please empty your brain below
Wow, a 1am post. Not even heard of this before. Strictly a test match watcher if nothing much else is on.

Probably give this a miss.

PiccDriver | 22.07.21 - 1:20 a.m. | #

The main thing I've learnt as a result of this post is that all of those crisp brands are owned by the same conglomerate, Intersnack. Perhaps if they add a new franchise to the competition they can be sponsored by Space Raiders or Monster Munch.

martin | 22.07.21 - 6:38 a.m. | #

I'm not a big cricket fan, but in normal times would attend a couple of women's and men's 20-20 matches each season. So I watched last night on the BBC and enjoyed the cricket; I did not enjoy all the contrived nonsense surrounding the actual sport. It may be fun for the young audience in the ground, but on tv who wants to watch Becky Hill (probably) lip synch during the interval? I was reminded that when Sky invented 'Monday Night Football' they had bands on the pitch at half-time, and fireworks at the end. Those innovations didn't last long, but the target demographic is entirely different. I will persist for a while with The Hundred for the cricket, and try to ignore the circus.

Frank F | 22.07.21 - 6:58 a.m. | #

Apparently it was a world record for people attending a women’s domestic league match - so they must be doing something right

Brian | 22.07.21 - 7:07 a.m. | #

A pity Intersnack doesn't own the Pringles brand, which would otherwise have been a shoo-in for the Oval team's branding

timbo | 22.07.21 - 7:17 a.m. | #

Have to confess I only watched about 10 minutes of what I thought was a poor idea (and I think I thought correctly) - the current spin-off (sorry!) formats of the real game - OD & T20 retain some semblance of the traditions .. this didn't.
The Sunday John Player League was a great step forward back in the day - this was a step back.
AND with the sponsorship of junk/snack foods that can't be good . . . if someone had a sense of humour they would have rolled out retired Test Cricketer Derke Pringle as a summariser!

Rob Gullen | 22.07.21 - 7:48 a.m. | #

Saw a bit of the cricket, didn’t feel much different to a T20. Wasn’t a fan of then screen overlays, made it very difficult to see which team were what.

The whole branding feels like what a older person thinks a younger person would say is cool. Feels contrived. But good to hopefully get different people into the cricket.

David | 22.07.21 - 7:50 a.m. | #

I really enjoyed it.

Simon G | 22.07.21 - 7:50 a.m. | #

Would rather watch Essex in a T20 so won't be watching this. Most successful county of recent years not given a team. Can't support teams based at Surrey or Middlesex.

Andy V | 22.07.21 - 8:01 a.m. | #

The teams are contrived and ludicrously-named constructs, the game is T20 bastardised for the sake of novelty, the gimmicks are an embarrassing attempt to get down with the kids, the overseas stars that were promised didn’t come, the attendance is driven by masses of free tickets being given out so the stadium doesn’t look empty for TV, the sponsors make junk food and the rest of cricket has been pushed to the margin to make room for this marketing ‘droid’s wet dream.

What’s not to like?

David | 22.07.21 - 8:06 a.m. | #

I enjoy Test Match cricket, but I will watch one day games and the T20's.
As for the 100 games I will watch this series, it will be interesting to see how the men teams perform.
I do not like fireworks or flame eruptions in any sport, unnecessary pollution.
In addition to BBC and Sky TV the games are also on BBC Radio 5

John | 22.07.21 - 8:13 a.m. | #

A full on attempt to introduce American sports branding to the UK.It's been all downhill since the Gillete cup. There has always been a lot of boredom in cricket.I always take a quality newspaper and a book to county matches.
I may not be the target audience for this new format.

coffin dodger | 22.07.21 - 8:18 a.m. | #

In spite of the innovation, individuals have to decide that 'The Hundred' is a better allocation of their free time than what they were doing before.

The artificial teams are a concern because you are building the team brands from scratch as well as the format, and having separate teams for women & men who repeat each match means spending money on two matches per week. Either have mixed teams or yet another new format called 'The Forty', where separate male & female cricket teams play the same fixture each evening.

Also the weather, something that cricket contends with, how many washouts will new supporters put up with?

Still Anon | 22.07.21 - 8:22 a.m. | #

Having seen comments on many forums about cyclists in replica kit looking daft, "it won't make you any better at it" and such like ... it occurs to me it is even sadder to buy replica kit just to watch your chosen sport.

Especially when you do so in a pub!

Putters | 22.07.21 - 8:44 a.m. | #

Given how popular the Baseball 'London Series' is, I'm always surprised that Baseball hadn't had this treatment in the UK, a short summer season between the football.

R2 | 22.07.21 - 8:47 a.m. | #

I think we have to remember that if you're currently a cricket fan then it's not aimed at you. Much like its distant cousin baseball, cricket is in decline in its home country yet still popular elsewhere. Which suggests there's no problem with the game itself, so why bugger about with it?

Chz | 22.07.21 - 8:49 a.m. | #

I'll wait for the ice-cream sponsored THE 99

Bob L-S | 22.07.21 - 8:50 a.m. | #

As a "traditional cricket fan" this isn't aimed at me. And that's a good thing because I have a lot to hate about it.

Such a shame they couldn't have just put some proper investment and marketing into the existing T20 leagues, maybe created a "premiership". Sigh :(

Huw | 22.07.21 - 8:58 a.m. | #

15 people on a field playing catch is not a watchable sport.

scrumpy | 22.07.21 - 9:03 a.m. | #

I normally tell people, who are sports fans, that I have no interest in ball games. But, thinking about it now, I'm just as disinterested in the results of sailing, boxing, cycling, etc. too.

Give me engineering, transport, exploring, buildings, puzzles instead.

Thanks for the term, DG. From now on it's No Sport Empathy that will be my descriptor from now on.

Petras409 | 22.07.21 - 9:22 a.m. | #

The Olympics started yesterday with women's football. It was in the empty Tokyo Stadium, but at least I understand the rules there.

Greg S | 22.07.21 - 9:24 a.m. | #

Probably an age thing but as others have said a bit too contrived. As a fan of test and one day international cricket, when 20-20 came along I thought it a bad idea, but to be fair it has taken off and does have excitement for those wanting a quick result, which a lot of the longer formats didn't always have.

I did switch on the 100 when I came in only to find it was during the break and someone was singing, so found something else to watch and never did switch back. (Becky Hill you say; who?)

Even though on the surface it would appear to compete with 20-20 I'm sure it will be a success, but not for me. Do away with the add-ons and maybe.

It's just not cricket.....

Tim | 22.07.21 - 9:29 a.m. | #

The best thing about Becky's singing was that it meant four minutes less punditry.

diamond geezer | Homepage | 22.07.21 - 9:32 a.m. | #

I don't like the artificial franchises, or the pointless new format. Getting live cricket back on terrestrial TV is great, but didn't need this competition.

Getting a reasonable crowd in is easy enough if you can charge low prices AND give away lots of tickets for free or as prizes. Men's T20 matches already attract really good crowds, indeed T20 Blast matches at The Oval and Lord's will fill the venues with full prices, so a full Oval tonight will hardly be a breakthrough.

Mikey C | 22.07.21 - 9:45 a.m. | #

I used to play alot of indoor cricket, back in the late 80s ... it was fast, fun, full of incident and over in a total of 32 overs (couple of hours max). Everyone batted and bowled, there were wickets, but these led to deductions rather than anyone walking back the the pavillion. If they wanted to have a TV friendly format, they could have revisited this.

PJS | 22.07.21 - 9:46 a.m. | #

I used to wear a football shirt with Pleasure Island printed on the front. Butterkist seems tame in comparison.

Brad | 22.07.21 - 9:49 a.m. | #

I went to the Oval last night and I took my 11 year old son.

I’m a cricket fan and he’s a cricket nerd. I like pretty much all formats of the game, in their different ways, and I generally appreciate the efforts that are being made across the board to improve access to the sport beyond the Sky paywall. (readers may well not be aware that pretty much all county games this season have been live-streamed on YouTube, synced to BBC Local Radio commentary.)

The Hundred is a belated attempt to repair the damage caused by going all-in with Sky, ironically immediately after the 2005 Ashes was such a success on Channel 4’s free-to-air coverage. And also to secure intellectual property rights for the ECB (something that didn’t quite happen after they invented T20 in 2003).

So, there is a lot of nuance here. I completely understand why long-term cricket fans instinctively dislike this kind of artificial meddling. I also found some of the trimmings last night fairly pointless (especially the guy with the mic roaming the ground to interview members of the crowd while the bowling team were changing ends, with results that were as trite and vacuous as you would expect).

But I genuinely enjoyed the sporting contest, and the talents of the players on display. My son, who carries far less baggage than me, couldn’t really see why this was much different to the County T20 we went to at Lord’s last month (a last-ball thriller between Middlesex and Essex). We just struggled with not being able to talk about “overs” and with not having a run-rate to look at during the chase. We’ll get used to that.

I certainly enjoyed being in a youthful, diverse, family-oriented crowd far more than I enjoyed being cooped up with a bunch of middle-aged blokes intent on getting as smashed as possible as quickly as possible, which was our experience of the England v Pakistan ODI at Lord’s a couple of weeks ago. If that’s the kind of traditional cricketing experience that some are so keen to preserve, then they are welcome to it.

My suggestion to anyone who is sceptical of The Hundred but who has any kind of interest in cricket would be to go to a game in person. I’ll watch the game on the BBC tonight in the full expectation that the coverage will be embarassing on many levels - but also with the expectation that the cricket itself will be great.

CJS | 22.07.21 - 10:20 a.m. | #

My heart says Invincibles, but my guts go with McCoys.

Kevin Hennessy | 22.07.21 - 10:32 a.m. | #

At 6.48 I think the commentator may have used the words "dot balls", i.e. no runs were scored from that delivery.

I enjoyed the broadcast more than I thought I was going to. This was helped by a tight finish, with victory only being achieved with two balls to spare. However, the TV graphics definitely need improving. They were placed so far to the edges of the screen that I couldn't see the full numbers displayed.

What is most pleasing is that a domestic cricket match -- yes, a cricket match! -- was shown on primetime free to air television for the first time since God knows when. Probably the last one shown was the old Sunday league. If the sport is to become popular with kids again, like CJS's son above, then long may it flourish.

Charles | Homepage | 22.07.21 - 11:06 a.m. | #

Great comment CJS, glad to hear that the actual experience of being there was good.

I caught the second innings on Sky, and enjoyed it a lot. I don't necessarily see the need to change from T20, as there are only 20 balls difference per innings, which adds up to maybe an extra half-hour total?

It's going to take a little time to bed in, and certainly the lack of run-rate will take some getting used to. A promising start though.

gooneruk | Homepage | 22.07.21 - 11:12 a.m. | #

As CJS mentioned, I think most sports work best when you are there in the crowd soaking up the atmosphere as much as anything.

But 3.5 hours! Ye gods! Most people wouldn't entertain watching a movie of that length!!

Cricket always seemed to be on the radio when I was a kid at my grandparents, but at least it was background drone while Grandad got on with stuff and we played!

Cornish Cockney | 22.07.21 - 11:37 a.m. | #

As a rather late convert to cricket,(after 2005 Ashes, having spent my 80s childhood summers on the perimeter of a cricket pitch watching my dad play) I can see why this format will upset the purists. But this has two big things going for it. Firstly it's on the TV and free to view and secondly the women's game is given the same prominence. Therefore my 8 year old cricket nut son was cheering the catches taken by women last night as much as if it was Ben Stokes playing and that is a huge thing for youth and female sport.

Lucy | 22.07.21 - 11:45 a.m. | #

Of course anything hyped as "bold and innovative" is doomed to be insipid and stale before it is even out of the dressing room door. I have a mental picture as DG as unimpressed as John Suttleworth's stony-faced Mary when various alternative comdedians were invited to "Make Mary merry."

cau1khead | 22.07.21 - 11:46 a.m. | #

The first ball in Twenty20 cricket as it is known today (for I'm sure it was independently reinvented many times over the years) was also a wide, so I regard the repeat in the Hundred as actually quite a good omen.

Chris | 22.07.21 - 12:04 p.m. | #

I was also at the game last night and second all of CJS's observations. The cricket was great and the environment was safe. Good to see so many families there, cheering on the players. Sadly, I didn't have a clue who Becky Hill was and her performance passed me by completely.

H SE18 | 22.07.21 - 1:59 p.m. | #

A larger crowd for tonight's men's match.
A lot more middle-aged men in the stands.
Rather fewer children.

diamond geezer | Homepage | 22.07.21 - 8:01 p.m. | #

I noticed the change of audience demographic too, many more of the beery, chanting, walking about under-40 blokes that are such a pain at 20-20 matches. I bet we won't get any close-ups of the ubiquitous "beer snakes" on BBC though.

Frank F | 22.07.21 - 8:19 p.m. | #

Can we have "I remember Angel Street"
back please.

Peter B | 22.07.21 - 9:50 p.m. | #

I'm not sure it's fair to compare the makeup of the crowd at a WOMEN's 100 game to that of a MEN's T20 match, as women's sport tends to attract a different type of audience. The crowd makeup and atmosphere at women's football is a lot different to that at men's football for example.

Yes cricket crowds can be a bit "beery" but I imagine that the income for the game from people getting pissed at matches is pretty important to the finances...£5.50 a pint...

Indeed tonight's crowd to me looked much like the crowd you'd see if Surrey had been playing instead

Mikey C | 22.07.21 - 11:44 p.m. | #











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