The Wisden Group was a group of companies formed by

John Wisden John Wisden (5 September 1826 – 5 April 1884) was an English cricketer who played 187 first-class cricket matches for three English county cricket teams, Kent, Middlesex and Sussex. His father, William, was a builder. He attended Brighton's M ...

& Co Ltd, publishers of ''

Wisden Cricketers' Almanack ''Wisden Cricketers' Almanack'', or simply ''Wisden'', colloquially the Bible of Cricket, is a cricket reference book published annually in the United Kingdom. The description "bible of cricket" was first used in the 1930s by Alec Waugh in a ...

''. As well as John Wisden & Co, the group included the magazine ''

The Wisden Cricketer ''The Wisden Cricketer'' was the world's best-selling monthly cricket magazine. It was created in 2003 by a merger between ''The Cricketer'' magazine and ''Wisden Cricket Monthly''. It is now no longer connected to Wisden and is called ''The Cri ...

'', Cricinfo – the world's highest traffic cricket website – and the Hawk-Eye computerised ball-tracking system, which is used by the media in cricket, tennis and other sports. The group also owned '' The Oldie'', a general interest British magazine aimed at older readers. Sir John Paul Getty was chairman of John Wisden & Co from 1993 until his death in 2003, when he was succeeded as majority shareholder by his son Mark.''The Insider: Mark Getty''
by Mark Getty (May 8, 2005, ''Guardian Unlimited'') The group was broken up in 2007 when ''The Wisden Cricketer'' was sold to

British Sky Broadcasting Sky UK Limited is a British broadcaster and telecommunications company that provides television and broadband Internet services, fixed line and mobile telephone services to consumers and businesses in the United Kingdom. It is a subsidiary of ...

, ''The Oldie'' was sold to a group of investors led by the magazine's former business manager, James Pembroke, and Cricinfo was sold to

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). Th ...

. John Wisden & Co was sold to A & C Black in 2008. Hawk-Eye remained under the control of Mark Getty, but was eventually sold to Sony Corporation in 2011.

References

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External links

Official site
(archive, 2006) Defunct mass media companies of the United Kingdom Sports mass media in the United Kingdom Wisden