The IT Pro Podcast: Bringing cricket into the digital age

Cricket may have something of an old-fashioned reputation, with its genteel attire and somewhat languid pace, but just like every other sport, it’s in the process of being revolutionised by increasing use of digital technologies and data. Nowhere is this more evident than in Australia, where cricket remains an almost universal passion.

In this week’s episode of the IT Pro Podcast, we talk to Michael Osborne, general manager of technology for Cricket Australia, to find out how the organisation - in collaboration with technology partner HCL - is using data to support volunteers, develop players and connect with fans of the game.

Highlights

“Over the summer there's over 700,000 registered players in the country who are competing at every level from the under-eights, all the way through to the seniors. In this day and age, we have about 60% of those games that are now live scored on a mobile app. So the old days of the big paper book, sitting by the sideline, keeping track of all the statistics; for 60% of those games - which happen every weekend - It's live scored, streamed across to our MyCricket app, where then parents, brothers, friends, siblings, can follow in real-time how the scores are coming together.”

“One [sport we’ve been inspired by] is the NBA. We've had the opportunity to connect with them a couple of times as well. But the NBA does such a good job of engaging the youth demographic. If you can believe it, the NBA itself is one of the most popular sports in Australia from a fandom perspective, particularly amongst that youth demographic. And none of those kids, or very few of them, will ever get to go and see a live NBA game. And in fact, we're gonna have to follow these games at inconvenient times of the day and night. Then yet, they're able to reach them, to connect with them, they're able to amplify their player brands, provide solutions into markets that really get people engaged. So a lot of what the NBA is doing, from a direct to consumer perspective, is really interesting to us”.

Footnotes

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