Take Friday’s famous Indian victory when Suresh Raina reigned supreme. Were you able to watch it? Not if you were (pretending) to work. Not if you were going from A to B. And only if your eyes had nothing else to do. How many of us had nothing else to do from 9 am to 5.30 pm—on a working day?

The cricket is being played on Sahara One and Doordarshan National. Once the match is over, these two omnibus channels revert to their regular programmes. There are no highlights of the match in the evening, late at night or at any other time. Which is why broadcasters invented sports channels that could be dedicated to sports, 24x7x365. On ESPN-Star Sports, Ten Sports, Zee Sports, DD Sports, etc., a cricket match is telecast live, and after it ends, a repeat telecast of the entire match begins for all those people who missed out during the day.

And for those who don’t want a blow-by-blow replay, there are highlights of falling wickets, soaring sixes and thrilling maidens (no sexist ideas, please). This deal struck by Nimbus with Sahara is a big blow to the viewer. The BCCI should really confine cricket telecast rights to sports channels or insert a clause on repeats and highlights in the viewers’ interest.

Let us hope those will be protected during the cricket World Cup to be played in the West Indies. At least some of the matches (including those that involve India) will be telecast when we should be not only in bed but fast, fast asleep. If there are to be no repeat telecasts the next day, or highlights, everyone but insomniacs will miss the lot. So the BCCI and SET MAX which will telecast the World Cup better not do a Sahara on us.

Another complaint (as always!) about the Sahara broadcast: the pre- and post-session analyses are too brief and unsatisfying. We are accustomed to Geoffrey Boycott, with Sunil Gavaskar and Ravi Shastri, or an Ian Chappell on ESPN-Star Sports; or Imran Khan and Mike Atherton on Ten Sports; MAX hosted a full cricket team of former players during the last World Cup. Why, even DD’s Fourth Umpire is preferable—with or without the ladies in waiting.

Here, there is David Gower with Ian Botham and Srinath, standing each other up for a few minutes’ chat. Then it’s over to Dino for the presentation ceremony and back to Buniyaad or whatever. This is not cricket, or cricket on TV.

If we are speaking of cricket can Navjot Singh Sidhu be far behind? The Sardar of Spinning Yarns can’t keep himself out of the picture. Not content to discuss the Turning Point of every match and Cricket Controversies on NDTV 24x7, guffaw to many jokes on The Great Laughter Challenge Show—Dwittiya (Star One), he must now take to acting in the latest K serial, Kya Hoga Nimmo, Ka (Star One). Have heard of Sardar Sarovar but ‘Sardar all over’ is bit much.

If TV news channel people watched Nimmo (which of course they don’t) they would have a laugh at their own expense. The dog of a celebrity is injured and hell breaks loose. TV crews descend on the spot for Breaking Barking News and, closely, interrogate the party suspects: Tell us exactly what happened? Who hit the dog? Why did they hit the dog? Who had something against the dog?...Next, shots of the dog being rushed to hospital. When Nimmo’s sister—a TV reporter—realises that Nimmo accidentally was responsible for the injury, she switches off the telecast only to be rung up by the channel boss—get that dog back on the air or else.

Look and sound familiar?