GLAMMY

[blue lewj]

In comparison the County Championship games are watched by about 50 people a day with backpacks and flasks with takings at the bar and food stalls being minimal.

Where do you think the ECB think their marketing budget is better spent?

[the other bob wilson]

Isn't that the same with anything though?
Surely the large crowds show there is appetite for it though.

Does the player's background matter if they're serving up entertainment? Keeping in mind the make up of the City squad this season.

It didn't seem to matter to most of those yesterday. I do agree that they will drop off if the product is bad though. As with anything really.

Regarding City, you look back beyond the last decade and there’s always been a Welsh nucleus (often a large one) in the team. City’s first team may not have a Welsh identity these days (maybe that’s why I don’t feel as close a connection to the club now), but it’s had one for the huge majority of its existence. Same with Glamorgan, the number of Welsh players may have dropped, but they’re still there and they are definitely a Welsh team.

What is The Welsh Fire meant to be? A side representing Wales of just a franchise? The make up of the team currently suggests the latter and, if that’s the case, they may as well rebrand the team as South West Fire and start alternating home games with Bristol ( a large potential audience is being ignored there) and Taunton - after all, Gloucestershire and Somerset at least have some representation in the team.

I agree about the T20 Blast which the marketing and media people at the ECB seem to have grown tired of and thrown away like a discarded toy. You only need to look at other parts of the world to see how popular it is and yet the money men and women prefer a new competition which offers a little more than three overs a side less and a few gimmicks thrown in - give it a couple of years and they’ll be agitating for something else (the One maybe) and the Hundred will be seen as old hat.

[blue lewj]

Regarding City, you look back beyond the last decade and there’s always been a Welsh nucleus (often a large one) in the team. City’s first team may not have a Welsh identity these days (maybe that’s why I don’t feel as close a connection to the club now), but it’s had one for the huge majority of its existence. Same with Glamorgan, the number of Welsh players may have dropped, but they’re still there and they are definitely a Welsh team.

What is The Welsh Fire meant to be? A side representing Wales of just a franchise? The make up of the team currently suggests the latter and, if that’s the case, they may as well rebrand the team as South West Fire and start alternating home games with Bristol ( a large potential audience is being ignored there) and Taunton - after all, Gloucestershire and Somerset at least have some representation in the team.

I agree about the T20 Blast which the marketing and media people at the ECB seem to have grown tired of and thrown away like a discarded toy. You only need to look at other parts of the world to see how popular it is and yet the money men and women prefer a new competition which offers a little more than three overs a side less and a few gimmicks thrown in - give it a couple of years and they’ll be agitating for something else (the One maybe) and the Hundred will be seen as old hat.

We're talking modern day though. I'm not sure the modern sports fan cares too much where the players are from. Obviously nice if they're local products and you have that connection but the requirement for many is if they are any good. Many will take performance over shoe-horning Welsh lads in for the sake of it. Do Man City fans care they have very few Mancunians in the team while winning the Premier League? I very much doubt it.

What is any new team meant to be really other than have a name representing the place it is from and actually playing there? All of the things you accuse the Welsh Fire of could be aimed at say Cardiff Devils. Most teams have to start somewhere. Again, it is a game where a glut of Welsh talent isn't at its disposal, at least if they have any aim to be competitive.

I think that the ECB could have saved money by not starting from scratch and keeping all the counties happy. They haven't though and whether we like it or not people seem to like it in record figures. Crowds drop off at City if we are playing rubbish as they do at virtually every sports team regardless of history. They could potentially go higher if Welsh Fire produce a successful team too. It isn't unique to the Hundred.

I enjoy watching it but have tried to take it on face value rather than get caught up in where the players are from etc.
Some of the performances have been shocking though. Yesterday, having been in some kind of control, they snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

[blue lewj]

Not sure if it is purely fixture coincidence but Welsh Fire are playing Birmingham Phoenix the evening of our game with Birmingham City.

[Pearcey3]

For what it is worth I think the money spent on marketing this competition could have achieved the same for T20 blast. All while not alienating most of the Counties involved.

..which is why a lot of us are so critical because this competition was not necessary. Just promote and fund T20 properly and with some BBC coverage as well you would see T20 rise significantly.

[blue lewj]

..which is why a lot of us are so critical because this competition was not necessary. Just promote and fund T20 properly and with some BBC coverage as well you would see T20 rise significantly.

I'm not sure it was needed. I totally agree on the T20 point too. I don't think there was much wrong with it and it will certainly suffer due to the Hundred becoming a thing.

The ECB will simply see record crowds, television viewing figures probably following the same trend and think that it was the correct decision.

People obviously have the choice to watch or not but I think it is here to stay and interest is definitely there and something to be built on, whether that be from traditional cricket fans or newcomers.

[The Bloop]

As has been said The Hundred just isn't needed.
It was only put forward as a tournament because the BBC didn't have any live cricket to broadcast and wanted something of their own. Somehow it's been timetabled at the same time as the 50 over competition at a time when England's performances in 50 over games have taken a bit of a downturn.
If the ECB want a successful national side then they should invest more in those formats at county level.

[the other bob wilson]

We're talking modern day though. I'm not sure the modern sports fan cares too much where the players are from. Obviously nice if they're local products and you have that connection but the requirement for many is if they are any good. Many will take performance over shoe-horning Welsh lads in for the sake of it. Do Man City fans care they have very few Mancunians in the team while winning the Premier League? I very much doubt it.

What is any new team meant to be really other than have a name representing the place it is from and actually playing there? All of the things you accuse the Welsh Fire of could be aimed at say Cardiff Devils. Most teams have to start somewhere. Again, it is a game where a glut of Welsh talent isn't at its disposal, at least if they have any aim to be competitive.

I think that the ECB could have saved money by not starting from scratch and keeping all the counties happy. They haven't though and whether we like it or not people seem to like it in record figures. Crowds drop off at City if we are playing rubbish as they do at virtually every sports team regardless of history. They could potentially go higher if Welsh Fire produce a successful team too. It isn't unique to the Hundred.

I enjoy watching it but have tried to take it on face value rather than get caught up in where the players are from etc.
Some of the performances have been shocking though. Yesterday, having been in some kind of control, they snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

Welsh Fire have a mostly domestic (English) batting line up full of players who, Pope apart, are county performers currently. Now, if I was a marketing man, I’d have tried to get the team to sign Welsh born Phil Salt who is currently closer to the England one day teams than the likes of Clarke, Duckett, Banton and Hain, so you’d be getting a good player who could be marketed as the Welsh face of the team representing the country - increasingly, people will notice the lack of Welshmen and women in the squads, especially if results stay as poor as they have been for a season and more.

I can’t comment on the women yet, but the men’s side looks a poorly put together cricket team to me - granted, they’ve been unlucky to lose Bairstow.

[blue lewj]

Welsh Fire have a mostly domestic (English) batting line up full of players who, Pope apart, are county performers currently. Now, if I was a marketing man, I’d have tried to get the team to sign Welsh born Phil Salt who is currently closer to the England one day teams than the likes of Clarke, Duckett, Banton and Hain, so you’d be getting a good player who could be marketed as the Welsh face of the team representing the country - increasingly, people will notice the lack of Welshmen and women in the squads, especially if results stay as poor as they have been for a season and more.

I can’t comment on the women yet, but the men’s side looks a poorly put together cricket team to me - granted, they’ve been unlucky to lose Bairstow.

I understand where you're coming from totally but the team have just had the largest domestic cricket crowd in Wales ever.

Marketing clearly isn't a problem at the moment. As you have rightly pointed out too, this crowd is off the back of some very poor performances.

If the performances stay bad then people will simply not go to games. I'm not sure they'll be thinking "Right, how many Welsh players have we got before I consider still going to games or not". I just don't think it is factored in as much as many would like to think it is in any sport these days.

[blue lewj]

As has been said The Hundred just isn't needed.
It was only put forward as a tournament because the BBC didn't have any live cricket to broadcast and wanted something of their own. Somehow it's been timetabled at the same time as the 50 over competition at a time when England's performances in 50 over games have taken a bit of a downturn.
If the ECB want a successful national side then they should invest more in those formats at county level.

I'm not sure it was needed. There is certainly interest though and interest that surpasses anything crowd wise seen before in Wales.

If something can be set up and surpass Glamorgan crowd figures in two years then it says more about what was not being done or being done incorrectly before than anything groundbreaking The Hundred are doing.

It shows though that people will turn up in Wales in numbers if it is marketed properly and they feel they're getting entertainment for their money.
I don't think people will watch a rubbish team though, Welsh or otherwise.

[The Bloop]

I'm not sure it was needed. There is certainly interest though and interest that surpasses anything crowd wise seen before in Wales.

If something can be set up and surpass Glamorgan crowd figures in two years then it says more about what was not being done or being done incorrectly before than anything groundbreaking The Hundred are doing.

It shows though that people will turn up in Wales in numbers if it is marketed properly and they feel they're getting entertainment for their money.
I don't think people will watch a rubbish team though, Welsh or otherwise.

It's marketed on the BBC and people watch the BBC. It's timetabled on purpose to coincide with school holidays.
The ECB should not sell exclusive broadcast rights for their competitions, but ensure that some matches in each competition (including finals) are broadcast free to air.

[blue lewj]

It's marketed on the BBC and people watch the BBC. It's timetabled on purpose to coincide with school holidays.
The ECB should not sell exclusive broadcast rights for their competitions, but ensure that some matches in each competition (including finals) are broadcast free to air.

I agree.

There has to be some thinking behind why the ECB sought to start from scratch with a totally new concept than run with the existing competition and counties. Not sure what the thinking is behind it but it surely would have cost them more to market these new teams and start a concept from scratch than say pump money into the T20. You would have thought so anyway. Unless the BBC had input and demanded a fresh new idea? Who knows.

[blue lewj]

Harry Kane on co-commentary on tonight's game.

Well popped in the pod for a few balls in his London Spirit shirt.

[Kind of Blue]

It’ll be around for a while I’m sure, the ECB can’t afford for it to fail so even if there are signs of it faltering I’m sure more money will be found to pump into it.

If the marketing and budget for all the “extracurricular” razzmatazz set aside for this, along with peak calendar slots, terrestrial telly exposure and the way the beeb have been pushing this, was given to the blast (perhaps with a refreshed name and image) I think you would have seen fairly similar results. The cricket and the standard clearly isn’t the whole draw to be fair, as the coverage I’ve seen likes to point out along with the games I’ve been able to watch and follow (primarily WF games, who to be fair have been pretty crap). Having the money to push all that “extra” stuff really helps.

I’m not a massive watcher of the short (and shorter) stuff outside of Glammy games, world cups (seldom bother with international series now) and some Big Bash in the winter when it feels a bit of a novelty after our summer. So the competition isn’t aimed at me, which is fine. Be nice to have a half decent side representing Wales in some way though!

[Father Dougal]

I do find the history argument interesting.

Everything had no history once.......

This thread is called glammy but do youngsters pay any attention to glammy now? There were thousands of kids at the Welsh fire game yesterday. They seemed to enjoy it anyway. Do they follow glamorgan also?

I just think we have to remember was the biggest welsh domestic crowd of all time yesterday. Glamorgan have never and will never have a crowd as big. Absolutely fine to say how bad and sad that is but to say nobody has any interest in the 100 is just nonsense sorry.

[Eric Cartman]

I do find the history argument interesting.

Everything had no history once.......

This thread is called glammy but do youngsters pay any attention to glammy now? There were thousands of kids at the Welsh fire game yesterday. They seemed to enjoy it anyway. Do they follow glamorgan also?

I just think we have to remember was the biggest welsh domestic crowd of all time yesterday. Glamorgan have never and will never have a crowd as big. Absolutely fine to say how bad and sad that is but to say nobody has any interest in the 100 is just nonsense sorry.

The 100 isn't really meant for anybody who already had an attachment to the game or a club. The shame here though is that Welsh Fire could have done a better job of working Glamorgan players into the squad to give some reason for new cricket fans to now follow the club. Could have quite easily had Timm, Hoges and Ingram and maybe Lloyd/Carlson/Douthwaite on their best form.

[Pearcey3]

Why can't we have a Welsh national team, breaking away from the ECB and going it alone? Ok, so we may not do very well on the international stage but it really pisses me off seeing the likes of Scotland, Ireland and Afghanistan present at the big competitions but no Wales. I am sure that people on here will come up with some valid reasons why not but it really does annoy me.

I think Glammy fill the gap of a national team

[Father Dougal]

The 100 isn't really meant for anybody who already had an attachment to the game or a club. The shame here though is that Welsh Fire could have done a better job of working Glamorgan players into the squad to give some reason for new cricket fans to now follow the club. Could have quite easily had Timm, Hoges and Ingram and maybe Lloyd/Carlson/Douthwaite on their best form.

I do think it would have made more sense to have the couple of overseas players and then the home players selected from the hosting counties, so for us would be the best English qualified players of glamorgan somerset and Gloucester.

Eg ollie pope playing for welsh fire v his home team yesterday felt silly.

[chrisp_1927]

I wouldn't get too carried away with the attendances for the hundred. Anyone who bought a Glamorgan season ticket that covered all Glamorgan games has free tickets for the welsh fire games,. There are thousands of free tickets being given out for every match to clubs and schools , and the tickets being sold are dead cheap. The test of the crowds will come when the subsidy tap is turned off.

I think the counties have completely mismanaged the T20 format over the years. For that reason I'm glad the ECB took control and I see the idea behind the franchises even if I don't naturally take to it. If anyone thinks that changing 6 ball overs to 5 ball 'sets' is a factor in attracting people in to the game I'd love to hear their arguments. I really think it was just about the ego's at the ecb. Every change they have made is essentially just copying what the Aussies did with the big bash, this hundred ball nonsense is just their pointless point of difference

[the other bob wilson]

I do find the history argument interesting.

Everything had no history once.......

This thread is called glammy but do youngsters pay any attention to glammy now? There were thousands of kids at the Welsh fire game yesterday. They seemed to enjoy it anyway. Do they follow glamorgan also?

I just think we have to remember was the biggest welsh domestic crowd of all time yesterday. Glamorgan have never and will never have a crowd as big. Absolutely fine to say how bad and sad that is but to say nobody has any interest in the 100 is just nonsense sorry.

The history or national identity argument became important as soon as the ECB named the Franchise Welsh Fire with an all red kit. The marketing men clearly want a Welsh team playing the Hundred or there would have been a team playing at Cardiff, Taunton and Bristol called the HTV wanderers or something. What we’ve got at the moment is a team that has no Welshmen, and one or two Welsh women I believe, repressing no one really.

I went downto Cardiff this morning and spoke to a couple of Glamorgan members who confirmed they’ve got free entry to Hundred games and that there are stacks of free tickets about that means the opportunity is there to get youngsters interested in cricket, but aree they going to keep on coming back if the team they support keeps on playing such crap cricket and the penny drops that there are more players in the Hundred with better connections to Wales or are from Wales (eg Hogan, Van Der Gugten, Salt ) paying for other teams than there are in the so called Welsh team.

[blue lewj]

The history or national identity argument became important as soon as the ECB named the Franchise Welsh Fire with an all red kit. The marketing men clearly want a Welsh team playing the Hundred or there would have been a team playing at Cardiff, Taunton and Bristol called the HTV wanderers or something. What we’ve got at the moment is a team that has no Welshmen, and one or two Welsh women I believe, repressing no one really.

I went downto Cardiff this morning and spoke to a couple of Glamorgan members who confirmed they’ve got free entry to Hundred games and that there are stacks of free tickets about that means the opportunity is there to get youngsters interested in cricket, but aree they going to keep on coming back if the team they support keeps on playing such crap cricket and the penny drops that there are more players in the Hundred with better connections to Wales or are from Wales (eg Hogan, Van Der Gugten, Salt ) paying for other teams than there are in the so called Welsh team.

I'm not sure they thought we will call this team Welsh Fire. Let's pack the squad with Welshmen. As you've said yourself elsewhere it is an auction/draft that is used to make up the teams. Do you suggest picking inferior players just because they're Welsh? How many Welsh players actually play in the competition this year?

People talk of free tickets and tickets for schools like Glamorgan couldn't do it more. There are literally thousands of empty seats at most Glamorgan games. They gave out a fair few freebies for the midweek T20 games but they could give a lot more.

I think a lot of people over estimate how much Welshness of the team matters to crowds. One player was Welsh in a squad of 18 for City against Norwich. Not sure most people cared all that much.

[Pedro de la Rosa]

I do find the history argument interesting.

Everything had no history once.......

This thread is called glammy but do youngsters pay any attention to glammy now? There were thousands of kids at the Welsh fire game yesterday. They seemed to enjoy it anyway. Do they follow glamorgan also?

I just think we have to remember was the biggest welsh domestic crowd of all time yesterday. Glamorgan have never and will never have a crowd as big. Absolutely fine to say how bad and sad that is but to say nobody has any interest in the 100 is just nonsense sorry.

Until last year, there wasn't a hundred team. Nobody really cares about it, in time they might but now? Behave.

[blue lewj]

Until last year, there wasn't a hundred team. Nobody really cares about it, in time they might but now? Behave.

They care about it to turn up to watch it more than any Glamorgan game here ever.

I can appreciate most of the other arguments but saying nobody cares about it here when they have just broken the domestic cricket crowd record is nonsense.

[chrisp_1927]

Can get 10/11 with bet365 on Glamorgan to win today if you're quick. Beats the betfair exchange prce

[chrisp_1927]

Spinners really putting the squeeze on. A decent start for Yorkshire has gone south very quickly.