Image Credit: twitter.com/@BBL
Following a gruelling season in which the BBL was mired in Covid-19 turmoil and shrinking curiosity, ruling leaders and sponsors in Australian cricket will convene soon to discuss the future of the reviled T20 competition. From instituting an overseas player draught to shortening the season, everything appeared to be on the counter to help revive the BBL, which finished its 11th edition on time but at a cost to some critics. Crowds were down from their high point five years ago, owing to community fear of Covid-19, and television ratings, while still high when particularly in comparison to rival sports, had tumbled.
This season, the pandemic’s hurdles became more drastic, with some unidentified players mustered to keep the competition running, but Australia’s utter lack of top names was emphasised once again. Due to the BBL’s nearly two-month season and the country’s pandemic restrictions, some foreign players had managed to avoid it wholly. In the aftereffects of Cricket Australia’s current billion-dollar broadcast deal expiring in 2023-24, it invariably ignited dire predictions about its coming years. When officials and stakeholders gather in the inner sanctum of the BBL, they are aware that some hard questions must be answered.
The Bubble of the Big Bash League
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The BBL exploded in the middle of the last decade, with kids and their families enjoying unparalleled game time, perhaps most memorably in 2016 when over 80,000 fans attended the Melbourne Derby at the MCG, followed by 71,000 during the same matchup a year later. Back then, the BBL had a 35-game season opener and a season length of around 40 days.
Given the tournament’s growing clout and pure conjecture that it was on the verge of eclipsing international cricket in popularity, an increasingly broad BBL was a crucial element of CA’s billion-dollar broadcast deal with Channel Seven and Fox Sports in 2018. As a result of CA clearing space in February – a month in the Australian sports calendar that is somewhat up for grabs – the 2018-19 season featured a 56-match regular season spread across 60 days, surpassing the inflated IPL. However, the tournament’s length contributed significantly to player and fan fatigue, and some international stars chose to sit out and pursue fewer taxing opportunities elsewhere.
With the broadcast deal still in spot, the BBL has maintained the same number of games but whittled down the duration to 54 days in the most recent season. Choosing the appropriate timeframe to accommodate the needs of players, fans, and commercial interests is a great struggle for BBL officials.
CA tried to cater to the BBL’s climax in late January, during the critical school holidays, having nixed playing into February, as indicated this season when Australia chose to postpone an ODI series against New Zealand, which was scheduled to begin two days after the BBL final. The BBL, however, is unable to have a self-contained window every year due to cricket’s crowded calendar. The continued exclusion of the Decision Review System (which would have been incorporated in BBL|11 but for issues with navigating state borders) or any kind of task process is a major source of annoyance. That is expected to be remedied for next season, though its execution will involve additional costs for the league, just as the execution of three new regulations divided coaches and players two seasons ago.
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