Super League officials are "confident" that the Magic Weekend at St James’ Park in Newcastle Saturday and Sunday will break the attendance records set at the same venue last year. A record aggregate crowd of 67,788 watched the '15 event and "it also set a new benchmark for the most number of people attending a single day of the event" -- 40,871 on the Saturday -- but those figures are reportedly "in danger of being topped this year." Interim Super League GM Mark Foster said, "We're slightly ahead of where we were this time last year. We'd like to get to 40,000 on the Saturday and beat the weekend total as well and the signs are good. We're opening the top tier due to demand" (RUNNING RUGBY, 5/19).
England & Wales Cricket Board Chair Colin Graves said that a day-night Test in England "will happen in the near future." The first five-day match under lights took place in Australia last November in its home series against New Zealand and Graves said "it is only a matter of time before the ECB follows suit." Graves: "You can't turn your back on it, it will happen. We just have to decide when it is going to happen. We're doing a lot of work on it and we'd love to see day-night cricket." Graves also said "Test cricket would never return to terrestrial television." He added, "The younger generation do not watch terrestrial television, they use social media. We have to take that into account" (PA, 5/19).
