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Assessing Cricket Australia’s TV gamble

14th November, 2018
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14th November, 2018
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“It’s cricket, but not as you know it” reads Foxtel’s summer tagline, and for many fans in the last week, this rang frustratingly true.

There was a delayed sense of indignation when the summer’s first international was beamed into just three in ten Australian homes. I say ‘delayed’ because we knew this would be the case way back in April.

Cricket Australia ‘landmark’ deal brokered with Foxtel and Seven stipulated that all white ball internationals would be behind a paywall.

It appeared many (justifiably) didn’t take too much notice of CA’s announcement earlier in the year.

‘$1.2 BILLION’ screamed the dailies, but opulence in sport no longer surprises. Despite some initial column inches, its April release coincided with footy season heating up.

Australian captain Ricky Ponting and adidas Managing Director of Australia Kevin Roberts display the new adidas apparel during a press conference announcing adidas as the official supplier of Cricket Australia's playing uniforms at Cricket Australia's Headquarters April 28, 2005 in Melbourne, Australia.

Kevin Roberts, pictured here with Ricky Ponting in 2005, is Cricket Australia’s new CEO. (Photo: Kristian Dowling/Getty Images)

The sporting world had more pressing matters. Now, however, it is real. The four T20 internationals in the next 11 days won’t be on free-to-air TV.

If we’re looking for precedent, we need to look no further than our old foes in the UK. Their experience in the shift to pay-TV is a cautionary tale told by those lamenting cricket’s downturn in popularity.

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Back in 2005, the England and Wales cricket board moved its entire cricket offering onto pay-tv provider Sky Sports after that year’s hugely successful Ashes.

The move brought unprecedented investment in the game’s governing body – which you could argue is a reason for their steady improvement in recent times – but a monumental drop in ratings and with it, wider popularity.

The ECB were blinded by the Sky money, and will still argue to this day their decision was correct. A recent decision to return some cricket to the BBC from 2020 might suggest otherwise.

It’s an intriguing (and complex) case study that, up until this year, Cricket Australia had noted and sought to avoid replicating. Which makes the decision earlier this year to move two of three international formats behind a paywall their biggest gamble in an already testing year.

Forget new chairman, CEO, coach and skipper – granting Foxtel the rights to a significant chunk of the summer is the one result they’ll be sweating on most at Jolimont. Its ramifications for the bottom line are stark.

The predicament is nothing new.

Sporting bodies are continually weighing up the fiscal foresight of a) putting their sport behind a paywall and guaranteeing a financial windfall, while alienating a percentage of the population; and b) granting rights to a free-to-air provider, thereby sacrificing a big payday but guaranteeing long-term exposure to all eyes.

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As it turns out, Cricket Australia has gone down the middle: ODIs, T20Is and around a quarter of BBL games are pay-TV only, while tests and all other BBL games are free-to-air.

Aaron Finch and the disappointed Aussies

Australia has been playing badly – not that you’d know it (AAP Image/Richard Wainwright)

So while they haven’t followed the ECB path and moved the entire product to a Murdoch subsidiary, this is a time they can ill-afford to have any international cricket reserved for the few.

Some argue, convincingly, that the move to put ODIs behind a paywall is insignificant given the format’s decline in recent years.

While this is hard to argue with, the decision to have all T20 Internationals on Foxtel appears extremely short-sighted. CA has made no secret its desire to push T20 as a primary marketing tool for the younger generation.

Putting all of next week’s T20s against India on Foxtel blocks momentum leading into the summer.

There’s no doubt Foxtel will be great for cricket. Their production and commentary has already shown promising signs, and a dedicated 24-hour cricket channel can only be good for the game. But, as cricket is essentially a numbers game, it’s impossible to look past the 70 per cent who are missing out.

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The ‘go watch it at a pub’ argument, usually espoused by those with access to the games, is unfeasible.

Cricket Australia will argue the money derived from the Foxtel deal ensures it can invest in the game at a far greater level than if they accepted a free-to-air only deal. But then again, that’s exactly what the ECB said. It’s also the primary justification sporting bodies the world over use to justify what is essentially an exposure cut.

In the UK, a cull in free-to-air screen time coincided with a downturn in the game’s popularity.

Here’s hoping the same fate doesn’t await.

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