Big Bash League 2014/15

[SteveNZ]

So you don't think Lee's wide down the leg side on the first free hit ball had anything to do with it ?

And the resulting six, I presume you mean? Yes, in a cause and effect sort of way. Doug being outside the ring caused Lee to have to change his plans. Without the free hit, he's possibly not bowling the deliveries he did. Very different bowling to a set batsman who knows if he gets out it's curtains, as opposed to bowling a ball that the set batsman knows he can't get out to.

All I'm saying is yeah, if Henriques collects that ball we're going to a super over. But if Doug (and probably Henriques needs to take ownership too) are on the ball, there's a decent chance the Sixers win. Of course, sport being sport, anything could've happened given a different circumstance. But it definitely was a momentum shift, that took Lyon and a great last over to change

 

[Riggins]

Nah he was definitely outside the circle. If he wasn't then there would never have been an overthrow on that ball.

 

[SteveNZ]

Nah he was definitely outside the circle. If he wasn't then there would never have been an overthrow on that ball.

Yeah, I was disappointed CH10 didn't show that on a wider shot. Kudos to Blocker Wilson for picking it up, and reverse kudos to Henriques who should be as vigilant. Big dopey fast bowlers can't be trusted, especially big dopey Dougs

 

[Niall]

I don't watch the T20 Blast, pray tell why it's better? And I wouldn't wager many Australians have any knowledge of it either, so I'd dispute whether there's a comparison.

I think he was joking. Cabinet is English and if you are from that neck of the woods, he has has been bombarded by online talk about how amazing the Big Bash is and how worthless the English t20 version is, its exhausting really. Think the lowlight or highlight was Lumb pretty much saying the English version was **** ignoring the fact he was rubbish in it last year.

Nobody genuinely thinks the English version is better, but it gets tiring been told the Blast is crap all the time. Contrary to what KP and his ilk will tell you, the Blast has loads of good games this season and does actually get very good crowds especially in London.

I'd also argue t20 champions of England Warwickshire would give Perth a very good match and would probably be favorites if you allowed both sides to play their internationals.

 

[Niall]

I

I'd also argue t20 champions of England Warwickshire would give Perth a very good match and would probably be favorites if you allowed both sides to play their internationals.

Just for anybody curious

Final: Warwickshire v Lancashire at Birmingham, Aug 23, 2014 | Cricket Scorecard | ESPN Cricinfo

That is the Warwickshire team. Trott could also be selected.

So what you reckon guys, could they trouble Perth?

 

[Cabinet96]

in all seriousness i don't understand the obsession over franchises in england as if that's what's made the bbl successful. try quality fta coverage and more compact scheduling first.

I straight up don't get franchise cricket. Like, why is it done at all? In Australia people just support the one that realistically represents their state and there are a few players which effectively change teams for the tournament, but I don't see why you can't just do that with the normal state sides anyway. I understand the point in England is you want less teams, but in Australia they actually added two. I don't see how the Big Bash League is any different from the original Big Bash except for the fact they allow an extra overseas player, told us all it's bigger and better and people suddenly decided it was much better. Like, it really confuses me.

I guess people are trying to follow the Premier League model, but even that was the same teams just with more tv exposure and more money involved. Why not just do that? Why does it have to be a rebranding of teams with over a century of tradition?

 

[Cabinet96]

Plus I don't get why everyone complains about County Cricket. It is what it is. Besides go to a ground on a Friday and you see thousands there.

 

[Niall]

Plus I don't get why everyone complains about County Cricket. It is what it is. Besides go to a ground on a Friday and you see thousands there.

Friday nights work for a lot of people. The ECB spent a lot of time trying to figure out when England fans wanted t20 and everyone agreed it was Friday Night.

Australia have lots of advantages which England don't. The Bash is on free to air in Australia, sadly I don't think any terrestrial companies are crying out for cricket in England, sadly most are getting rid of live sport. The idea of playing it all in a block which everyone wants is fine in Australia, but in England when you have rain a lot, it is not possible, in fact the last time they tried it in a block about 1/5 of the games got rained off.

 

[Cabinet96]

Having done a bit of looking at possible rebranding ideas having a first and second division appeals to me, like the County Championship. But I'd still just keep it as the counties.

 

[Antihippy]

I straight up don't get franchise cricket. Like, why is it done at all? In Australia people just support the one that realistically represents their state and there are a few players which effectively change teams for the tournament, but I don't see why you can't just do that with the normal state sides anyway. I understand the point in England is you want less teams, but in Australia they actually added two. I don't see how the Big Bash League is any different from the original Big Bash except for the fact they allow an extra overseas player, told us all it's bigger and better and people suddenly decided it was much better. Like, it really confuses me.

I guess people are trying to follow the Premier League model, but even that was the same teams just with more tv exposure and more money involved. Why not just do that? Why does it have to be a rebranding of teams with over a century of tradition?

I think the whole point of the rebrand is to be able to give it an entirely fresh slate for CA to redesign everything, from brand image, to the way it's run. Completely separates.it from shield cricket and gather more audiences that are different from the cricket tragics that would follow shield cricket. Get a whole new audience really. Which I think is one thing the big bash has done really well. The colours, mascots and gimmicks may seem a bit garish but they've done really well in getting families and kids in.

Seeing the TV ratings and audience numbers and it's great to see our domestic players getting more exposure.

edit: though that being said I really don't know if the T20 blast is doing the same thing either. My perception is that it mostly attracts the same people who follow county cricket.

 

[Cabinet96]

I'd be against trying to detach it from long format cricket though. What's the point of trying to bring new people to the game if you're not trying to get them into the Shield or Championship as well and are instead just hoping they follow a sub-section of the sport? Someone like GIMH or Pothas could explain to you for hours how the creation of the Premier League in English football has hurt their teams due to increasing the gap between the top level and lower leagues. Cricket is probably similarly vulnerable to that with the new money in the T20 form and the lack of glamour in long format cricket these days, and if it got more extreme that would suck in my eyes.

If we're going to start calling Middlesex the North London something silly I'd much rather we did it across all of county cricket than leave the Championship (which, lets face it, needs the audience much more than a comp which attracts thousands, much, much more) adrift.

#AgainstModernCricket

 

[Antihippy]

Thing is I don't really think the big bash is trying to push out the more traditional formats really. I don't think there's much CA can do to give shield cricket the same prestige as county cricket, but it seems very telling that the big bash is concentrated in one block and is designed more as a festival really. It's meant to be a sideshow. They actually do pretty well in integrating test cricket as part of the programming. If there's a test going on they always do a half-time interview with the coach. Test greats like ponting, gilchrist and mark waugh commentate on the game and they always discuss about the test or ODI matches that happened recently.

Shield cricket will always be something for the more hardcore cricket fans, but at least the big bash gives an avenue for someone to follow a domestic player who might one day go on to national duties which CA is still obviously placing their priorities in. The big bash is definitely starting to turn into something much bigger though.

 

[Prince EWS]

What's the point of trying to bring new people to the game if you're not trying to get them into the Shield or Championship as well and are instead just hoping they follow a sub-section of the sport?

Do you think actually making the Shield or Championship keenly followed and/or profitable competitions is really an achievable goal?

I don't think the idea really is to get people who follow domestic T20 to start following domestic FC cricket as well. It's just not going to happen IMO. You can, however, take some of the money the former generates to prop up the latter...

 

[Cabinet96]

Do you think actually making the Shield or Championship keenly followed and/or profitable competitions is really an achievable goal?

I don't think the idea really is to get people who follow domestic T20 to start following domestic FC cricket as well. It's just not going to happen IMO. You can, however, take some of the money the former generates to prop up the latter...

Enough people like long format cricket for test matches to be really successful in certain countries. And in sports like Association Football domestic stuff is arguably bigger than international stuff. So I don't think it's theoretically impossible. The issue is that at the moment domestic stuff is an incredibly diluted version of international stuff in that the maximum number of international standard players you'll see in a game rarely exceeds two or three players on either side, which isn't at all the case in football. You'd have to try and increase the talent pool, probably by improving associate cricket, actively encourage overseas players rather than limiting and discouraging them and prevent domestic games clashing with internationals; which all sounds hard but you don't know until you've tried. But I can definitely envisage a future of high level, highly followed domestic first class stuff in the long distance future, simply because that's how it is in football.

 

[Prince EWS]

There was I time I would've agreed 100%, but I've basically just given up on the idea of marketable domestic First Class cricket. I don't think it's ever going to happen again no matter what you do. I think the administrators basically gave up on it even before I did.

 

[Cabinet96]

When globalisation reaches it's peak international sport will die for good and cricket will be awesome, obviously.

 

[Prince EWS]

I'm probably a bit more cynical about people's support for long-form cricket than you. I think a lot of casual fans support it for cultural and institutional reasons rather than a true love of it. If you abolished international cricket I don't think four-day domestic cricket would gain much popularity; in fact I think it'd probably fizzle out into an irrelevance without Test cricket to supply a pathway to. It couldn't survive on the strength of diehards like us alone.

 

[vic_orthdox]

I'll put my hand up and admit I was wrong, had massive misgivings about the whole repackaging of the T20 competition.

But you know what, the idea wasn't aimed at me, nor anyone else who posts on this forum. Cricket Australia brought it forward because of trends in junior participation and engagement, and from all reports it's done marvels. Going to a game can almost be tedious with the amount of rubbish on the scoreboards, PAs and all the other spectacles around it, but the kids are loving their night at the cricket; if it starts an engagement in the game for the 7-12 year olds in some form, then it's going to be for the best. And combined with a great TV presentation, it's still a great product to consume as a cricket lover.

I went to a Stars game with 32,000 and I'd never seen that many youngsters in a whole crowd at the AFL.

The participation issue in England is a stark reminder that the status quo can't be continued, from a marketing side of it at ECB level through to the participation at local leagues.

 

[Spikey]

I straight up don't get franchise cricket. Like, why is it done at all? In Australia people just support the one that realistically represents their state and there are a few players which effectively change teams for the tournament, but I don't see why you can't just do that with the normal state sides anyway. I understand the point in England is you want less teams, but in Australia they actually added two. I don't see how the Big Bash League is any different from the original Big Bash except for the fact they allow an extra overseas player, told us all it's bigger and better and people suddenly decided it was much better. Like, it really confuses me.

Originally CA had dreams of selling large stakes in each 'franchise' to private owners. That plan was abolished reasonably early on, and given the history of private ownership in Australian sporting history, that was probably a good thing, and now, it isn't really a franchise system. CA/the states own everything. There's no shady 'owners' like in the IPL. It's really just a brand extension or reboot or something. Given we've only got 6 states and 2 territories, it was pretty hard to expand the comp without doing some sort of reform, and changing it from states to cities allowed the possibility of expansion in NSW/VIC/QLD, while not really changing things in WA/SA/Tas which have no chance of expansion. So basically you're right, it's not different, except we changed the names of the teams so we could actually expand.

 

[TheJediBrah]

Just for anybody curious

Final: Warwickshire v Lancashire at Birmingham, Aug 23, 2014 | Cricket Scorecard | ESPN Cricinfo

That is the Warwickshire team. Trott could also be selected.

So what you reckon guys, could they trouble Perth?

lol no

They have one player (Ian Bell) who might be considered for selection in the Perth side