Too Much International Sport?

Playing for your country is the pinnacle in most sports. It is an honour and a privilege, and something that once achieved can never be take away.

In some countries it is still a treasured moment every time a player dons the national colours. In other countries the value appears to have diminished. There is no longer the same pride amongst the players, replacing that pride has come an expectation and a feeling of entitlement. Which is incredibly sad.

Why has this come about? Is it the result of a centralised contract system, which has seen the gap between international representation and the next level increase to extreme levels? This in turn protecting those fortunate to be on such a contract, and making it harder for others to break into the ‘purple circle.’ Or is it simply that there is too much international sport?

Take cricket as an example, in the 2019 -2020 International season which ran from May 2019 to April 2020 in the men’s game there were 39 Test matches played, 156 One Day Internationals and 254 T20 matches played or scheduled prior to the Covid 19 pandemic. In the women’s game there was one Test match, 32 One Day Internationals and 191 T20 matches played or scheduled.

With just the Men’s Test matches – assuming they lasted the full five days – and the One Day Internationals that is just under a year’s worth of cricket, 351 days played. Throw in the T20 games and the figure jumps to over 600 days of International cricket. Throw in the women’s matches and that is 829 days of International cricket a year.

Is that too much?

The word is that the viewing figures for the T20 World Cup, which just came to a close, were “disappointing.” There are of course many traditionalists who simply will not watch this format of the game, even so it is believed that the viewing numbers were well below what was expected or forecast. As one cricket-loving friend from the UK stated “if you watched it you would understand why people turned it off.” They said that the constant chatter from the commentators became unbearable, and was frequently completely irrelevant to what was happening.

This is a path that cricket has been treading for a while now and comes as no surprise. Being a talented player does not guarantee that an individual will transition from the pitch to the commentary box. If they fail to offer insights or suggest what a captain or a bowler should do, they become unnecessary, and an irritation. The broadcasters of cricket in Australia in recent years have failed to grasp that concept, and have blind faith that big name ex-players will pull people in no matter what they say. Ashes fans in England are in for a rude awakening, with BT sport opting not to send a commentary team to Australia as they will be receiving the one-eyed Australian commentary. There needs to be more of the Richie Benaud style, less said, but what was said carried gravitas.

However the real issue for the drop in viewing figures must be either that the world interest in T20 cricket is waning, or that there is too much international cricket being played across three different formats.

If you look at a second tier sport like Hockey, in 2019 the FIH (International Hockey Federation) launched its much hyped Pro League. This ran from January until the end of June and only featured a select group of eight teams in the Men’s competition; because Pakistan withdrew after the start and before playing a match. Including the semi finals and finals there were 60 matches played. In the nine team women’s competition there were 76 matches played. This made it a total of 136 matches in five and a half months.

For the European nations in August they had their European Championships which saw eight nations in both the men’s and women’s competition both play 20 matches. There were other international tournaments played such as the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup, in which six teams played 18 matches. At the Pan American games 8 teams in the men’s and women’s competitions both played 24 games . In Africa the Olympic Qualifiers were played and six teams in the men’s and five teams in the women’s competitions played a total of 25 matches. This takes the total to 267 International matches and does not include individual Test matches between nations or indoor tournaments. IT also does not include the international tournaments played by many of the other nations looking to climb the World Rankings. If we add these in we will be close to an International fixture for every day of the year, in a sport where players are essentially amateurs. Is that feasible and is it good for the sport? It is important to remember that 2019 was a year outside of a World Cup or an Olympic Games. Also, this is only International hockey and is not taking into account junior tournaments or club competitions. Is this too much international competition? Has this diluted the appeal for fans to pay for a ticket and watch or tune in on television?

The viewing figures for the 2021/2022 FIH Pro League have like the T20 World Cup by all accounts also been ‘disappointing.’

In some countries there can be no doubt that the national team has strong support. However if we look at Australia a disconnect has sadly developed between the national team and the club sides. The centralised program means that many of the clubs that developed players will only see those players play in their home state every three years; this will be an issue wherever the program is based. Yet even in Perth the support that the International players used to receive from their adopted clubs is no where near the levels it was in the 1980’s and early 90’s. Clubs would turn out in force to support the international players playing for their clubs. International coaches may not want these players playing club hockey for a myriad of reasons but those running the game have to realise that that decision has an impact on the support the national team receives. Sadly today there are many who play club hockey who simply do not watch the national team, either on television or live.

If you look at football, it truly is the “World Game,” easily surpassing cricket for the most international matches played in a year and this is based purely and solely on eleven-a-side football. There is no need to look at beach football, or futsal. One of the reasons that there are so many games of football played annually is because there are more nations as members of FIFA than the United nations recognises! In 2019 alone there were 32 senior international competitions held across the world. These included The FIFA Women’s World Cup, The Men’s Asian Cup, the African Cup of Nations, the Copa America and the CONCACAF Gold Cup. Just those five tournaments saw 212 matches played. There were another 27 International tournaments hosted that year!

On top of these tournaments there were five weeks known as FIFA International Day/Dates for International teams to play International friendlies. So with so much international football is it any wonder that some games will not pique the interest of all fans.

Of course the problem facing many football fans today is working out where they can watch the matches they want on television. With so many different stations owning the rights unless you are a die-hard fan you may not even know a game is taking place. This was the case in Australia during the recent Matildas v Brazil matches. Channel Ten now has the rights to the International games, and foolishly they assumed that all would know the games were taking place and when. While the potential is there to attract a bigger audience on free to air television, in order to pull in those fans who no longer watch free-to-air television you are going to have to spend money marketing the games. That marketing spend is going to have to be spread over a variety of platforms in order to achieve the best results. Having spent so much on the rights are they going to spend that money? Do they expect the FFA to market the games? Certainly just promoting them via their own channels and social media platforms is never going to be enough to pull in the audiences that they and their sponsors are going to want.

The question here is again are the teams playing too many games? To many all they are interested in are the World Cup and European/Asian/African Cup of Nations qualifiers etc. and possibly Olympic Qualifiers. Then if their nation qualifies there will be added interest, but the World Cup and the Euros are watched by fans across the globe irrespective of nationality. Yet with the World Cup having been expanded to 32 teams lifting the number of games to 64, less people are able to watch every game, as they did in the past. Once again is this a case of too many games? Certainly the feeling with the Cricket World Cups is that there are too many games and the tournament drags on for too long.

It would appear that Rugby Union has the mix about right with the tier one nations. The Europeans play the Six Nations Championships and the Southern hemisphere sides The Rugby Championship. Then they each tour to the Northern or Southern hemisphere in their off-seasons. While the number of games played at International level in a year may appear to be right, there are question marks over the exclusivity of the games and opponents. England for example has not played in Fiji outside of a World Cup in the professional era. Their last match in Fiji being played in 1991. That may be good for England but is it good for the sport as a whole?

Rugby Union turned professional following the 1995 World Cup. In the amateur era, only two players achieved the milestone of over 100 International Caps, France’s Phillipe Sella (111) and Australia’s David Campese (101). There are now 67 players who have passed this milestone, with Wales’ Alun Wynn-Jones the most capped on 161 International caps, 149 for Wales and 12 for the British and Irish Lions.

It is interesting to note that in football Billy Wright became the first footballer in the world to earn 100 international caps. Wright also holds the record for longest unbroken run in competitive international football. He made 70 consecutive full international appearances and in his 105 appearances captained England 90 times. His 100th appearance came against Scotland in 1959. It is worth noting that Wright broke the all-time England appearance record with his 42nd cap. Even with so much international football only nine England players belong to the Centurion club. Peter Shilton’s record of 125 International Caps set at the FIFA World Cup in 1990 still stands 31 years on.

To prove how much cricket there is now players are nudging 200 Test matches in a career, with only India’s Sachin Tendulkar having reached that milestone. The retired Ricky Pointing and Steve Waugh finished on 168 while England’s Jimmy Anderson is about to pass them, he is currently sitting on 166 appearances. After Tendulkar in 1989, and Steve Waugh in 1985, Australian Allan Border is the highest player whose career at international level started prior to the 1990’s. His Test career began in 1978 and he amassed 156 caps. He sits ninth on the all time appearances list. The West Indies Courtney Walsh debuted in 1984 and has 132 caps while India’s Kapil Dev has 131. They sit 19th and 20th on the all time list. The highest placed player to have made their debut in the 1960’s is West Indian Sir Clive Lloyd in 46th place with 110 caps. Sir Colin Cowdrey is the only player to have debuted in the 1950’s to have played 100 test matches, he was also the first man to achieve the feat finishing with 114.

Out of the 70 players to have player over 100 Test matches in Cricket only 24 of those had careers that started before 1990. So is this yet again proof that there is too much cricket?

Professional sport has boxed itself into a corner. League competitions in many sports have built up strong supporter bases over decades, and the consistency and history of their competitions as well as sticking with broadcasters make them appealing to fans. They are appealing to sponsors and television companies as they offer a popular product consistently, not only through most of the year, but every year.

The National associations in many sports want a slice of that pie. Hence the need to increase the amount of games that fall under their control. Players were brought under centralised contracts to try and control the availability of players, and also to ease the burden on their club or provincial side if one was injured while on international duty. Of course if you are paying top dollar to your international players then you need to have them playing in order to earn the money to be able to pay them. If a national team does not have a centralised program where players are contracted on high wages, one wonders why they need to play so often?

Yet the problem facing the sports that are playing so many internationals is the cost of paying players. In most cases this is on the rise as is the staging of the matches. However the powers that be are often diluting their own product. The fans are disengaging due to the overload of matches. They are becoming more discerning in terms of the tournaments and games they will watch. The players too are doing the same, many now choosing loyalty to lucrative deals with T20 franchises over representing their country. This creates a huge problem when it comes to selling the television rights and attracting sponsors. Tie in the now very real need to advertise when and where games are going to be broadcast and the signs are that the costs are going to increase while the incoming revenues look like decreasing.

There are plenty of saying’s such as ‘too much of a good thing is a bad thing,’ and ‘sometimes less is more,’ there is a reason that these sayings have hung around for so long, and that is because there is wisdom in them; The first comes from the 15th century and the second the 19th century, but well over 100 years ago! Having so much international sport is devaluing what was once a very special product, one that pulled people in and caught the nation’s attention. The games also meant a great deal to all who were selected. Clearly not all international sport is capturing the attention of many fans and that is very sad for all those honoured to wear the colours of their nation.

Can or will any of these sports trim things back and restore the magic, or have they already gone too far to be able to claw back the interest that is waning?