The 2011 edition of the World Cup will begin tomorrow. There’s no excitement yet about the World Cup – TV sales are flat, veteran cricket writer Suresh Menon wonders if there’s a ‘fan fatigue’, and I don’t hear too many conversations about the cup. A majority of the voters, in an on-line poll conducted by the popular blog Churmuri, confirmed the sentiment: a 56% of the voters said they weren’t interested in the tournament’. Of course, the excitement would rise in the days, once the minnows are eliminated (though at least one minnow, as always, will make it to the qualifying stages) and the qualifying round commences - our hyper-active media will ensure that enough buzz is generated.
I gave up watching cricket on TV three years ago – it had stopped being fun for a long time, but 2008 onwards it ceased even being a decent source of entertainment. The greedy broadcasters and ICC, the sleeping guardian of the game have together worked hard to ensure that viewers are put-off as much as possible, thanks to a slew of advertisements. Last year SET MAX (the broadcaster of the muck-filled, scandalous IPL tournament) violated one of the most sacred experiences of the viewer: the space between the deliveries, by converting it into air-time to broadcast advertisements. This year, TEN Sports went one step ahead by cramming the screen with as many floater ad-boxes as possible, when the ball was live. These steps, along with a steady decline in the quality of commentary (I shudder every time when cliché-spewing machines like Sunil Gavaskar and Ravi Shastri hold the mike), makes the experience a disgusting one.
Therefore, I doubt I’ll be watching much of the World Cup this year, even though its broadcaster, ESPN-Star, is yet to completely bow to the demands of selling every available slice of air-time and every pixel on the screen. What is it with the Indian media that makes it sell the ? Print newspapers sell their editorial space and disguise news as advertisements, journalists sell their ethics, and cricket channels sell their live-space?
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