2. World Series Cricket, 1977-79
With all the current talk about the IPL and the future of test cricket, it can be said that we are witnessing the greatest changes in cricket for a generation. Certainly thats how it must have felt in the late-1970s when World Series Cricket shook the game at its foundations. In 1977 Australian media mogul Kerry Packer hit upon the idea of a series of exhibition matches, attracting the finest international cricketers to play against each other for money. Originally intended as a contest between an Australian XI and a Rest of the World XI, he began secretly recruiting players around the time of the 1977 Ashes. In the process he offered a job to incumbent England captain Tony Greig (him again), offering him a job for life with Channel Nine if he acted as recruiting sergeant. World Series Cricket came at a time when TV coverage of cricket was in its infancy, and it was widely perceived that cricketers were underpaid compared to other sportsmen. The Packer Circus, as it was dubbed by British media, pitted the best of the best against each other and accelerated the development of great players like Viv Richards and Imran Khan. It also introduced many of the things we take for granted in the modern game, including floodlights, coloured clothing, coverage with on-pitch cameras, personal sponsorship of players, and helmets for batsmen. World Series Cricket resulted in a series of bitter court cases between Packer and the various cricket boards, over whether involvement in the World Series was a breach of contract. Although the establishment won several small victories (e.g. making him call the matches supertests rather than tests), the crowds eventually embraced Packers vision for the game, forcing the Australian Cricket Board to reconsider. In 1979 an agreement was reached between Packer and the ACB which secured both the financial future of the cricket board and coverage rights for Channel Nine.
What Happened Next: World Series Cricket ended in 1979 with the formation of the World Series Cup. The way that TV stations covered cricket was changed forever, and its repercussions are still being felt, particularly on the one-day game.