Indian Viewers - STAR CRICKET , will it be as elusive as Neo Sports ?

[sohum]

I wanna watch Saqi and Mushy and Rana against the Indians today, but Star Cricket doesn't even come in Pakistan.

Cricinfo suggests that this is the team for Sussex: MH Yardy, JD Lewry, AJ Hodd, MA Thornely, CJ Liddle, RR Montgomerie, RSC Martin-Jenkins, RJ Kirtley, CD Hopkinson, Saqlain Mushtaq, CD Nash, OP Rayner

No Mushy or Rana. Unless they made a mistake.

 

[Insomniac]

Cricinfo suggests that this is the team for Sussex: MH Yardy, JD Lewry, AJ Hodd, MA Thornely, CJ Liddle, RR Montgomerie, RSC Martin-Jenkins, RJ Kirtley, CD Hopkinson, Saqlain Mushtaq, CD Nash, OP Rayner

No Mushy or Rana. Unless they made a mistake.

Boohoo, I just realized that county teams dont play Overseas players in friendlies

But I still wanna watch Saqiii...

 

[aditya123]

I doubt you'd get the Pura Cup, not even we get it on TV.

We used to get the Pura Cup on ESPN till a couple of years ago.
We still get to watch quiate a lot of the English County season on ESPNSTAR but now that they have started a new channel, I doubt we`d be able to watch any of that.

Star Cricket will shortly be available on TATASKY.
I just called the hotline and they have confirmed the news.

In my opinion,this channel will be better than the stupid nimbus channel.
Nimbus lacks the professionalism.Their graphics remind you of a shoddy powerpoint presentation.

No one is doubting the professionalism of ESS.They are a quality product but the problem of accessibility of these new channels is what Iam concerned with.
Now that they have Ian Chappel on the panel of `A few good men` , we can expect some high quality analysis as always.
Will be some good respite for the likes of Arun Lal and L.S.

 

[icyman]

Yes,accessibilty may be a problem.But one has to say that the problem starts with the BCCI's inefficiency to sell the TV rights.They also contemplated floating their own cricket channel.

Accessibilty is going to be a problem,even on the DTH platform.
Nimbus,initially entered into an agreement with ESS to distribute the channel,but they broke off later citing certain legal problems.

Star Cricket,on the other hand,will be a channel from the ESS stable and would be available easily to TATASKY holders.But,i seriously doubt whether other DTH providers like DishTv will be allowed to have the channel given that TATASKY does not have Zee Sports

 

[smssia0112]

Must have been a while back because it hasn't been covered in a while now.

 

[sohum]

Yes,accessibilty may be a problem.But one has to say that the problem starts with the BCCI's inefficiency to sell the TV rights.They also contemplated floating their own cricket channel.

I disagree with you. The only blame the BCCI possibly has in this fiasco is that they are selling rights to too many different companies. But this decision is made based on economics--it's not good to allow any one company to have the right as their quality will automatically degrade. Apart from that, I don't believe the BCCI sold rights for the England tour because it is not a BCCI home or away-home tour (where away-home is "home" matches played in neutral venues). This problem has happened because of repeated miscommunication between cable operators and channels.

Accessibilty is going to be a problem,even on the DTH platform.
Nimbus,initially entered into an agreement with ESS to distribute the channel,but they broke off later citing certain legal problems.

Star Cricket,on the other hand,will be a channel from the ESS stable and would be available easily to TATASKY holders.But,i seriously doubt whether other DTH providers like DishTv will be allowed to have the channel given that TATASKY does not have Zee Sports

See, this part is all true. The BCCI have nothing to do with what you have mentioned above. It is simply the fault of the TV service providers (whether they be cable operators or DTH services such as Tata Sky or DishTV) and the channels for failing to come to an agreement. As such, no company that broadcasts ESPN/Star Sports should have a problem bringing Star Cricket on-board. However, cable operators are complaining because of the high price of the channel and it seems DishTV has a sour relationship with ESS.

 

[Adarsh]

No cricket for 28 bloody rupees ?!! What a farce (though I'm in no way affected). Loads of people (most) will be ready to pay 28 rupees for the channel, even the slum dewellers in Mumbai would do it to watch cricket .

To put it into perspective, Rs.28 is about £0.30. I think my family pay about £10 for Sky Sports. I know it isn't worth it comparing two economies, but anyway....

 

[aditya123]

No cricket for 28 bloody rupees ?!! What a farce (though I'm in no way affected). Loads of people (most) will be ready to pay 28 rupees for the channel, even the slum dewellers in Mumbai would do it to watch cricket .

To put it into perspective, Rs.28 is about ?0.30. I think my family pay about ?10 for Sky Sports. I know it isn't worth it comparing two economies, but anyway....

It is not the people but the cable operators who decide what the people must/(must not) see.
With CAS not being fully implemented in Mumbai, the cable operators still hold the aces.
Who cares about the consumer anyway ?

 

[Pink Unicorn]

Does anyone else think Star Cricket was created purely so that ESPN Star could charge for 2 channels instead of one ? Suppose theres 3 ODIs and 3 Tests in a tour within a month, if ESPN Star telecast the ODI series, and Star Cricket telecast the Test series, they could mint double the money by forcing people to subscribe to both channels.

 

[Sagacious]

STAR Cricket is currently showing India Vs Sussex match live.

 

[m_vaughan]

Does anyone else think Star Cricket was created purely so that ESPN Star could charge for 2 channels instead of one ? Suppose theres 3 ODIs and 3 Tests in a tour within a month, if ESPN Star telecast the ODI series, and Star Cricket telecast the Test series, they could mint double the money by forcing people to subscribe to both channels.

Since ESS acquired the rights for ICC events, a seperate channel for cricket was essential. ESS already have exclusive rights to cricket matches in England, Australia, South Africa, Zimbabwe and New Zealand. And now with the ICC and Afro-Asian rights also bagged, the amount of cricket that this network has to show is just too much. Besides ESS also broadcasts most of the other major sporting events in Football, Formula 1, MotoGP, Tennis, NBA, etc.

As a result a third channel was necessary and making it cricket-only will make it easier for the other two to concentrate on the rest of the sports. Considering major sport networks around the world have numerous channels, this was pretty much expected.

 

[Insomniac]

Frustrating enough, I was looking forward to Star Cricket in Pakistan, but it seems like our cable operators refuse to show it either, and pay up

 

[sohum]

STAR Cricket is currently showing India Vs Sussex match live.

Are you trying to rub it in?

No cricket for 28 bloody rupees ?!! What a farce (though I'm in no way affected). Loads of people (most) will be ready to pay 28 rupees for the channel, even the slum dewellers in Mumbai would do it to watch cricket .

To put it into perspective, Rs.28 is about ?0.30. I think my family pay about ?10 for Sky Sports. I know it isn't worth it comparing two economies, but anyway....

The problem is that the cable operators make money by disclosing only a portion of their customers. For example, if a cable operator has 1000 viewers, they will say that they only have 500 and then they will pay for 500 viewers to the channels. This is one reason cable operators and channels have had disagreements in the past. Also, since they probably can't bump the price per month up immediately, they figure that paying Rs. 28 per viewer will result in short-term losses.

Finally, I believe that they just want to drive the price down with settlements with the channel, and then charge the full price to the viewers, thus making a cut there as well.

But I agree with you. Rs. 28 is a bargain for a month of cricket. But cable operators will have to pay Rs. 28 x # of viewers so it becomes a big sum for them. This is why I think we need a more direct connection between channels and subscribers, which is what I thought DTH was.

Does anyone else think Star Cricket was created purely so that ESPN Star could charge for 2 channels instead of one ? Suppose theres 3 ODIs and 3 Tests in a tour within a month, if ESPN Star telecast the ODI series, and Star Cricket telecast the Test series, they could mint double the money by forcing people to subscribe to both channels.

ESPN/Star Sports have bagged a lot of sporting rights over the last few years. Apart from all the cricket mentioned by m_vaughan, they also hold a lot of official rights for football, golf and whatnot. At some level they were probably trying to make more money by adding an extra channel to their bouquet, but I think they plan to broadcast all cricket on Star Cricket except when there are clashes with other cricket games.

I'm not sure if ESPN/Star Sports (there are 2 channels) are bundled together but if they aren't then there was an opportunity for them to do what you consider anyway.

 

[aditya123]

STAR Cricket is currently showing India Vs Sussex match live.

Please do not rub it in mate !
Where do you stay and on which platform are you getting STARCRICKET ?

 

[aditya123]

Any TATASky users who started getting STARCRICKET ?
I`ll be getting a TATASky connection this week and I want to make sure that it has STARCRICKET before I go for purchasing it.

Is TATASky a venture by TATA and British Sky Broadcasting ?
Does Murdroch own both ESS and Sky Sports ?