Kate Mason – Cricket, Olympics and not being a ‘Total Prick’

Kate Mason is a well-known face in sports broadcasting having presented on Bein Sports, Sky Sports and in her present roles with TNT Sport and Eurosport. She is currently the lead presenter on TNT’s cricket coverage. Mason is, to use cricket parlance, an all-rounder who also features on Radio 4 and writes a regular column in the Metro.

I had to be honest with Kate that cricket was not a sport I had ever really connected with. Rather than pretend otherwise for the purpose of our chat, I thought I would start off by putting Kate on the spot with the task of selling cricket to me.

Sell me cricket

“Oh my God, that is so hard. Why should you start watching cricket apart from because I’m presenting it, obviously. The reason people love cricket is because there is so much nerdery to it. There is so much nuance to it. There are different lengths of matches. The one I am doing is test cricket. It is like a whole day, and then another whole day, and potentially five whole days. Which is a mad thought!

I think one of the reasons why it is so great is because it is kind of a companion to your everyday life. You can sometimes do that with a football that you are not that fussed about. Maybe, you put it on whilst doing other stuff. But usually, you sit down and you are fairly focused it for ninety minutes. Whereas with cricket, it is like having a little friend that is pottering along while you’re living your day-to-day life.”

Edge of your seat

“It is just really interesting. There are some moments where if it is tight, you’ll be there on the edge of your seat wondering how it is going to play out. I don’t know if you would have seen the 2019 World Cup. There was the super over and England beat New Zealand by the barest of margins. That was unbelievably intense and like football in its huge emotional moments. There are moments where someone hits an incredible shot or they achieve something amazing during the game. You are just completely blown away by the skill of these people.

I think what is fun about it is that you can watch it and figure it out as you watch. If that makes sense. As a lover of pretty much all sport, it is always funny that everything is categorized in this one space. The experiences of watching many sports are very different. I am not sure if I’ve done a good job of selling it. But, I think once you get a bit into it, you’ll basically be hooked.”

Sporty youngster

Kate isn’t one of the growing list of former professionals covering sport in the media. She does have previous for playing though, as a keen young cricketer and squash player. Her experiences in sport were not always positive though, as she found out in an all too familiar way for a sporting female.

“I played squash to a good level. I stopped playing when I was at university after we finished third in the national finals. That was pretty good given that the top two teams had professional players in their ranks. Hand-eye coordination has always been something that has come quite naturally to me. There would always be a bat lying around and I would try and hit things in the garden. Then I hoped to go and play cricket for the little local team.

Unfortunately, it was in an era when this was like a big shock. ‘Why is there a girl trying to come and play in this little team?.’ I was a very young age, around ten, I think. We were not toddlers so we were kind of physically competent!”

You’re not welcome here

“I went in and I was given a bowl and I got two consecutive wickets. So, I got the first two little boys out and I just vividly remember the coach saying ‘if this little girl turns up here and gets a hat trick, I’m going to resign.’ I would love to tell you that I went on and got the hattrick and everyone was like ‘oh my god, you’re the greatest thing ever’ but obviously I didn’t. But I just felt very exposed and immediately felt like I’m not part of this team. I’m not part of this unit. I am some sort of special freak that’s shown up here.

I think I went back a few times but it was kind of ruined to be honest. My dreams of becoming an international cricketer were over before they began. Every female athlete had experiences like this. Footballers like Leah Williamson have talked about it. I guess some people are less put off by people saying no, you’re not welcome here. But yeah, I was.”

I’m a total prick actually

She may have had to permanently shelve those playing dreams but in fronting TNT’s cricket coverage, Kate has found herself in the studio with some greats of the game. The channel’s coverage of the sport prompted an interesting critique that it was too ‘kind, decent and fair-minded.’ Mason’s repost on X came with her commenting ‘I’m not. I’m a total prick actually.’ I was interested to know if cricket is suited to the controversial clickbait comments often used in football coverage.

“It is really tricky, as I totally recognize how it works. For example, you and I wouldn’t even know about the CBS football show with Kate Abdo and Thierry Henry if their clips were not on the internet every other day, getting over twenty-thousand likes. We probably get the idea that that’s a good show. Which I don’t know as I’ve never seen it as we don’t live in the States. That shows the need to advertise your own products in media, I think.”

I think that is the point that specific piece was making. The thing about cricket is that it leans more into an analytical kind of coverage. Obviously, I am not saying football doesn’t. Some of the best bits are when Sky leans into that and properly analyse games. There is just so much you can talk about in a game of cricket that it really lends itself to that.”

We’re just quality

“I think cricket fans get excited when we put up a clip of Cookie (Alistair Cook) talking through why Harry Brooks stance is the way it is, what he is doing and how there is weight on his front foot or whatever. I think that we are kind of majoring on this being our best coverage. We’re not trying to lure you in by method of fake news or big bombastic bits of behaviour, we’re just quality and I think that is our approach.

They are very good these guys and very helpful to me. I get to watch the play and then get one of the greatest ever batsman to explain to me why he thinks that shot was taken and it is fascinating and makes it easy to learn. That is one of the things I have enjoyed the most to be honest. It is just like going to watch something with a bunch of friends and then you go on the telly.”

Enthusiasm shines through

One of the reasons I wanted to talk to Kate was that her enthusiasm for whatever sport I see her covering really comes through the screen. That same enthusiasm shone as we talked, as did her sense of humour and personality. I let her know that her love for sport always shone as I asked if television was always where she saw herself, given she also presents on radio and writes.

“That is so cool that you say that. I don’t want to say that I just and occasionally go on TV and chat to people about sport and it is a piece of piss and that life is so easy. Obviously, that is not the case. You have to chase stuff down and be very alert that you that you’re doing the right things all the time and working really hard on that. Things go wrong but fundamentally, anyone would want to work in sport as it is so much fun.”

I just love it

“You look at Peter Drury, I think he really understands football, not just technically, but also in terms of the emotion it brings. I think he said something like that. He said whatever moment it is, it could be the most important moment for somebody that is watching the game. I think that is the important thing to remember, you know, you’re getting to be there. You are a conduit for that. And ultimately just so lucky to spend your days trying to express the emotion, trying to act as a bridge between people who aren’t there and you and what’s going on. So yeah, I just love it.

I think my impression was if you want to have a long, sustainable career in this, which is very tricky, there will be different seasons for the different stuff that you are doing. I’d love to do more radio. I can imagine having a regular radio show where you just go into the studio two or three times a week. That would be something maybe I would look to do when I’m a bit older, I guess.”

Wanted to have fun

“There is a lot of travelling with the some of the coverage that I do and the hours are quite crazy. I like it now, but I can imagine it would be good having the ability to go and be in a studio, have your team and communicate with your audience every few days. I can see that as being a really, really nice thing to do later in my career. Presenting sport was always the aim. I don’t think I had specified in my mind between TV and radio. I’d always thought writing would be part of the package. I read English at Cambridge so writing and reading was something that I’d done a lot of before I went into the world of work and I think I was a bit kind of like, ‘oh I’ve sort of done this’.

I wanted to have fun with sport and basically presenting live sport is like a skill. It is a practical thing that you learn how to do and it has got a knack to it and I find that very pleasing and comforting. I know that I have these tools of my trade when all this stuff is happening in my ear and things are going on or something happened that you didn’t expect to. I find it very comforting that that is what I know how to do.”

Social media

A few days before we spoke Kate had posted on social media about abusive messages she had received on social media. The sporting world can be a difficult one to be in for women, particularly if they are in the public eye. It is something Mason has thought a lot about and an issue which she doesn’t feel is getting any better.

“I think we can all try and contribute to improving the space. There are contributions that everyone can make, but equally you don’t want to be constantly having battles with people about stuff they’re putting out online. I entered this space and got into this work with an awareness that I felt like I wasn’t as welcome as I could be in some predominant football spaces. I feel like I have got something to offer and I feel like I am quite a strong person.”

God, this is not good

“The social media thing was more surprising. I got a bit of it when I was working on Bein Sports, but obviously when you start working at Sky, you just get a bit more well-known. There is a culture of people feeling like they know you, which is nice, most of the time. It does mean that people act as though they know you and then that leads them to feel comfortable saying quite shocking stuff. They also feel like they know you and don’t treat you like a human and you’re like ‘oh God this is not good.’

As I was saying before, you get better at doing the job and you learn more. But, no matter how much you learn and no matter how many times you’ve experienced the social media thing, there’s not a lot you can do to change it. It’s not improving and having more women in sport now, you think you have made progress with that, but then there is more pushback as people feel like they have more to fight against. It is bloody annoying to be honest. I’m not sure where we go from there, really, um not to sound like I’m super crushed by it. I do occasionally tell someone to get to fuck or not exactly in those words!”

Career highlight

I was keen not to dwell too much on the negative aspects of her job so we moved on to the highlights. There was one event that Kate has covered when stood out to her above the rest.

“I was lucky enough to go to the Olympics this summer and I can’t believe how good that was. I wanted to go for many years, since I was a kid basically. I’ve been to a lot of live sport in this profession and often bigger events are more of a hassle. Also, you are older, so you think, well, maybe it won’t be as like cool as I imagined it would be. Paris was just as special as I could ever have imagined it.

On the one hand, speaking to gold medal winners after they’ve just achieved the greatest thing of their entire lives. Then, I was able to go when I had free time, into whatever live stuff was happening. I saw Simone Biles and her first come back. I don’t know like, it makes you cry. It is so beautiful to see somebody like that at the top of their sport. I was in the Olympic Stadium where for the 100 meters final, Mondo Duplantis the bloody unbelievable pole vault guy hitting that world record on the third attempt when everyone was there just to see him.”

Unbelievable

“Trying to communicate with athletes about to tell their story in the best possible way in that pinnacle moments is tough. If you if you fuck up somebody’s post gold medal interview, they are never going to get that chance again, are they? Yeah, it was unbelievable. It was unbelievable.

I would like to do more football in the coming years. I was doing a lot of it before when I was part of a big football podcast. Then because of the way my career has taken me and the opportunities I’ve had, you can’t do everything.”

Match of the Day

More football coverage was clearly still on Mason’s mind when I finished by asking about her future hopes and plans.

“I mean, the bloody Match of the Day job has still not been announced has it, so that was always the dream. The dream is to be number two on Much of the Day, so not the Gary Lineker role, if you like, more the current Martin Chapman one. That is my dream. Also, there would be presenting a World Cup in the near-future. I want to do the Winter Olympics too.

With potential interviews, it’s not so much the people that I’m thinking about, it’s more the styles of interviews that I would like to do in future. I would like to do some more in-depth stuff. I did a podcast series of more in-depth interviews. Patrice Evra was probably one of best as he has got so many different elements to him and to his style. He suffered, he has experienced the worst of football and he has experienced the best of football. That kind of conversation is what I would love to find a way of doing through TV, like a documentary series.”

You can follow Kate on ‘X’ here – https://x.com/kvlmason