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- Kerry Packer, the Australian media tycoon, wanted broadcasting rights for Australia’s home series for 3 years and offered $1.5 million to the Australian Cricket Board (ACB).
- But ACB gave the rights (at $210,000) to government-run Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), stating ABC’s loyalty (ABC had been airing cricket for 20 years).
- Packer, frustrated, started his own professional cricket competition in 1977 – World Series Cricket (WSC).
- For WSC, he secretly signed up the best players across Australia, West Indies, England, Pakistan, New Zealand & South Africa at salaries higher than most would have made in their careers.
- Secret signings & their media leaks, crazy money & court cases brought unprecedented worldwide attention to cricket.
- On top of it, WSC’s heavy promotion – centered around lethal pace bowling & giving it a theme of a ‘gladiatorial’ war – changed the way cricket was looked at.
- Also evident in India was the absence of any Indian player in WSC signings.
- And, all this was happening against the backdrop of Television’s growth in India.
- TV came to India in 1959; from 1975, services started reaching major cities, but it was in 1982 that Doordarshan (DD) became a national broadcaster.
- India had such low odds (66/1) of winning the 1983 World Cup that even DD didn’t bother telecasting it; it was only when India got into the semi-finals that DD made arrangements for live transmission.
- An underdog winning a ‘gladiatorial’ war against the mighty West Indies and being watched by millions back home got emotions attached to the game.
- Soon media attention & money poured in; the structure of the game – a 1-minute break between overs – also gave cricket an advantage to attract money.
- This media attention & money grew multi-fold when India opened its economy to foreign investment in 1991; this also let the Indian cricket board (BCCI), who used to pay DD for telecasting cricket, sell rights to international TV networks.
- With the backing of a billion as an audience, BCCI became a force on the global stage (a first for any Indian sport); power, money, and fame made cricket a great career choice for young aspirants and ensured the craze never died.
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Image courtesy of Picture by Tourism Victoria through Flickr
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