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[procricket]

Gm pads...?

[Nickauger]

Drop Compton, he's useless. Get Root to open!

[thedevil]

GM pads.
Adidas gloves
Bat Looks like his old adidas, especially with the grip(but that's not a dead cert)

[Vitas Cricket]

Def adidas gloves. The 3 stripe wristband gives that away. Not caught a close up on his pads yet, and the bat I assume is the one he's always had, with the Adidas stickers removed.

Wonder who will sign him up? Slazenger went through a phase of snapping up England players, especially bowlers, but they've gone quiet recently.

Puma would make sense as for me a bowlers endorsement should not be concentrating on his batting gear, but his footwear. But puma are dropping players left right and centre.

New balance? Dale Steyn seems to like his new spikes, and an additional England player on board for the seemingly imminent UK launch would help NB, and judging by their graphics and softs, they need plenty of help!

[ProCricketer1982]

Spartan?

Not a bad deal for someone (depending on how much he wants of course!), yeah he won't bat for ages 9 times out of 10 BUT he should be around for a fair few years and play most if not all games.

[Vitas Cricket]

Yep, GM pads, good spots guys who got there before me.

How deep is Spartans pot? Prior cost a lot of dollar, then again, they too are looking to launch in the UK soon.

[ProCricketer1982]

Yep, GM pads, good spots guys who got there before me.

How deep is Spartans pot? Prior cost a lot of dollar, then again, they too are looking to launch in the UK soon.

If your going to go to the trouble of trying to crack into the 'big boys' then you are going to need the international players using your kit. Bog standard county cricket guys won't really sell much. Local guys would be better than county ones I'd imagine (purely speculating so tell me if I'm wrong).

[Vitas Cricket]

If your going to go to the trouble of trying to crack into the 'big boys' then you are going to need the international players using your kit. Bog standard county cricket guys won't really sell much. Local guys would be better than county ones I'd imagine (purely speculating so tell me if I'm wrong).

Adidas, Woodworm and to an extent Mongoose tried throwing money at the best players in the world.

To various degrees, they've all failed. Mongoose and woodworm went bust and re-emerged as new brands with more sensible strategies (that's my take on it anyway, but I'm an outsider looking in, I don't know the ins and outs) while Adidas appear to be stagnating. The amount of heavily discounted 2010, 2011 and 2012 Adidas bat models on sale everywhere you look tells me not many people have bought bats. I'm presuming they are treading water via the sales of SA and England replica kit and training wear, along with footwear which is popular.

It's a risky strategy. With no guarantee that paying player x will mean you sell y amount of bats.

I imagine it to be incredibly tough to break into the big cricket brands. They all share the common themes of brand identity, history, consumer trust and widespread awareness in the wider bat buying community. All of those things take a long time to establish, and can't be done with a flash in the pan approach.

[ProCricketer1982]

I agree that throwing money at top players won't generate enough awareness. As you (IMHO) rightly stated, it's about awareness. Ask most cricket players and kids parents and they only know about GN, GM, Kookaburra on the whole. So when they buy kit they are only interested in that kit. Then they see all their mates and others at their club and clubs they play using the main brands and it keeps getting it into their heads.

That's why when we had threads a while back I said, I reckon the best way is to just target sponsoring amateur players at club level. All you need is a few spread through each league structure, who then push it to their clubs and their mates at other clubs etc (maybe at a discount)... Then after a few years said new brand will have loads of exposure. To me that's the best exposure you can get.

So, is that a viable option Jake (as a retailer and brand owner) or would that just not work? If not, why not?

[Vitas Cricket]

Trying to find a bookies that will take a bet I want to make.

NZ to take less than twenty wickets in the remainder of the series.

[ProCricketer1982]

This game reminds me of a win/lose/draw game where one team is just batting it out.

[Vitas Cricket]

I agree that throwing money at top players won't generate enough awareness. As you (IMHO) rightly stated, it's about awareness. Ask most cricket players and kids parents and they only know about GN, GM, Kookaburra on the whole. So when they buy kit they are only interested in that kit. Then they see all their mates and others at their club and clubs they play using the main brands and it keeps getting it into their heads.

That's why when we had threads a while back I said, I reckon the best way is to just target sponsoring amateur players at club level. All you need is a few spread through each league structure, who then push it to their clubs and their mates at other clubs etc (maybe at a discount)... Then after a few years said new brand will have loads of exposure. To me that's the best exposure you can get.

So, is that a viable option Jake (as a retailer and brand owner) or would that just not work? If not, why not?

It works on a small scale. We 'sponsor' a minor counties player and vital first team player at the biggest club in our area. No end of kids have bought our own brand bats because he is using them.

In theory it works, but doing it nationwide would require a lot of effort, time, and money still. probably not the amounts needed to get top internationals on board, but that route is certainly easier.

[procricket]

Half  the forum deserve sponsorship with the amount of exposure some give

[The_Bird]

Half  the forum deserve sponsorship with the amount of exposure some give

Someone was getting their 15th H4L I read yesterday!!

[Vitas Cricket]

Is anything but a draw possible now?

At least I get my stake back on the 'draw no bet' bets I made on England to win.