As a follower of Northants in two minds on this.
In a way, look at Liverpool, would a franchise work there? You can still have a Manchester team, I think certain local derbies would be important. Especially two in London.
Where else.
Durham
Southampton but why not Portsmouth?
Bristol and Cardiff, but what of Swansea?
Birmingham sure, where else, Coventry, Nottingham?
Leeds and Sheffield maybe?
The East of England is a pro cricket desert. Norwich , Cambridge.
Why Northampton, why not Milton Keynes or Oxford?
Plymouth, out on a limb from rest of England, but is it. It enough for a team?
But teams like Norhants and. Essex I suspect need the T20 revenue.
Would smaller counties benefit more if Sunday League cricket was on FTA TV, exposing the. County brand to a wider audience and the Franchise maybe having a Friday FTA slot.
Just look at what happened to football with the creation of the Premier League in 1992. It has taken off in every way possible - crowds, TV and other media viewing figures, and generally much greater exposure of the product which has resulted in tremendous amount of money coming into the game. I was wrong to say the latest deal was 4bn, it was in excess of 5bn. I realise cricket will not come remotely close but if they can create a great T20 product it could do something similar to cricket, though on a smaller scale. It could raise the profile of the game several fold. I actually think T20 cricket can take off in a big way in the US also. As far as I can see, T20 seems to have some similarities to baseball but seems lot more action-packed. There is some talk some minor league baseball players, who are paid at most a few thousand dollars per season compared to the millions MLB pros earn, might contemplate T20s as an alternative career. A former county cricketer is trying to get some of these minor league to convert to cricket, and since they are both bat and ball games there will be a little bit of familiarity.
I agree about BT Sports. Its free for BT broadband customers so they could potentially have millions of customers on board in the next few years. With Premier League, Champions League, rugby, NBA, MLB, ESPN in their portfolio, I think they are becoming viable competitors to Sky. Sky's broadband offering including the sports channels probably turns out to be 30 pounds more each month. And with Netflix, Amazon Prime, and the plethora of free movie channels on freeview, Sky's movie package is no longer really a selling point. Without Premier League, and for cricket fans, England internationals, Sky would be in the dumps.
It seems BT already has pretty much caught up with Sky. I notice the Arsenal Vs. Tottenham match got 1.6mn and the Merseyside derby the following day got 1.2mn. These figures are excellent for a company that only started broadcasting sports couple of years ago.
Comments
In a way, look at Liverpool, would a franchise work there? You can still have a Manchester team, I think certain local derbies would be important. Especially two in London.
Where else.
Durham
Southampton but why not Portsmouth?
Bristol and Cardiff, but what of Swansea?
Birmingham sure, where else, Coventry, Nottingham?
Leeds and Sheffield maybe?
The East of England is a pro cricket desert. Norwich , Cambridge.
Why Northampton, why not Milton Keynes or Oxford?
Plymouth, out on a limb from rest of England, but is it. It enough for a team?
But teams like Norhants and. Essex I suspect need the T20 revenue.
Would smaller counties benefit more if Sunday League cricket was on FTA TV, exposing the. County brand to a wider audience and the Franchise maybe having a Friday FTA slot.
I agree about BT Sports. Its free for BT broadband customers so they could potentially have millions of customers on board in the next few years. With Premier League, Champions League, rugby, NBA, MLB, ESPN in their portfolio, I think they are becoming viable competitors to Sky. Sky's broadband offering including the sports channels probably turns out to be 30 pounds more each month. And with Netflix, Amazon Prime, and the plethora of free movie channels on freeview, Sky's movie package is no longer really a selling point. Without Premier League, and for cricket fans, England internationals, Sky would be in the dumps.