Graphic detail runs riot
WHEN it comes to attracting new supporters, cricket never quite gets it right. Even THE HUNDRED (BBC2, 2.45pm, 6pm), a format designed to be as easy as possible for newcomers to grasp (which team can score the most runs from 100 balls?), manages to make things confusing, particularly for potential new fans who might discover it while channel hopping.
Stumbling upon BBC2’s coverage (or indeed Sky’s), the casual viewer – someone unfamiliar with the game but open to persuasion – is immediately confronted by an absolute dog’s dinner of garish graphics, peppered with all manner of stats they’ll struggle to understand the significance of, cunningly hidden among which – if they make a bit of effort – they’ll find the actual score.
And will they know who’s playing? They will if they’re blessed with razor-sharp vision and/or don’t mind sitting about an inch from their tellies.
That’s because, rather than displaying the two teams’ names (this is largely aimed at attracting new fans, remember, so it wouldn’t be unreasonable), the telly ninnies have decided each side’s badge will be sufficient.
Upon that badge, to be fair, the team’s name is displayed – in type about a tenth of the size you’ll find on your mobile phone contract.
So, yes, the perception of the game, for many non-believers, will remain as it’s always been – that if it’s not going to bore them senseless it’s going to leave them baffled.At which point they’ll switch over to Emmerdale. Which brings me, rant over, to Andrew “Freddie” Flintoff, the former England cricketer turned TV star.
Besides being an all-round splendid chap and an engaging personality, Freddie is that rarest of things – a cricketer whose enthusiasm for the game is so infectious that he can convert the unconvertible. It’s more Freddie Flintoffs the game needs, not more gimmickry. FREDDIE FLINTOFF: FIELD OF DREAMS ONTOUR (BBC1, 9pm) is a timely reminder of that, reuniting him with the ragtag bunch we first met a couple of years ago – a group of lads from Preston, his hometown, that he’d somehow managed to turn into a team of sorts, from a starting point of utter indifference to the game.
It’s also a series that nearly didn’t happen. In December 2022, three months after announcing to his players that he planned to take them to India, Freddie was involved in an horrific accident while filming for Top Gear. It’s a miracle he survived.
This time, then, as he endeavours to return to some sort of normality, it’s as much about what these lads can do for Freddie himself as what Freddie can do for them.