Bryce Johns: Cricket losing its attraction

Martin Crowe's comeback dominated cricket headlines in New Zealand. Photo / Jason Dorday

Opinion

It says much of the parlous state of cricket in this country that the most interesting story of the week has been the comeback of a pudgy 49-year-old.

Of course, when that man is New Zealand great Martin Crowe, it's bound to command some air time.

And it helps if that same player, one of our best ever batsmen, is appearing in the Auckland reserve grade at the Papatoetoe Recreation Ground and is as happy as ever to fire off a few verbal volleys over the state of the pitch. Never mind the caretaker probably has six grounds to look after - and a couple of roundabouts on the streets of Papatoetoe as well.

A rare test win, even if it was over Zimbabwe; the opening of the domestic season; the national cricket awards; and a looming date with those ever cocky Aussies just didn't set the pulse racing in comparison.

It goes without saying not everyone feels the same way, though it seems to be a dwindling band. There was a twinge of nostalgia to read earlier in the week of Brendon Bracewell sitting through the night watching live coverage of the Black Caps' closer-than-they-would-have-wanted victory in Bulawayo. He did have familial reasons to display his stamina, the 52-year-old former speedster glued to his son Doug's test debut. The younger Bracewell's 5-85 in the second innings turned out to be a key part of the result.

Still, someone needs to point MySky out to Bracewell snr.

Apart from proud dads, how many others were interested enough to stay up all night to watch two of the world's worst test-playing nations?

Cricket's waning pull with the punters has never been so obvious. When the Plunket Shield started this week, the picturesque - but empty - Cobham Oval in Whangarei beamed into lounges on TV's sports news.

But at least we briefly got to see the cricket on screen - the absence of ball-by-ball coverage on mainstream radio this summer is significant. It's made the gardening at home slightly more painful and though cost-cutting will have been part of the equation, if the fans had been tuning in, there's little doubt there would not have been a change.

So why do the flannelled fools consume so much media space?

By default, quite possibly.

With sports editor Paul Lewis on leave this week, I've been helping (or hindering) the sports department. And trying, at this time of year, to find good yarns to attract the reader, other than cricket, can be a struggle.

We're over rugby for the moment; the league's on at the wrong time in England; the Phoenix are rubbish (again); we can't attract a decent golfer here for our one big tournament; tennis is only hot for two weeks of summer.

And if Martin Devlin, that 'respected' sports broadcaster, is to be believed, women's sport is, well, crap. He might think differently if he'd read stories of sacrifice and dedication involving our Olympic Games contenders. Like our Kim Smith feature last week or Kate McIlroy's triathlon revival (p75 today). But the Olympics are still most of a year away.

Maybe the only hope is the Breakers taking back-to-back titles.

That or Steve Hansen saying something interesting at his All Black anointing. Fat chance.

In the meantime, the hunt is on for the players and gameplan to get our first test cricket win in Australia in 25 years. The focus is on Tim Southee's injuries, Dan Vettori's spin partner, the burgeoning captaincy of Ross Taylor, Jesse Ryder's gut and finding a batsman to withstand the barrage.

Most of New Zealand wants the Black Caps to do well, it's just that we don't hold out much hope. Is that the fascination for the hangers-on? Can we not resist watching a train wreck?

The advent of Twenty20 cricket has done a couple of things - made the visits to places like Blake Park in Mt Maunganui over Christmas even more fun, and made the best players unimaginably rich.

If only they'd live up to the hype when playing for the national side, or in the longer forms of the game.

Then they might go some way to justifying the resources media throw at them.

- Bryce Johns is the editor of the Herald on Sunday.