Competition looking at changing the vocabulary for victory
➤Organisers believe simplified terms could appeal to new fans ➤TV chiefs overhaul graphics to improve coverage of game
Television executives are working on a simplified method of telling viewers which side are winning as they plan a graphical revolution of how cricket is presented in the Hundred.
It follows news broken yesterday by The Daily Telegraph that the word “wickets” could be replaced with “outs” when commentators call the new tournament, which starts in July.
Cricket chiefs are also working through how to describe victory for the team batting second, which is currently denoted by the number of wickets in hand. It could be that without the use of the word wickets, results are just presented as a team winning, without the margin of the victory. For example, simply Trent Rockets beat Welsh Fire.
Extensive market research has been carried out over the past two years by the England and Wales Cricket Board, Sky and the BBC, which showed cricket’s terminology is a major barrier to understanding the game. Sky is leading the way with devising new graphics that will make the sport more understandable to a new audience.
Sky uses the Winviz graphic in Test and white-ball cricket, and something similar could be adopted for the Hundred. A countdown clock from 100 was suggested at the outset of the competition’s launch and making the information on screen more team-orientated is one of the challenges under way.
Replacing wickets with outs led to an outcry on social media and a backlash from many existing supporters. It could persuade the ECB to stick with wickets, but there is a feeling the tournament has to look very different from existing competitions and this does make a bold statement about going in a new direction.
Colin Graves was chairman of the ECB when the Hundred was devised and announced. He believes the terminology of cricket has to change if the tournament is to be understandable to people who do not currently follow the game.
“When we first set it up one of the first things we looked at was how to make cricket more easy to understand,” Graves said. “Cricket can be difficult to pick up because of terminology. [The] ECB were working on that when I left and outs instead of wickets makes sense. Everybody understands ‘out’. We upset the traditionalists 2½ years ago when we announced the competition. You can’t upset them any more. That is history. It should not be part of what they are thinking about now.”
Attracting new supporters is the publicly stated aim of the Hundred, but underneath it is about the ECB having a new commodity to sell and monetise. The broadcast rights market is shrinking after Covid. Subscription channels like Sky and BT cannot continue to pay such hefty rights fees and if the ECB went to market now its broadcast deal would be significantly reduced from the £1.2billion deal signed with Sky and the BBC two years ago. The ECB is exploring potential partnerships with the Board of Control for Cricket in India and Indian Premier League franchises, but the United States is also another possible future market.
The word “outs” is associated with baseball and simplifying cricket’s terminology might help sell the game in an expanding market.
“The Hundred is marketable elsewhere because it is a new, simple format of cricket,” said Graves. “It is easy to understand. There are so many cricket supporters from India in the US. There is a thirst for cricket in the United States, it is a market that could easily absorb the Hundred. You will have an ICC [International Cricket Council] event in the US within 10 years and the Hundred fits into that.”