ECB keen on free-to-air partner
The BBC has been in talks with the English Cricket Board (ECB) about televising a new city-based Twenty20 tournament from 2020.
The Times reported that director general Tony Hall met with ECB officials after its chief executive Tom Harrison expressed an interest in securing a free-to-air broadcast partner for the planned tournament.
The BBC has not televised live cricket matches since 1998 and Test matches have not appeared on a free to air channel at all since Channel 4 showed the epic 2005 Ashes series.
Sky has been the dominant broadcaster of cricket since then, although BT Sport has secured coverage of England’s Ashes tour to Australia this winter.
The ECB announced plans for the eight-team T20 tournament this week. Harrison said: “We’ve got to go beyond the audiences that we’re reaching at the moment. We need to be box office, to create that sense of occasion, to have relevance to new audiences in this country – young and family audiences – and to a global audience as well”.
He added that both subscription and free to air broadcasters were interested.
“There’s a desire from free-to-air to partner with us on new T20, and that’s because they’re excited by where we’re taking the game,” he added.
In Australia, the domestic T20 tournament, called the Big Bash, has been a ratings hit for free to air network Channel 10.
In the UK, Channel 5 has shown a handful of games from the tournament.
The BBC has repeatedly expressed its commitment to ‘Crown Jewels’ sports events but has struggled to compete with the rising cost of many rights in recent years.
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