Sideshow to money-spinner: The rise and rise of T20 cricket
cricket has gone from being a light-hearted sideshow to a money-spinning, central plank of the sport's global calendar. With the eighth T20 World Cup starting in Australia on Sunday, AFP Sport looks at the rise and rise of the game's big-hitting, crowd-pleasing format. The end of the Benson and Hedges Cup one-day competition in 2002, due to a ban on tobacco advertising, left a gap in English cricket's domestic calendar. Stuart Robertson, the marketing manager of the England and Wales Cricket Board, proposed a 20-overs-per-side event, a format already known in amateur and junior cricket. The aim was to attract a younger audience who might not have the time to engage with longer formats.
