No cricket! What would Kerry think?

Channel Nine has a history of passing up great sporting events it owns the rights to for mediocre television. When Nine needed Channel Ten to take up the slack with its AFL rights, it managed to secure a great deal which saw the junior broadcaster show the finals series for the length of the rights term – the problem was the Sydney execs who signed the deal to get Ten on board didn;t quite appreciate just how big a televison event the Grand Final is. Legend has it when Kerry Packer found out that he forked out millions only to not show the finals he politely asked “who’s the cunt that signed this?”

Nine had the rights to the Football World Cup 2oo2 and decided months out that it would only show games with popular teams like Brazil, Italy and England, not quite realising that Nigeria versus Spain can be an absolute blockbuster. SBS took up the slack and rated its arse off, leaving Nine to look like fuck wits.

Nine did a simular thing with the 2005 Ashes Series, which allowed SBS to show the matches Nine didn’t want to show because of prime time shows, Wimbledon ot that no one will stayt up late to watch cricket – they fucked that one up big time.

Tonight Nine did similar thing and decided not to show India versus Sri Lanka in the Commonwealth Bank Series match from Adelaide, which turned out to be the most exciting match so far, with Sri Lanka’s attack claiming late scalps before allowing India to just get over the line with two wickets and about three balls to spare.

So late was Nine’s decision not to show the match live that it actually provide a broadcast, which was shown live on Foxsports 3. Great for those of us with Foxtel or Austar, but an arse suck for cricket fans who love watching Sri Lanka and India but are stuck with free-to-air.

So what did Nine decide was so important to watch instead of the cricket? Monster House (fucking Monster House?), Sarah Connor Chronicles and Gordon Ramsey’s Kichen Nightmares and some shit called Sensing Murder.  

I reckon all of those shows would have been beaten by their commercial opposition and I hope Foxsports 3.

Surely it’s time for the commercial networks to have a second digital channel so they can show sports when it conflicts with other programs, even of its the last half hour of day’s play that goes into the news. The BBC often switches sports coverage between its three channels to accommodate popular programs.

Do something soon Nine, otherwise all sports will be lost to free-to-air TV.