Geoffrey Boycott on The Hundred: ‘no one watches if cricket is boring or tedious
These days we don’t have to endure Geoffrey Boycott on Test Match Special. His opinions can be found in the Telegraph and he has of course opined on The Hundred. An edited version is below.
An irony alert sounds throughout. Boycott wants to keep an ‘open mind’ something he is well known for. He notes he doesn’t ‘dislike’ The Hundred and after all no one watches boring cricket, which may explain Geoffrey’s sustained absence from England Test sides in the past.
To his credit he makes the entirely correct point that the ECB should promote Test cricket as much as it does The Hundred but then backs 4 day Tests. As someone who watched Boycott bat one might ask if that would be long enough for him to complete his first innings on occasion?
‘The Hundred is a concept for today’s society. People think that just because I love Test cricket I will not like the Hundred but I do,’ Boycott wrote in a column for the Daily Telegraph.
‘We should all keep an open mind because over the years when times have changed cricket has always adapted.
‘It cannot be a bad thing if people enjoy watching cricket, whatever the format. Every type of sport is played or watched for fun. I have watched a few Hundred matches and I don’t dislike it.
‘Nobody plays or watches if cricket is boring or tedious. Is the Hundred my favourite form of cricket? No. But there are some skills required — no doubt about that. Hand-eye co-ordination, improvisation, inventiveness are all more important than technique in 100-ball cricket.
‘The Hundred is giving people who have no chance of affording Test match tickets a chance to go and enjoy cricket with their kids. What’s wrong with that?’
While Boycott has no qualms about 100-ball cricket, he says it is ‘sad’ that administrators have not ‘promoted’ and ‘sold’ Test cricket in the same way.
And the Yorkshire cricket legend fears Test cricket will disappear in ‘many countries’ in the next few decades if the red-ball game continues to be neglected.
‘The sad thing for me is that the administrators have spent so much money on promoting and selling the Hundred but have done nothing to increase the enjoyment of Test cricket,’ he added.
‘There should be room for both formats but we are only selling the short game. Test cricket has not changed for yonks.
‘The administrators don’t promote it or force the over rate up. They have not tried to move the game along by having a real go at four-day Tests.
‘That is a sadness for cricket because if they don’t do anything then in 20-30 years Test cricket will be lost in many countries. We will have the Ashes and England will play India but other than that the game will be gone.
‘Eventually we will see other countries struggling to make Test cricket pay and if we don’t promote the longest format as much as the Hundred then when the older generation who watch it die off the youngsters will not replace them because the format will never have been sold to them.’
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