Big Bash League changes: Bizarre recommendations that can save BBL, cricket
With the Big Bash League looming as Cricket Australia’s only source of revenue this summer, a confidential report has revealed several bizarre recommendations to revive the stuttering competition.
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A report tabled before the coronavirus pandemic crisis rocked cricket lays out a series of suggestions to resuscitate the Big Bash League as the administration faces the very real prospect that it may be the only source of revenue this summer.
Cricket Australia is preparing for a number of eventualities, including a 2020-21 season in which international sides are unable to visit, but is confident that nothing short of another catastrophe can stop the Big Bash League going ahead.
If so, it will mean big-name international players will be available for the entire tournament, a development that would more than compensate for the loss of overseas stars. Broadcasters and the BBL franchises have always pushed to have more involvement from the likes of David Warner, Steve Smith, Pat Cummins and Mitchell Starc.
That quartet are among the most valued players in world cricket, but are rarely available for the BBL tournament as international duties take precedence.
The Australian has learned details of the report compiled by former television sports chief David Barham, which was commissioned by Cricket Australia in the summer as broadcaster concerns grew about falling ratings and declining crowds.
Barham was credited as the man who took the BBL to the next level of popularity when he was at Channel 10. He is understood to have consulted widely and written a 50-plus page report full of suggestions to return the product to its glory days.
At its peak the BBL would regularly outrate the Australian Open tennis tournament and was a massive success for its broadcaster, who signed up a lucrative list of advertisers attracted by the competition’s demographics and popularity, but it has lost its gloss in recent seasons.
The success of the BBL was critical to Cricket Australia landing over a billion dollars from Channel 7 and Fox Cricket in 2018. Both have been frustrated by the administration’s attitude to the tournament since and urged it be given higher priority.
Average crowds in 2019-20 were the lowest since the tournament’s first two seasons and are down from a peak of 30,114 in 2016-17 to 18,353 in 2019-20.
Barham has consulted widely within the game and outside its boundaries, and urges Cricket Australia to innovate and enhance the product, warning that if it doesn’t it will only decline further.
Cricket Australia is unlikely to release the report or act on it in full, but it is understood parts of it will be incorporated into this summer’s tournament. Barham gave his first presentation to the game’s chiefs at a conference at Collingwood’s headquarters in Melbourne after the women’s T20 World Cup Final.
The sporting world changed that week as the reality of the virus hit and some who attended that conference have never returned to their offices.
Barham gave another phone presentation to the state chief executives soon after.
The report says cricket needs to remember that the BBL is a made-for-television product built on innovation and entertainment. It urges cricket chiefs to pay it more respect or it will further degrade one of its better assets.
One of Barham’s key calls is to free a window from the end of the Sydney Test to the end of January and somehow compel the big local stars to play for a franchise.
Warner, as an example, is not signed to a BBL team and has played over 120 matches in the IPL but just three in the BBL split between two franchises. Smith got to play a handful of games last year while Cummins opted to rest.
Barham recommends the tournament should aim to finish on the Australia Day weekend, potentially hosting all the finals in Adelaide in that period.
There’s been criticism that the extended tournament loses people by playing into February but BBL chiefs are resistant to starting early and anxious about competing with tennis if they finish at the end of January.
One of the ideas floated by Barham is to divide the game into four innings in an attempt to sustain interest.
While organisers made a conscious effort to increase scoring rates last season after a disappointing 2018-19, they found that the unintended consequence was the increase in big wins by sides batting second.
T20 needs close finishes to keep viewers tuned in and many matches can essentially be over if wickets are lost early.
When the BBL was launched, the then cricket chief James Sutherland said one advantage of having a domestic league would be that it would stop the local game being reliant on international sides touring, which was its single major income stream. The game had a taste of the precarious nature of that arrangement when India had threatened to go home during the Monkeygate scandal of the 2007-08 summer.
Sutherland and company should be lauded for their foresight, although they can never have imagined circumstances such as these.