I haven’t posted my Worldcon schedule yet because the timings of events are still somewhat up in the air and I may not be able to be on everything I was originally offered. However, one panel that was suggested that I would very much like to do was on the Future of Sport. If that does happen, I will make the case for Twenty20 cricket conquering the world.
You will be forgiven for scoffing at that. After all, the recent attempt to run a Twenty20 tournament in New York collapsed very quickly, at least in part because the foolish organizers wanted to hold it in October. But it was also because it was a pirate event, and as such it would have not attracted big name players. Today, however, the ICC has sanctioned plans for a Twenty20 tournament to be run by the USA Cricket Association, who we might expect to have a better idea of the weather required to play the game. They are talking about venues in Florida and California.
But wait, you say, Americans have no interest in cricket. This idea is doomed! I don’t think so. Test cricket certainly is a step too far for Americans right now, but Twenty20 is ideally suited to American sport-watching habits. It takes about the same time as a baseball game to play, it has scoring as frenetic as basketball, and it never ends in a draw. Also, being cricket, it is loaded down with statistics, which Americans love. And, as the IPL has proved, it is a tremendous spectacle. Something about the Twenty20 format conspires to produce lots of very close finishes.
What’s more here are a few choice quotes from the USACA’s proposal document:
The existing passion for cricket in the United States currently lies largely in ex-patriot communities from the Caribbean, Sub-Continent and other traditional cricket playing nations and regions.
Their hunger for cricket and willingness to watch cricket on Pay-Per-View television has made the USA the second highest pay television earner in the world, behind India.
The USA is also the world’s second biggest Internet cricket market. The ICC Cricket World Cup 2007 attracted 1.15 billion hits within the USA, only fractionally behind India.
The USA is a very big and densely populated country, and even a small population of cricket watchers can easily produce the same amount of revenue as existing cricket-playing nations. Where there is money, the sport will follow.
There are even the occasional native USA residents, like myself, who are excited about Cricket in the States. We have had local leagues in the Bay Area for at least 25 to 30 years, when I first started to be involved in the sport. I’m quite surprised, sometimes, at how many pitches we have locally – at various schools and parks.
We also just had the first ever inter-league cricket tournament held in the USA for women right here in the South Bay (though our San Jose team had only been playing for six weeks – and the Seattle team had been playing for five to six years – we stood up quite well…)
And don’t forget that the US will be fielding a team for the T20 Qualifiers in the UAE this coming October. That should generate some excitement here in the States…