ECB admits no evidence Hundred has attracted new fans to other forms of cricket
'The Hundred is all about throwing cricket's doors open – and it's already delivering,' the ECB's then chief executive, Tom Harrison, said after the first tournament in 2021. 'We need to grow cricket, reach more people, and that's exactly what the Hundred does.' A report published last October stated that 31% of tickets for the Hundred have been bought by women, that 23% were bought for juniors and that 41% of buyers attended in family groups.
But on the day that counties received their first downpayment on the windfall generated by external investment into the eight Hundred franchises Gould said no work had been done into finding out if any of those new fans remain involved in the sport during the 11 months of the year when the tournament is out of action.
'That's probably a bit of work that we now need to do going forward,' Gould said. 'Just to check that when people do come in, where do they go? Because you might get some coming in to Test cricket [who] then go to the Hundred, and Hundred into Test cricket. We haven't done that work in any great detail.'
That lack of work is particularly surprising given that cross-pollination between formats is one of the ECB's primary goals.
'Fandom is really important for us, whether it's England, Leicestershire or London Spirit,' Gould said. 'That's the key. We've got a really dedicated core audience, which is relatively small compared to other sports. And then we've got lots of people that are very interested in cricket but perhaps don't come to it as often as we want. We know that the interest is there, we just need to get people to come more often for all formats, rather than just that 'I've been to the Test once a year' type of thing.'
This year's Hundred, which starts at Lord's next Tuesday, is likely to be the last before new owners start to push through significant changes, from team names and kits to the length of the format itself. 'That's the kind of conversation we're starting to get into now,' said Vikram Banerjee, the tournament's managing director. 'It would be slightly odd to bring all these great people in and then just leave it as it is.'
Deals for the sale of part or full stakes in six of the eight Hundred franchises were finalised this week, with the final two expected imminently. The total investment has been put at £520m of which an initial sum of 'just north of £400,000' has now been released to every county. In all host counties can expect to receive a minimum of £18m, and non-hosts around £25m.
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The possibility of adding a ninth team to the competition has already been discussed, but current non-hosts have been warned against spending their windfalls on unnecessary stadium upgrades as they jostle for position in the queue.
'When giving guidance as to what a future expansion team needs to look like in terms of facilities, we're not going to be setting huge capacities,' Gould said. 'What we don't want is a load of empty plastic seats around the place. We're not looking to see investment going into creating white elephants.'
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