Cricket AM

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cricket AM is a Saturday-morning cricket-based television programme broadcast in the United Kingdom on Sky Sports 1. It began broadcasting in May 2006, and is largely based on its successful fooball-related counterpart Soccer AM, as a replacement during the football off-season. The show lasts for 90 minutes and is presented by Simon Thomas and Anita Rani. The show is on for 90 minutes as most times during the English Cricket Season either an England test or game or a County Cricket game would follow the programme.

[edit] Features

The show features a range of regular cricket-related programming features. Studio guests include past and present cricketers, and musicians with an interest in cricket. Aside from results, previews and commentary on ongoing cricket, there are a number of regular studio features on the show, including Ready Steady Freddie, a segment featuring prominent England all-rounder Andrew "Freddie" Flintoff competing against professionals in a number of different sports. Freddie has competed against Ricky Hatton at boxing, Joey Barton at football, and has played table tennis, tenpin bowling, archery, baseball, basketball and darts against world champion Phil "The Power" Taylor, with mixed success! Another regular feature has two animated characters ("Willow and "Stumpy") explaining unusual rules or jargon. 'Champagne Cork' features Lancashire's Dominic Cork looking back at the best moments of the past seven days, also there is a Stat of the Week, presented by the Sky Sport Statistician Benedict Bermange, while one of the Sky Sports commentary team is sat behind him looking distinctly unimpressed.

The show mirrors Soccer AM very closely in many regards; the Luther Blissett Stand is renamed as the Gary Pratt cricket pavilion, (2006). Renamed as the Dwayne Leverock pavilion in the 2007 season. The pavilion is filled by the members of a club cricket team, who compete in a bowl-out in the outdoor car park at the end of the show. Throw Time, a feature in which county cricket teams are visited and contested to throw a ball at the stumps with their "wrong" hand, closely resembles Soccer AM's Crossbar Challenge.