Cricket Australia CEO James Sutherland hailed the Big Bash League's TV numbers this summer "as a success despite the spike in crowd numbers not being mirrored in the ratings," according to Andrew Wu of the SYDNEY MORNING HERALD. Approaching the end of its fourth season, the BBL "is achieving CA's aim of taking the game into new audiences but Test and one-day international cricket remain the forms which are putting bums on lounge seats." The coverage of the one-day tri-series "has attracted more than double the numbers of the BBL." A combined five-city audience of 1.475 million "watched Australia put India to the sword in Melbourne last Sunday compared to 620,000 for the clash between the Melbourne Renegades and Adelaide Strikers, which was the highest rating BBL game." Channel Nine's coverage of the one-day internationals featured in three of the top 10 programs last week "while the Renegades-Strikers match came in at 27th." The combined TV audience for this summer's BBL had been down 4.2% as of Jan. 4 compared to last summer but CA believes that "has narrowed down to two per cent on year-to-year comparisons." Metro numbers "are down but regional audiences have increased." Sutherland said the TV ratings had "held up well" with last year considering the increased TV sport competition with the Socceroo's Asian Cup campaign and the "rise in Australia's fortunes" in tennis, headlined by Nick Kyrgios (SMH, 1/26). In Sydney, Andrew Faulkner wrote Sutherland said that the Big Bash crowds were up 18% "across the competition this year." Sutherland: “Something like 23,000 was the average crowd for a game. Which is pretty good considering a number of the venues like Perth, Hobart and Spotless can’t fit that many people, which means we are getting pretty significant crowds elsewhere.” Giving Canberra the Big Bash final "seemed another of the odd decisions that included stripping Perth of its Test and Adelaide of its Australia Day ODI." It "wanted to ease the load on the main venues just days from World Cup warm-up games and ahead of the Sheffield Shield’s resumption next week." CA said, “Part of our consideration was around kids. In the ACT it will still be school holidays when the final is played, making it attractive for families" (THE AUSTRALIAN, 1/27).
