Cricket-Match-Special ... A forum for discussion

Although if the match does go 5 days, and the prices and weather are reasonable, then could be a great opportunity for locals to take in a Test.

ianp1970 wrote:One of the disadvantages of beginning on a Friday, I guess. Birmingham has the opposite with a Wednesday start: unlikely to sell too many weekend tickets...

Starting on a Wednesday so the London test at the Oval can have a Saturday day 3, which has now become standard practice.

ianp1970 wrote:Although if the match does go 5 days, and the prices and weather are reasonable, then could be a great opportunity for locals to take in a Test.

A game at Edgbaston without rain now that would be something.

hopeforthebest wrote:

ianp1970 wrote:Although if the match does go 5 days, and the prices and weather are reasonable, then could be a great opportunity for locals to take in a Test.

A game at Edgbaston without rain now that would be something.

It would be something if you could use the appropriate weather/3rd test thread to discuss it.

sussexpob wrote:

hopeforthebest wrote:

ianp1970 wrote:Although if the match does go 5 days, and the prices and weather are reasonable, then could be a great opportunity for locals to take in a Test.

A game at Edgbaston without rain now that would be something.

It would be something if you could use the appropriate weather/3rd test thread to discuss it.

Let's not turn this in to a party convention now folks.

Bhavesh - you yourself have given some of the reasons for the reason why people are not sitting in seats which is not due to a lack of interest in cricket but at the same time you maintain that a low crowd on one individual day spells the death knell of Test cricket?

Without wanting to echo my earlier sentiments on other threads, I dont buy for a second that money is the issue here. Bristol Rovers are the smaller less successful team in a medium sized town that houses a far bigger more successful club, and they were regularly turning gates of 5 figure attendances in the 4th tier of the football pyramid despite charging near £30 a ticket. If people can regularly afford to pay that up to 25 times a year for a home game, then to argue people are put off going to the test match once in a blue moon by the difference of a ticket value of £20.... well it doesnt stand up to scrutiny. I have said before that Leeds has the best attended away fans in football in the country, but in a game in 2014 that went to decide a series on a 5th day with cheap admission, no one turned up to witness it at Headingley.

Look around at all events/sports ticketing in the UK and people regularly pay the worse prices in the world, and all events are going up in value. The last time I went to Reading Festival I paid £90 for a camping ticket for the weekend, and that was probably 8 years ago. The cost now having checked is £213.00. Glasto tickets in 2006 were 135 quid, they are now 238 quid. Both of these values are far over inflation raises. All of these events sell out, people pay it. Tickets at Arsenal/Man U etc are ridiculous in cost, but the stadiums are full all the time.

As I said earlier, the ECB's conduct in the last few years has left a lot to be desired, and has treated all fans with a contempt. I still think you are witnessing a lethargy in fans that will take time to heal, if it can heal. We dont want the CE wickets, we dont want the drummed up press pack propaganda on all ECB's decisions, we dont want Franchise cricket destroying the county championship, we dont want county players doing nothing, we dont want meaningless series and endless international games...... but we get it, because it generates money.

braveneutral wrote:Bhavesh - you yourself have given some of the reasons for the reason why people are not sitting in seats which is not due to a lack of interest in cricket but at the same time you maintain that a low crowd on one individual day spells the death knell of Test cricket?

TBH only believe this because England are in decline at 3 aspects, was only a matter of time before attendances went down.
England worries me the most in the future of cricket, don't actually see any cricket fans coming through when the current fans go.

But crowds in other countries are far more regularly less.

Participation Fiqures and tv viewers are so much higher even icc chairman mentioned it today on the Sri Lanka broadcast today that more people play the game in Sri Lanka than people playing the game in South Africa.

England haven't got that their actually the only full members to have a drop in both numbers.

Think they only about 200,000 thousand hardcore cricket supporters in this country far less than what the fiqure was 4-5 years ago.

Maybe because like Aus England/UK has so many sporting strengths in multiple sports year round.

I would imagine when there is a major football tournament on that the viewing and participation figures drop sharply given the football spillover.

Emphatic victory.

braveneutral wrote:

Arthur Crabtree wrote:I hate Kevin!

He does come across as one of your big corporation men so I can understand your resentment.

If Kevin wasn't such a victim, and wasn't such a victim of an organisation as unlovable as the ECB, he'd be pretty hard to like. But the ECB taints those that it approves of, and makes Ealing Comedy type antiheroes of those it damages.

Indeed. A bit like all of the persecution that Jeremy Corbyn undergoes on a daily basis from the evil Labour Apparatus.

Third test squad has been announced.


It's the same squad as for the 2nd test but without Ben Stokes.