The Big Bash T20 cricket League here in Australia is mid-way through their current season, and the comparisons with other sports is being made again. The national soccer league is one sporting code that is copping it with their competition running head to head over the summer period, with the BBL. It’s the time of year when a lot of people are on holidays, taking a break, and although it’s not a traditional ratings period, the numbers are still being crunched and the soccer is taking a bit of a flogging in the TV ratings.
It doesn’t help when they keep on having internal politics and fan behavior issues, giving the game a bad look.
Since the BBL left the pay-TV Foxtel network, and went over to free to air channel 10, they’ve made every post a winner. It seems like sponsors are lining up in droves to get their products aligned with this entertaining type of limited over, big hitting, fast paced form of the game. It is all over in a few of hours and is tailor made for TV, with a commercial break every couple of minutes, at the end of every over. They’ve enhanced the presentation in the 5 seasons they’ve been operating here in Australia, and have now got a pretty slick package on the Ten network. T20 cricket has many tournaments operating all over the world. It’s a bit of a hit and giggle type of game, much the same as the fifty over, one day internationals have been over the years, since World Series cricket started many years ago. Traditional test match cricket aficionados tend to hate the T20 game, but with all the competitions being played around the world these days, it seems like it is here to stay. It is pulling crowds that haven’t got the time, inclination or the patience to watch the 5 day form of the game. T20 certainly gives the young players a chance to play the game as professionals around the world, and make some pretty good money on the way, whereas in the past, they had to wait for somebody to get injured or retire, to get into a Test or One Day International team, plus it gives older players, an opportunity to make some good money and extend their careers. From a cricketing fans perspective, we get to see the great players from all over the cricketing world playing here in Australia in a domestic competition, alongside some of our best young, up and coming cricketing talent. On top of all that, throw into the mix, some of the coolest dudes playing the game in the world, West Indian players, Dwayne Bravo, Chris Gayle and Darren Sammy. 
T20 cops a bit of flak from some sections of the game for supposedly destroying the test playing characteristics of some players, but most of the Australian players still play in our domestic Sheffield Shield competition, and still manage their style of play between the two forms of cricket satisfactorily.
I wrote the preceding paragraphs in the last couple of days before the end of the year. Fast forward to December 31, New Years Eve 2015. With the wife at work, and me being of an age where going out on New Years Eve, is not even remotely considered or cared about any more, home alone, I sat down to watch the BBL game that is fast becoming a must have ticket on New Years Eve in Adelaide. The Adelaide Strikers vs the Sydney Sixes. Without getting too carried away, I would have to say, that this game is going to have to be up there, with the most exciting Australian sporting events of 2015, and a young guy named Travis Head, who has already been a pretty handy cricketer, has just had his stocks rise considerably, out of this one game alone. This is the final over, that won the Strikers the game.
http://www.adelaidestrikers.com.au/video/travis%20heads%20incredible%20final%20over/2015-12-31
The whole game was played on a knife edge with each team gaining the ascendancy at different points, but here’s another of the game changing moments that helped get Adelaide over the line.
Well over a million people tuned in on TV to catch the game on New Years Eve across Australia, in a country with a population of 23 million, and the game played to a sell out crowd of 46000, at the Adelaide Oval.
The BBL has been a breath of fresh air, since it’s inception, and particularly since it came over to FTATV. It’s provided not only a brilliant competition over the Christmas/New Year sporting wasteland, but a runaway, nightly TV ratings winner, as well. I can see the next BBL TV contract being a hell of a lot more than the current channel Ten deal.
So…..lets see what the other sporting codes and TV networks can do over the future summer breaks. We can certainly do better than watching re-runs of crappy sitcoms and Christmas movies, over the holiday period.
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