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Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 09:26 - Jul 29 by Konk
I can only speak from experience, but as I say, I have a fair few mates who got into cricket via the BBC coverage, our local cricket club had plenty of kids who weren't from cricket-loving families. My Dad and eldest brother are very heavily involved in local and County cricket and say it's incredibly rare now to have kids coming along unless they have a Dad who plays/has played or at least regularly watched the game.
The Ashes series in 2005, the only people who went to the pub at lunch and to catch the last of the day's play, were myself, a couple of Aussies and a few British lads from Indian or Pakistani families - no-one else was interested. By the fourth and fifth tests, people with no interest in cricket, were coming in on Monday saying they'd watched the whole day's play on Saturday and Sunday. Yes, it was an incredible series, but if it hadn't been on free-to-air, a lot of those people wouldn't have got into it. We had a Dutch mate living with us at the time, he got hooked, started playing the game in London (very badly) and he now lives in Oz, where he continues to play badly and both his kids are cricket mad. The ECB's own figures show participation has plummeted post 2005, I'm not sure that's a co-incidence.
Did most of the country even know the cricket WC was on? We watched the final with friends and even though their kids have zero interest in the game, everyone stopped what they were doing and came and watched for the last hour and one of his sons has now been swatting up on the England team in anticipation of the Ashes. Wouldn't have happened if it wasn't on C4.
Mini Dorse got into cricket a couple of years ago. The village team down the road from us does kid's cricket sessions every Friday. It has become so popular that they have to break the sessions up into 2 (broad) age groups, Under 11's and Over 11's. They regularly have upwards of 60 kids a week.
Mini Dorse has been brought into the Under 13's side (even though he's only just 11) as a bowler and he fcuking loves it. Not a bad way to spend an evening, few beers in the Pavillion watching the cricket and being inordinately proud but far too emotionally repressed to say anything as Mini Dorse skittles one of their openers. Muahahahahahaaa!
Anyway, get to the point Dorse, I hear you say. Alright, don't rush me you bastards. Having the cricket on TV really inspires him, whether it's the day's Test highlights on C5, live matches or the WC highlights on C4. My major irritation regarding the World Cup coverage was the decision to put it on at 10 or 11PM. A primary school kid with school the next day, wasn't going to watch them and so we viewed them on 4OD, by which time we already knew the outcome, major talking points etc.
At least with the Ashes coverage, it kicks off at 6PM on C5 on the actual day!
As far as BBC minority sport coverage goes, expect to see World Championship Belching competitions next.
[Post edited 29 Jul 2019 10:23]
'What do we want? We don't know! When do we want it? Now!'
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Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 10:24 - Jul 29 with 1204 views
Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 07:33 - Jul 29 by jonno
No they didnt. Very occasionally on Grandstand it might be something like the Great North Run or the boat race, but it was usually full of Horse Racing and Rugby League, sometimes Union. Or the Olympics once every four years. As for Sportsnight, usually football or boxing. As I say, they are only showing women's football and netball now because they have lost all the main sports, if they were to get those back you can be sure they would drop those minor sports like a hot potato. If they were really that interested in the minor sports then why don't they bring back Grandstand, Sportsnight etc and show them on there? Answer - Because they know that only three men and a dog would be viewing.
[Post edited 29 Jul 2019 7:34]
Christ mate, is there anything you don't get angry about? you don't even live here. Why does it bother you so much? And I remember seeing things like handball and volleyball on the beeb in the old days. Darts is a minority sport, but the beeb got it huge figures. speedway was on a lot. The reason Grandstand isn't on is because they can't afford that massive OB every week, plus all the stuff to fill it with. I actually do disagree with that - I think Grandstand should be back, and fill it with minority sports and use it to keep us all updated as we lead into each new olympics. But it's a bizarre criticism - 'you wouldn't show this if you had more of this' - well, yeah. But they don't. so what's your point?
Bare bones.
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Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 12:24 - Jul 29 with 1082 views
Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 08:11 - Jul 29 by gobbles
Cricket participation has fallen off massively because they don't play it in schools anymore - unless you go to public school that it. My nine year old has had one game of "Kwik Cricket" in school all summer term. He seems to play endless dodgeball in PE lessons. Grandstand and Sportsnight have been massive losses to British sports that are considered "minority".
True, but if you look at total participation numbers they peaked in 2005 and have been in decline ever since
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Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 12:47 - Jul 29 with 1057 views
Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 10:20 - Jul 29 by Dorse
Mini Dorse got into cricket a couple of years ago. The village team down the road from us does kid's cricket sessions every Friday. It has become so popular that they have to break the sessions up into 2 (broad) age groups, Under 11's and Over 11's. They regularly have upwards of 60 kids a week.
Mini Dorse has been brought into the Under 13's side (even though he's only just 11) as a bowler and he fcuking loves it. Not a bad way to spend an evening, few beers in the Pavillion watching the cricket and being inordinately proud but far too emotionally repressed to say anything as Mini Dorse skittles one of their openers. Muahahahahahaaa!
Anyway, get to the point Dorse, I hear you say. Alright, don't rush me you bastards. Having the cricket on TV really inspires him, whether it's the day's Test highlights on C5, live matches or the WC highlights on C4. My major irritation regarding the World Cup coverage was the decision to put it on at 10 or 11PM. A primary school kid with school the next day, wasn't going to watch them and so we viewed them on 4OD, by which time we already knew the outcome, major talking points etc.
At least with the Ashes coverage, it kicks off at 6PM on C5 on the actual day!
As far as BBC minority sport coverage goes, expect to see World Championship Belching competitions next.
[Post edited 29 Jul 2019 10:23]
Regarding highlights - a lot of the time the deal we'll be it can't be broadcast until Sky's finished showing it, and they'll whack hours and hours of stuff after the game to keep the programme going and delay the highlights
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Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 12:57 - Jul 29 with 1044 views
Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 09:26 - Jul 29 by Konk
I can only speak from experience, but as I say, I have a fair few mates who got into cricket via the BBC coverage, our local cricket club had plenty of kids who weren't from cricket-loving families. My Dad and eldest brother are very heavily involved in local and County cricket and say it's incredibly rare now to have kids coming along unless they have a Dad who plays/has played or at least regularly watched the game.
The Ashes series in 2005, the only people who went to the pub at lunch and to catch the last of the day's play, were myself, a couple of Aussies and a few British lads from Indian or Pakistani families - no-one else was interested. By the fourth and fifth tests, people with no interest in cricket, were coming in on Monday saying they'd watched the whole day's play on Saturday and Sunday. Yes, it was an incredible series, but if it hadn't been on free-to-air, a lot of those people wouldn't have got into it. We had a Dutch mate living with us at the time, he got hooked, started playing the game in London (very badly) and he now lives in Oz, where he continues to play badly and both his kids are cricket mad. The ECB's own figures show participation has plummeted post 2005, I'm not sure that's a co-incidence.
Did most of the country even know the cricket WC was on? We watched the final with friends and even though their kids have zero interest in the game, everyone stopped what they were doing and came and watched for the last hour and one of his sons has now been swatting up on the England team in anticipation of the Ashes. Wouldn't have happened if it wasn't on C4.
2005 was incredible. I remember sneaking out of the pub to watch the last session at Old Trafford and barely being able to squeeze through the door. I was in Ireland for my sister's wedding during Trent Bridge and the mania had even reached there. I went into a florist's in Mitchelstown in County Cork, where I doubt there's been any cricket played since 1914 and they were listening to TMS. I was on the road when Giles and Hoggard won the game and drivers were tooting and waving to each other.
My comments are largely based on my son's experience, and are as relevant or distorted as that makes them. Master Sheen was 6 in 2005, and was absolutely gripped by cricket, or perhaps the effect he could see it had on me. He begged me all winter to take him to a club the next year, and even insisted on having a helmet he could wear. Unsurprisingly, they were swamped with kids, but I feel they didn't get the balance right between what the kids could do and what they played.
Football and particularly rugby have both come up with formats that let small kids feel they are playing the same game they watch on TV, while leaving out most of what they can't or don't need to do. Cricket's a much more technically demanding game than either, but they treated it so reverentially that it was too difficult and eventually boring - he would wait an hour for his ration of batting, then got a series of wides rolling past him in the distance. He stuck it out for a couple of seasons but like most of his little team-mates then, hasn't played since, despite going to a cricket-playing school and having Sky at home.
I learned to play cricket in the street , bowling a tennis ball across the road to stumps chalked on the wall. If you got a ball you couldn't reach, the ball would be back in the bowler's hand quick enough. Obviously, no-one can do that now, but that degree of informal play is what might have won him over, rather than attempting to mimic the adult game, but with even longer pauses and delays, and all the more weighty significance about the rare occasions when the game comes to you.
Tennis has a similar problem. It looks easy on (terrestrial) TV, but its really difficult for kids to master, hence participation and court use being in low single digit percentages.
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Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 12:58 - Jul 29 with 1044 views
Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 07:52 - Jul 29 by Konk
Ski Sunday, Horse of the Year show too - neither of which were exactly mass-participation activities for most of the British population during my childhood. As cricket has showed, if you take it off free-to-air tv, kids participation falls off massively, so it's not unreasonable to suggest if you actually stick women's football and netball on the telly, some girls will be inspired to take the sports up with all the attendant benefits in terms of health. Probably 1/3 of my mates that love cricket aren't from cricket-loving families, but got into it through watching it on the BBC during the school holidays. Viewing figures for Women's football WC were about 7m for the Qtr-final and 11m for the Semi-final, so some people obviously wanted to watch.
Spot on Konk. I got into cricket aged about eight in the early 70s through watching the John Player League on Sunday afternoons, the domestic one day cup competitions after coming home from school and England's test matches. During the school holidays when there was a test on you would not get me away from the telly until close of play.
Chances are if I was the same age now, I wouldn't have got into the sport because of being behind a pay wall. Millions of kids now are denied the opportunity of viewing cricket as kids of my generation and other generations were. The legacy of the ECB selling out to pay television will be in years to come empty grounds not just in domestic games but test matches as well. It's no good putting the money into grass roots cricket if young kids aren't taking up the game.
Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 12:09 - Jul 29 by Antti_Heinola
Christ mate, is there anything you don't get angry about? you don't even live here. Why does it bother you so much? And I remember seeing things like handball and volleyball on the beeb in the old days. Darts is a minority sport, but the beeb got it huge figures. speedway was on a lot. The reason Grandstand isn't on is because they can't afford that massive OB every week, plus all the stuff to fill it with. I actually do disagree with that - I think Grandstand should be back, and fill it with minority sports and use it to keep us all updated as we lead into each new olympics. But it's a bizarre criticism - 'you wouldn't show this if you had more of this' - well, yeah. But they don't. so what's your point?
Antti, just looked at the BBC Genome site at a random date (Saturday April 14th 1979 as it goes) and showing on Grandstand that afternoon alongside Football Focus (obvs), the racing from Kempton and boxing from the Albert Hall were international table tennis from Edinburgh and international badminton from Gloucester.
As you say they always did show minority sports as fill ins to go alongside the big hitting sports.
Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 16:23 - Jul 28 by ingeminate
What wrong with the BMX stuff? Watched it this afternoon, very entertaining. Wouldn’t fancy it myself, but fair play to those who do, it was carnage in the rain.
Long, long ago when I didn't have a car and relied on my racing bike for transport, I went to watch my French cousin in an organised BMX race. He was in the top 10 in the country for his age, in spite of being tiny compared with most of his rivals (he had his growth spurt quite late).
After the race, which he came third in after crashing on the penultimate obstacle, while leading, I thought I'd give it a go. Easy, I thought, I ride my bike every day, I am fit, I ride off road too. Piece of cake.
Errr, wrong. Even at the rather low speed I was travelling at as I cautiously trundled round the course on a BMX bike borrowed from my other (taller) cousin, I managed to make a right pig's ear of things as I tried to ride over - not even jump - one of the berms. My foot slipped, I nearly fell off, I narrowly avoided castrating myself but did manage to rake my unprotected shin down a serrated pedal.
Harder than it looks
"Things had started becoming increasingly desperate at Loftus Road but QPR have been handed a massive lifeline and the place has absolutely erupted. it's carnage. It's bedlam. It's 1-1."
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Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 14:18 - Jul 29 with 951 views
Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 14:15 - Jul 29 by R_from_afar
Long, long ago when I didn't have a car and relied on my racing bike for transport, I went to watch my French cousin in an organised BMX race. He was in the top 10 in the country for his age, in spite of being tiny compared with most of his rivals (he had his growth spurt quite late).
After the race, which he came third in after crashing on the penultimate obstacle, while leading, I thought I'd give it a go. Easy, I thought, I ride my bike every day, I am fit, I ride off road too. Piece of cake.
Errr, wrong. Even at the rather low speed I was travelling at as I cautiously trundled round the course on a BMX bike borrowed from my other (taller) cousin, I managed to make a right pig's ear of things as I tried to ride over - not even jump - one of the berms. My foot slipped, I nearly fell off, I narrowly avoided castrating myself but did manage to rake my unprotected shin down a serrated pedal.
Harder than it looks
'Harder Than It Looks' - isn't that the strap-line from a Viagra advert?
'What do we want? We don't know! When do we want it? Now!'
1
Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 14:19 - Jul 29 with 948 views
Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 10:02 - Jul 29 by loftboy
World of sport had the most diverse, cliff diving from Acapulco was my particular favourite.
[Post edited 29 Jul 2019 11:49]
Yes, back in the 80s the BBC had all the events, and world of sport had to fill in with the cliff diving. Double decker bus racing was a highlight too, totally impossible to overtake on a tight oval track
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Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 11:17 - Jul 30 with 677 views
Nothing can ever surpass Superstars on the BBC or a rainy Saturday afternoon watching Big Daddy wresting on ITV (the days of 3 channels).
Am glad BBC are going to streaming FA cup games from the preliminary round. Starting with Punjab United against Broadbridge Heath . Nice to see some grassroots football getting a look in and give Daily Mail readers a chance to get annoyed. Wonder if Vauxhall Motors will get a look in.
I genuinely enjoyed watching the One Man & His Dog/ Sheepdog Trials programme. Like Loftus Road for the past decade I didn’t have a clue what was going on but something kept me watching.
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Sport on BBC has surpassed itself on 13:24 - Jul 30 with 606 views
I was stood on the corner of the running track when keegan fell off his bike in superstars, I was in the third year (year 5 to you younguns) of junior school. My mum let me bunk off to watch it, when I got to the sports centre half the school was there. No one got into trouble and nothing was said, wouldn’t happen these days.
favourite cheese mature Cheddar. FFS there is no such thing as the EPL
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