Wyn Drabble: When players on field outnumber fans in stands something doesn't add up

Wyn Drabble.

Stayed in Saturday night.

It's becoming a more common option these days though I have to add I was right up there in the mosh pit at Ben Harper and the Innocent Criminals a week earlier so there's life in the old boy yet.

Anyway, searched for some TV viewing to provide the entertainment on Saturday and happened upon something called Super Smash cricket, which ended up raising a few questions.

Oh, there was no problem in the colour and movement department; the Knights wore bright pink, the Central Stags wore green and there was plenty of slogging.

The venue was excellent too. New Plymouth's Yarrow Stadium was a picture postcard even though the cloudy weather obscured the local landmark that is Mt Fuji. I think it was called Egmont once but they had to change it with decimalisation or something.
So venue was another box to be ticked along with colour and movement.

Attendance was the main issue. Nobody sat in the seats around the ground; they all huddled into the centre of the main stand. All 11 of them.

It's possible that the figure was upwards of 11 but that was as many as I could count from one long shot.

The question was how did 11 people cover the costs of the event? There was the ground hire (though maybe you get a reduction if the mountain doesn't show), the colourful uniforms, team transport (the Knights had to come all the way from "Northern"), crowd control officials and TV coverage costs.

The caravan selling battered savs on sticks would have had a bleak night of it.

Just for argument's sake, I did a rough budget. Of course, the figures are not accurate because I have made them up but they will serve to illustrate my point.

Please do not write in to the editor about inaccuracies. (I have already realised my earlier mistake about the mountain. The correct full name is of course Mt Fujiyama.)

My rough budget:

Ground hire - $5000 (cleaning extra)
Colourful uniforms for the players - $5000
Team transport - $5000
Crowd control - $5000
TV coverage - $5000
Hotdog wastage - $275

As you see, that all adds up to (if you use the metric system) $25,275. Doubters will already be thinking I have forgotten about the incoming funds. Well I haven't.
Incoming funds:

Admission tickets - 11 @ $20 each - $220.

Now, I'm no arithmetic expert but I make that a loss of $25,055. It could be reduced if they managed to freeze the saveloys for later use but they would definitely have had to chuck the batter.

I managed to work out how they do it. There in front of the words Super Smash was a golden arch. The stylised M was also dotted around the venue, painted on the grass and even took star billing on the front of the players' shirts.

So, the losses did not matter. The tab would be picked up by a fast food chain which was sponsoring the whole event.

May I therefore suggest that the fast food chain is making too much money. Perhaps they could afford to halve the price of a happy meal, or even make their drinks free.

Anyway, the rains came and the match was abandoned so it wasn't the finest night of TV viewing but certainly better than the likes of Big Fat Gypsy Weddings or a re-run of Snakes on a Plane.

Footnote: The sub-editors have already been in touch to point out my major inaccuracy so again I ask you please not to write in. The correct name of the mountain is, of course, Mt Kilimanjaro.