By Sam Hathaway
April 28 2006

Mentioned by Alex Rae's hair on the message board, sky sports are set to broadcast a brand new show involving cricket. It begins on Saturday 20 May and runs weekly from 9am until 10.30am. Presented by Simon Thomas and Anita Rani, it promises to be a great show for all cricket fans. Cricket AM features a light-hearted mix of cricket news, reviews and features, appearances by current and former players and a range of studio guests from sport and entertainment. It will also feature contributions from England all rounder Andrew Flintoff.
The show is designed to appeal to devoted cricket fans and young or newcomers to the sport. But it's main motive is to entertain as well as to teach and together the presenters will cover all levels of the game from grass-roots to Test match cricket.
There will also be other new cricket programming coming to your screen on sky sports:

CRICKET WRITERS ON TV - A new Sunday morning discussion show with national newspaper writers debating the stories behind the headlines.

WILLOW & STUMPY - Animated characters who will explain the meaning of various cricketing phrases - such as 'Silly Mid-off' and 'the Doosra' - interactively and during breaks in play. This will appeal to the younger cricket fans.

CLUB LIFE - A monthly feature following the game at its roots as it reports on the fortunes on three selected amateur clubs from across the country; Tynemouth, Mount and Tilford Cricket Clubs.