Mellow Yellow

The tendency for New Zealanders to get wound up by a cricket match at Westpac Stadium is really quite something.  And when people get wound up they tend to lose sight of a few realities.

There was outrage at the number of yellow seats visible on Thursday and it’s happening again today.  Strangely, a lot of it is coming from otherwise sensible people too.

Perhaps the outrage is partly because the Basin Reserve is just down the road, and everyone has a soft spot for the Basin Reserve.

But the Basin Reserve does not have lights, and its capacity these days is around 8000 people.  Despite the shafts of yellow seats on Thursday the attendance shaded that.

This is Cricket Cup year, and the Westpac Stadium has already sold out for the New Zealand v England game, will sell out again for the Quarter-final and will come close for the England v Sri Lanka fixture.  And by selling out that means four times the crowd that the Basin can handle, as well as Day Night games which a preferable for the global TV market.

If CWC games had been played at the Basin the fixture list would have been more like what Nelson has ended up with.

So, because these matches are warm-up matches, by definition they need to be played at Westpac.  It is about players getting used to the conditions; not the viewing sensitivities of your disgruntled New Zealander sitting on the couch.

The seats themselves seem to be an issue.  Admittedly, it probably was not the best decoration decision ever made, it does accentuate emptiness, and over time they will get replaced, but does it really matter that much?  It actually has no effect on how many people turn up to a game; no one ever refuses to go to a match because they are scared of sitting next to a yellow seat.

There may be a case for moving future ODIs back to the Basin, but that is not for this season.

So get used to it New Zealand, and stop getting so obsessed with the yellow.  That really is one of the most bizarre First World Problems you could dream up.