Now we are seeing saturation coverage for BBL players in the local tabloids.

Comparatively, Tasmanian Shield players, apart from George Bailey and Matthew Wade, are rarely seen or have anything written about them. A lot has been recently   written about Tim Paine because he is Australia's current Test captain.


The BBL players receive the same volume of coverage as AFL players, probably more. I might be biased, but unless they play FC cricket, I don't even rate them as  proper or serious cricketers. All over the place one sees people wearing Hobart Hurricane shirts too.

Big Bash to myself is just a massive marketing campaign, which raises revenue though merchandise sales and the media promotion. A family day out to match the football, what ever code you follow, which amounts to 3-4 hours max. To me this may be an indication of the short attention span of the youth today, and gone are the days when the family could go for 8 hours to the cricket in an ODI. The result is the death of ODI's. Even at a shield level we use to have most limited over matches played on a Sunday so families could go to them and they did draw a crowd. And they were played on a home and away basis. Now it is a preseason format, localised at smaller grounds where if you are lucky a man with 2 dogs watch the game.

For a seasoned cricket follower like yourself I still have interest in the FC level as that truly is where the talent lies. And in all honesty after the first 2 games of the Big Bash I would have wasted my money if I paid to attend. That's the problem with the hit and giggle format it is based a lot on luck, and sometimes that luck is not there and you don't see a lot of runs scored. So it really is a gamble to pay money to watch Big Bash and expect a quality competitive game but at only $42 for a family it is cheaper than going to the movies, but is it? Still have to buy food and the merchandise etc. But obviously we are alone in our thoughts because these games sell out at the big stadiums. And the timing is right being put on at the holiday time of the year. It is probably the perfect marketing campaign resulting in a massive economic windfall for CA. Doesn't mean it's talent based game.

I think Jeff Thompson said it best that T20 was a perfect format for himself, shorten the batsmen up with a couple of fast throat aimed bouncers and follow it up with the yorker. And he only had to do it for 4 overs. He believed that the batsmen would fail every time to score runs. Got to be good to get bat on his fast deliveries.

As for the players, it is where the money lies for the majority, so if that means they have to power hit more so than graceful stroke play, to make cricket a career they have to alter their games to be successful. Pride in the Baggy Green? Can't trade a Baggy Green for groceries. Unfortunately this will result in a sub-standard player in the longer form of the game because they don't have many to choose from to fill a team. Already there are plans to make test cricket 4 days instead of 5, because the realisation for cricket hierarchy is the quality of player is on the decline and the games won't last 5 days but T20 is the cash cow so it is here to stay.

Because the sad truth is no one cares about first class cricket.

Gday Mike R,
I love test cricket & did follow International T20 & ODI's when they were on free to air, as I don't have Foxtel don't anymore.
As mentioned FC cricket is the pinnacle, the best of the best & this is where we are sadly lacking.
I also do not see ODI's surviving in the format it is. If they want it to be a cash cow to suit limited time & concentration, they will need to change it
to something like T40 = 2 innings each, each innings the same as T20 rules. This would be ideally suited to day / night matches.
In the current test squad, I do like the way Khawaja is developing more into a patient test batsman, unfortunately still goes out to the same shot.
As for BBL, I haven't watched a game yet.