Is The Hundred Really the Best Way to Bring Cricket to the Masses?

This summer is hoped to be the premier of cricket’s newest format, namely ‘The Hundred’.

It is the English Cricket Board’s latest attempt to ‘save the game’, believing it will bring the sport to a newer audience who wouldn’t normally watch cricket. The competition is surrounded by at thick layer of controversy; even one of its sponsorship deals has been heavily criticised.

Cricket fans around the world are struggling to see the point of the new tournament, with many left wondering how exactly it will revive the game’s popularity with other short-format options already available (ODI and 20-20).

There is no denying that England’s summer sport has certainly began to drift out of the nation’s consciousness over the past few years, but surely The Hundred is not the best solution to this very real problem.

So, what can be done instead?

Perhaps to get cricket back on everybody’s lips, it needs to return to everybody’s TV screens.

In 2005, after 23 million Britons tuned in to watch at least 30 minutes of England’s victorious Ashes series, Sky decided to offer the ECB a ludicrous sum for cricket’s TV rights and the game subsequently vanished from free to air television. Currently, only those privileged enough to be able to afford an expensive subscription can watch the game, a far cry from the situation 15 years ago.

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In England, cricket has long been viewed as a sport for the middle classes, and with cricket not now accessible on TV to those with less financial means, how will it be able to reach a new, broader audience?

Many state schools do not even offer cricket to pupils, meaning one of the few ways children could be exposed to the game is via the television. If the only thing children have heard about cricket is that it’s a boring sport played by public schools and they have nothing to challenge this belief, how is the game supposed to grow?

On the other hand, perhaps we shouldn’t criticise the ECB for their decision to take cricket off terrestrial TV. Maybe I am simply forgetting that cricket needs money to thrive; Sky's multi-million pound deals for TV rights provides the ECB with the cash it needs to keep the struggling counties and grassroots teams afloat. Even though cricket on free to air TV would help to grow the game, it might not provide the short term funding that the sport desperately needs.

Maybe my fantasy of cricket on terrestrial TV is simply unfeasible in a world run by money. Maybe The Hundred really will manage to bring a new audience to the game despite its lack of support among the cricketing world. Or maybe cricket really should return to terrestrial TV. Maybe.

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