Daily Mail

IF THE HUNDRED TURNS INTO A BOOZE-UP, ECB WILL BE IN A TON OF BOTHER

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THE violence at Goodwood last Saturday was timely. Cricket now knows what it has to look forward to.

A brawl involving up to 50 racegoers marred a sunny bank holiday meeting, exchanges of chanting between groups in the bar exploding in brutality captured in sickening, graphic footage. One prone figure is seen being kicked in the head as he lays on the floor, and police report four were taken to hospital.

‘Events like this remain very rare in our sport,’ said Racecourse Associatio­n chief executive Stephen Atkin. But they don’t. There were scenes at the Guineas meeting in newmarket a few years ago that resembled the Wild West. And if actual fights do not break out, the conditions that lead to them — extreme drunkennes­s, aggression, over-crowding — are commonplac­e.

Why? Because racing has pursued a non-racing crowd, the same way cricket is increasing­ly dismissive of cricket-lovers. Boozers. That’s what they want. All-day, or all-night drinkers, who will boost revenue at the bar and are more interested in an expensive trip to the champagne tent than a look at the paddock.

Every major race meeting these days produces scenes of drunken debauchery and as the British cannot handle their drink, or hot weather, a 50-man fight on the Sussex Downs is always a possibilit­y.

The Hundred, the ECB’s latest attempt to sell the game to anyone but those who love it most, is supposed to appeal to families and new customers. Yet the same was said of Twenty20 and now look at it. The louts have taken over.

Many Friday night Twenty20 matches are beery, yobbish affairs, the last place anyone would want to take youngsters keen on cricket. It’s a giant pub beer garden with a cricket match faintly attached; lairy, boorish, the sport incidental to the more dedicated pursuit of bleary oblivion.

Why would The Hundred be greatly different? It’s aimed at the same audience. People who don’t like cricket. People who wouldn’t dream of engaging with the nuances of a Test game, or even marvelling at the skill in a well-played Twenty20 innings. They’ll raucously cheer a six but, really, if it’s a choice between the sport and the bar there is only one winner.

The utter confusion as cricket thrashes around in search of a new audience could be felt in the fallout from the ECB’s meeting with the Profession­al Cricketers’ Associatio­n. Daryl Mitchell, the PCA chairman, emerged with startling news about The Hundred.

‘Test players won’t be taking part,’ he said. ‘The likes of Joe Root and Ben Stokes will be allocated to a team for marketing purposes, but they won’t play. The point was made that the new audience won’t necessaril­y know who Stokes and Root are anyway.’

Think about that one for a minute because it’s quite possible nobody at the ECB has. Cricket is attempting to attract a fan so ignorant of its virtues, he doesn’t know England’s captain or its best player. Yet the ECB is so stupid it plans to attach these two unknown figures to teams — not to play and attract interest with their skills, but for ‘marketing purposes’.

And what exactly are they going to market if no one knows who they are? They might as well get someone in from Geordie Shore. In fact, why stop there? Let the mug from

Geordie Shore open the batting. It would make as much sense as wasting the time of England’s captain, having him promote a competitio­n few care about to a roomful of people who don’t know who he is.

Still, racing thinks it has been very successful, if we can ignore the sirens, in locating its new audience. Maybe cricket will find one, too. The undercard starts at 7pm.

 ??  ?? Non-playing role: England’s Joe Root
Non-playing role: England’s Joe Root

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