WHY THE INTRODUCTION OF TWENTY20 CRICKET AND THE INDIAN PREMIER LEAGUE THREATENS THE FUTURE OF TEST CRICKET?

by

ABSTRACT

This study examined the Twenty20 cricket competition launched in England and Wales in 2003. The findings identified that the competition has many of the characteristics which current diffusion models believe to be critical success factors. However, most research focused on American and Australian sports, and two key contextual factors are excluded: both timing and weather have been critical factors in the competition's success.

Successful launches and also factors that led to failures. Most of the research conducted has been in American and Australian sport, with academic models developed in these countries, particularly America. The researcher believes the models to be useful, but felt there were likely to be differences in England and Wales because of the sporting culture and calendar.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACTII

CHAPTER IIV

INTRODUCTIONiv

BACKGROUND TO TWENTY20vii

THE DEVELOPMENT AND TRADITION OF CRICKETx

INNOVATION IN CRICKETxii

BREAKAWAY LEAGUES - PACKER'S WSC AND INDIA'S ICLxiii

OBJECTIVESxviii

CHAPTER IIXIX

LITERATURE REVIEWxix

THE GAME BEFORE TWENTY20xxv

EVOLUTION OF THE INTERNATIONAL CRICKET COUNCILxxix

THE ICC'S CHALLENGESxxxiii

IMPACT ON THE PLAYERSxl

CHAPTER IIIXLVI

METHODOLOGYxlvi

CHAPTER IVL

ANALYSISl

ATTENDANCESl

QUESTIONNAIRE RESPONSESlii

TIMINGlii

WEATHERlii

CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTORSliii

FUTURE CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTORSliii

FINANCESliv

NEW AUDIENCEliv

FURTHER COMMENTSliv

CHAPTER VLXI

CONCLUSIONSlxi

FURTHER RESEARCH AND LIMITATIONSlxxiii

REFERENCESLXXIV

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

Cricket is currently at the strongest point in its history. There are more players, men and women, from more countries involved in the game than ever before; cricket is followed by more people on television and the internet, in more parts of the world than could have been imagined ten years ago. Most importantly, high quality, innovative and exciting cricket is being played at the international level. In its numerical support base, cricket is the second most popular sport in the world, after football. After years of limited development the game has evolved rapidly in the past decade, bringing with it the promise of a truly global sport played in all regions of the world.

It is important to place the game today in context. In order to know where the game will go from now, we need to examine how it has got here in the first place.

The researcher investigated the issues involved in making a new sport successful. What factors determine whether people are likely to attend a new sporting event and become interested in it? Compared to other forms of cricket, the competition appears to have been successful at bringing in spectators, but what have been the critical factors in this success?

Attendance figures were gathered from a number of sources to quantify the success of the competition in terms of spectator numbers. These clearly show that crowds are a lot higher for this form of cricket. A short open-ended questionnaire was developed from the literature review in order to investigate the likely critical success factors. This was then sent to the marketing departments of the 18 counties who participate in the competition.

The secondary research and the comments received from respondents identify a number of factors that were attributed to being critical to the success of the competition. These include the use of market research and the application of marketing techniques, media ...