How to Stream Test Match Cricket from Channel 4 Anywhere

Last Updated on December 15, 2023

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It’s finally happened after what seems like decades but is actually only 16 years. To hear the wonderful sound of Lou Bega’s Mambo Number 5 heralding the return of Test Match Cricket to terrestrial TV. For cricket fans it’s a wonderful moment and one that hopefully will attract more fans back to the wonderful game. Cricket on free, terrestrial TV – about time too!

Here’s the trailer for the latest Test Match which is of course India Vs England –

Now first of all let’s set expectations to a realistic level. Channel 4 were only granted the rights to this Test match two days before it actually started and of course in the middle of a global pandemic. So there’s a few cut corners in this production which are perhaps inevitable.

Yet they have a knowledgeable team presenting in Rishi Persad and Alistair Cook. True there was no fancy extras like the Analyst truck and the Sky cart but this is cricket, it’s not really needed. Test Match Special has proven that the game doesn’t need fancy gimmicks just decent coverage and a couple of presenters who know their stuff. Of course it also helps if your team does well, and any England fan would have enjoyed Joe Root’s century.

It’s alsovery important because there are rumours that cricket could return to terrestrial screens in the future. Consider that none of Alistair Cook’s 161 Test matches for England could have been watched live on free, terrestrial TV. His entire career was broadcast behind a satellite paywall. Sure, Sky’s coverage was brilliant, yet it excluded millions of fans and potential fans from enjoying top class cricket.

How Can You Stream Channel 4 Cricket Coverage from Outside the UK

Although Channel 4 is a free-to-air channel which is supported by advertising, unfortunately it’s also not accessible outside the United Kingdom. If you try and access from anywhere outside the United Kingdom, then you’ll just get a message like this.

Basically, when you connect to the Channel 4 website, it will look up the location of your IP address and see which country it’s from. Anything that’s not registered in the UK then will get blocked from all the media streaming parts of the site.

At first this seems like something of a showstopper because you can’t really change your IP address unless you own an ISP (Internet Service provider). Yet fortunately it’s possible to ‘hide your IP address’ rather than change it by routing through a server based in another country.

Hide Your IP and Watch Channel 4 from Abroad

It’s called a VPN (Virtual Private Network) and is used by millions of people to hide their real locations online and access the thousands of sites which block access like this. So here’s how it’s done, and if you watch you’ll see that it requires no real technological knowledge at all.

The VPN we used here is called NordVPN – Click for Latest Discount Page for NordVPN

That’s all there is to it, you simply fire up the VPN software and click on the country you need. Then visit the Channel 4 website as you would if you were in the United Kingdom. The IP address registered will the that of the VPN server, yours will not be visible and everything should work fine. You will have to create an account if you haven’t already got one, but there completely free and only used for preferences and suggesting shows you might like. When creating the account you may have to supply a postcode for your location – just pick any valid UK postal code (like a US ZIP code).

On occasion you may find even using a UK server that you have trouble accessing. In this case it’s normally too many people using the same VPN server and hence IP address at the same time which ends up getting blocked temporarily. If you’re using a VPN like NordVPN then just choose another server and you should be able to reconnect.

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Then just enjoy the cricket, well at least the first few matches. Of course, you have other options too using your new VPN service. Make sure you get a BBC and ITV account too, there’s bound to be highlights on these channels too. Also, on the BBC you can access the wonderful Test Match Special on the radio, all accessible using a UK VPN service free of charge as well. There are great Premiership football highlights on the BBC – you can watch MoTD live or for a week or so later. I’ve not checked recently but you used to be able to watch the cricket by changing to an Indian server and accessing a site called Star TV too. This might not be free anymore, but an Indian TV subscription is probably quite reasonably priced.

There are lots of VPNs out there of course, and many of them work well with Channel 4. However, for the best value and fastest VPN then we recommend –