The International Cricket Council (ICC) unveiled the results of the largest ever market research project into the sport which reveals cricket has over one billion fans globally, the average age of which is 34 with a demographic breakdown of 61% male and 39% female.
The research was undertaken to enable the ICC and its Members to understand the growth potential of cricket, help shape the development of the growth focused global strategy for the game, drive decision making and to provide a benchmark upon which to measure the outcomes of the strategy.
It also supports the ICC and its Members in shaping and implementing their fan engagement strategies and clearly presents cricket as a vibrant and popular sport globally.
The breakdown of cricket’s three different formats in the research showed two-thirds of fans over the age of 16 are interested in all three international formats of the game. The importance and popularity of ICC global events was evident with 95% of fans interested or very interested, with the ICC Cricket World Cup and the ICC World T20 the most popular.
The women’s game continues to gain momentum and on the back of the game-changing ICC Women’s World Cup, two-thirds of cricket fans are interested in women’s cricket (68%) and the ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup (65%) – in addition, 70% of fans want to see more live coverage of women’s cricket.
Close to 70% fans are interested in Test cricket with fans in England & Wales showing the strongest interest in this format (86%), South Africa lead the interest in ODI cricket (91%) and Pakistan in T20I cricket (98%). Globally, T20I is the most popular format with 92% interest whilst ODIs are close with 88% interest.
ICC will also use this research to develop their cricket calendar and will make it to easier to follow. Fans were also asked about cricket and the Olympic Games with 87% of fans claiming they would like to see Twenty20 cricket in the Olympic Games.
