The Hundred: official statistics….
The ECB which runs cricket in England and Wales have produced a press release (23rd August) providing statistics about The Hundred which concluded on Saturday at Lords.
Press releases don’t tend to mention downsides (unless to excuse them) and this one certainly doesn’t.
Even so that stats are of some interest
The headline is here:
57% of viewers hadn’t watched any other live ECB cricket in 2021
•510,000 tickets sold and issued across the competition
•55% of ticket buyers hadn’t bought a ticket for cricket in this country before
•Attendance across the competition is highest for a women’s cricket event globally ever
•More than 34.3m video views as event goes digital
As already noted the impact for women’s cricket is a significant positive, albeit it could have been achieved in another format and was only achieved here because COVID restrictions dictated double headers of womens and mens games at large venues.
The reference of tickets ‘sold and issued’ suggests I think that quite a number were given away free.
A couple of other paragraphs are perhaps of interest. Merch is important to any operation nowadays but the fact that I have an Oval cap does not mean I support Surrey or identify them. I got it to keep the sun or rain off.
The para on the matches themselves is also interesting although if 15 went down to the wire its actually saying most were one sided, characteristic of short form cricket
Fans have shown a remarkable affinity with the eight brand new teams as well, with replica kits selling out from club shops. More than 28,000 items of merchandise have been sold, including 7,000 items of team kit and training-wear.
The cricket has been high quality, with more runs per ball in the men’s competition than the IPL and the Big Bash League, and more in the women’s than in the Women’s Big Bash League. 15 matches went right down to the wire with all to play for in the final five balls, and batters smashed 429 sixes.
Link to full press release
Finally ECB head Tom Harrison has said that the pay gap between men and women players will be less in future. Equal would be good but words in this context mean little. One hopes the PCA are already on to it
Leave a Reply