And now, the cricket press

BY B.P. Sanjay| IN Media Practice | 21/04/2008

Media groups owning industry or being owned by it is not new. The jute press and cement press are old labels for media whose proprietors also  own  industries. The Deccan Chronicle Holding Ltd  (DCHL) owns one of the IPL teams, Deccan Chargers.  The group¿s aggressive strategies in raising resources from the public are well known. Its foray into sports would perhaps be valid in the normal course and the argument in favour of free enterprise would bar any further scrutiny.

However, the build-up coverage in the paper preceding the tournament and the coverage of the match featuring its team made the connection obvious. The day of the first match featuring Deccan Chargers saw the newspaper featuring the encounter as an above-the-fold front page story and announcing a four-page supplement, Deccan Chargers. This apart from a full page (including half a page advertisement for the tickets) story only about the Deccan team and its readiness to face the challenge completed the focus. Turning readers into fans is perhaps a built-in strategy. The frenzy that is normally built up by television channels prior to Team India¿s tours or matches has seeped into newspapers as well.  

After they lost the match to Kolkata¿s Knight Riders who had loads of glamour with SRK and his VVIP fans cheering their team, DC had coverage which smacked of sour grapes. Its headline ran, "Lights, pitch defeat Chargers" on the front page.  A woeful account of the match and how the pitch and the lights failed them formed the body.  Its sports page carried a column by Kris Srikanth batting for the Chennai Super Kings and a tame story about the Royal Challenger¿s win against Mumbai Indians.

The Deccan Chargers supplement devoted a full-page portrait coverage to their ace member, Shahid Afridi, who according to the newspaper is "one man who would have been quite handy for the Chargers" and proved "more than a handful for the Knight Riders."  "Mouth watering encounters" was another full page account of the Chargers vs. their opponents. The charged fans, the pitch in Hyderabad, and the hope that the chargers will roar back after a bad day occupied another page with the fourth page devoted to genteel and motivating dimensions of the game.

Agenda-setting by the media is an  oft-repeated concept in journalism classes. It adds the critical sting to academic discourse. Applied here, clearly the coverage and framing of the event were disproportionate to the interest that readers may have in only one team and  that too sponsored by the newspaper itself. With no laws or regulatory agencies governing such coverage one expects more aggression by the newspaper if the Chargers were to move ahead and be in the reckoning for the trophy.  

Deccan Chronicle is aiming at girdling South India with its multi city editions.  The management¿s letter to the share holders articulates: "Deccan Chronicle has captured a significant share of the mind space and market share in Chennai, our growing circulation is evidence to our right content mix, relevance to market requirements and mirroring readers concerns and aspirations." Its advertisement to circulation revenue ratio is 92% to 8% for 06-07 and promises better dividends for the shareholders.

With a growing presence and a love-hate relationship with a loyal local readership, the newspaper¿s ownership of a team participating in a major tournament is a major test for it to establish a balance and not go overboard. If the bubble bursts earlier than expected, will the Deccan Chargers supplement continue? We already had Vijay Mallya canceling music and pomp for the second match in which his team featured owing to their dismal performance in the first match, The pattern might settle down to sensible coverage. Media that could unabashedly rip team India¿s performance when they were not directly owned by the corporate companies is now on test when it comes to their own partners setting the agenda and deciding the rules of the game and of coverage.