the occasion. I suspect it might’ve even been at the Sydney Sports Ground, that’s how long ago it was!
Of course, over the years I’ve watched the occasional Hockeyroos or Kookaburras match at an Olympics or Commonwealth Games, and I remember a few years ago watching and enjoying some Champions Trophy matches and thinking how much more accessible the game seemed to me after several years of watching and enjoying soccer.
Anyway, with two of ABC Grandstand’s most experienced hockey callers, Quentin Hull and Tim Gavel, occupied with other sports in Glasgow (Quentin with athletics and Tim spreading his talents across rowing and rugby sevens, as well as hockey) some of the gaps need to be filled by yours truly.
It’s one of the most terrifying and pleasurable aspects of working for an organisation where specialisation is a luxury afforded to none. And it’s resulted in me suddenly taking as little interest in rugby league as Darius Boyd does in media interviews.
It’s been hockey morning, noon and night for me since last Sunday when I finished my last NRL show for a few weeks.
As I’ve watched the action from the World Cup that finished a few weeks ago in the Netherlands, a question put to me last weekend by Hens FC panelist Julie Dolan (the former captain of the Australian women’s football team) keeps bobbing around in my head.
Why doesn’t hockey have a higher profile in Australia?
The question keeps coming back to me because I’m struggling for an answer. Clearly the competitiveness of the Aussie teams is not an issue. The men are top ranked in the world and were the gold medalists in the Netherlands. The women took silver.
It’s a fast, skilful game to watch and has a good participation rate among both sexes at the grass roots.
I suppose the default answer for most people would be lack of media coverage. Yet the Hockey World Cup was covered on ABCTV.
As I’ve watched replays of the games involving the Hockeyroos and the Kookaburras I’ve enjoyed them so much I’ve found myself wondering why I didn’t watch them live at the time. The answer certainly isn’t that I didn’t know they were on; I was giving the results on breakfast radio the morning after many games.
Working breakfast radio is a clue, because mostly the games were late night, early morning east coast time in Australia, and staying awake to watch them live was problematic for many people. There were however some nights when I didn’t have to work early the next morning, but then there was also the small matter of the French Open tennis and the FIFA World Cup which, between them, overlapped either end of the hockey World Cup.
Not that I stayed awake into the wee hours to watch everything that happened in those tournaments either but, given my affection for tennis and football goes back further than any affinity with hockey, I was always more likely to choose from my long established sporting preferences.
Therein lies the real issue for sports trying to build a bigger profile – there is just so much sport to choose from. And when faced with a choice, most people gravitate towards the sport they know best.
It doesn’t mean the other sports are inferior, or that the general sports viewer dislikes them, it’s just hard to find a potential sports viewer whose cup doesn’t already runneth over.
The naive idea that sports just need to be put in front of the public more regularly and they’ll attract new fans drives me crazy. Perhaps there are some innately curious sports-loving folk with lots of free time who’d make the effort to sit down and watch a telecast of a sport they know little about, take the time to get familiar with the rules, the teams and the characters, but that’s not how the average person operates.
Even more unusual would be someone who took that curiosity to the level of showing up and paying their money to watch a live event of a sport they know little about.
I blame Kevin Costner and his damn “build it and they will come” line for some of the silliness around this question of attracting new fans. Several times a week as a sports broadcaster I get hassled about “why didn’t you mention this sport?” or “You left out this result?” from supporters of lower profile sports who seem to think that having a team, or a sport, or a result mentioned on the radio will magically make their sport more popular. I wish I was so influential!
These days with pay-TV, digital radio and the internet, people are increasingly able to narrow down their preferences with regards to sport – as well as news and politics – so the fact that something is mentioned on the air, in a news bulletin, or in print means less and less that it’s actually being read, heard or absorbed by anyone other than those who are already interested.
So, you may well ask, “How do the ‘other sports’ shoulder their way into the mainstream?”
They need to find a way to make potential fans take the time and effort to care about their teams, their results, their personalities. How do they do that? That’s the multi-million dollar question that sports marketing gurus all across the planet wrestle with every day.
So rather than leave you with an answer as I dash off to the airport, I leave you with the question: how do sports recruit new fans?
I wish I knew. I’m no guru, I just happen to be an incredibly lucky sports fan whose job has given her the incentive to invest time, energy and emotion in the Australian men’s and women’s hockey teams.
I’m going to enjoy the ride for the next few weeks and, no doubt, come home with a brand new affection for the sport.
(If, by the way, I stumble across the answer to the question I’ve posed here I will let you know. Then I promise to keep blogging from my multi-storey waterfront mansion in Monaco!)
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