Screen Queen TV: Freddie Flintoff’s new show, The Pitt, American Primeval and Siobhan Finneran’s Protection

Freddie Flintoff’s Field Of Dreams On Tour

Monday, 5.55pm SBS Viceland and SBS on Demand

For a hot minute one year, I considered enrolling my son in a cricket camp. His cousin, a massive cricket head, had made a comment during a backyard match that my then-four-year-old showed “natural aptitude” — I got swept along, thinking he might have found his “thing”.

A word from my sister on the realities of the game, most notably the hours spent watching it (on a camp chair side-of-oval, or on the couch, side-of-son), persuaded me to nudge him in the direction of karate instead — a wise move.

But after watching this delightful doco series, I’m starting to think I may have been too harsh on the sport. There’s so much more to “the global game” than I ever gave it credit for — and this moving series is proof.

It starts off as one thing — the continuation of the show that saw champion British cricketer Freddie Flintoff select a group of kids from his hometown in Lancashire to form a cricket team — and becomes something else entirely.

While filming, the unthinkable happens and Flintoff is injured in an awful accident while filming Top Gear. He sustains devastating facial injuries and almost dies. It has an enormous psychological impact; he withdraws from public life.

This is all about how the show, and his association with the boys picked for his team, helps pull him out of that awful funk, reigniting his passion for the game — and for life — in the process.

It’s truly a moving piece of television. In fact, not since that heartfelt cricket-themed episode of Bluey have I felt so emotional.

Seek this one out.

The Pitt

Friday, streaming on Binge

Whatever you do — don’t call this show ER. OK, so it stars Noah Wyle. And it’s set in the emergency room of a US hospital. And it’s from ER’s original creators. But this is categorically nothing to do with that — according to the estate of the writer of the ER pilot, Michael Crichton, who are suing the producers, claiming this is the ER reboot they first pitched to them in 2020, which they declined to be involved with. It’s getting messy. But regardless of the controversy, this is an undeniably great show, and it’s fabulous to see Wyle back in the ER. Having each episode play out as an hour of his shift is a genius concept. Genuinely compelling television.

Dr Karl’s How Things Work

Tuesday, 8pm, ABC

Dr Karl Kruszelnicki knows absolutely everything — except how bog rolls are made. But by the end of this weirdly fascinating first episode, he’s the full bottle on that, too. I’m absolutely obsessed with how random this show is.

American Primeval

Thursday, streaming on Netflix

Thanking my lucky stars I wasn’t born in 1857 America — it looks a truly brutal place, at least according to the promo for this series. One for fans of historical drama.

Protection

Friday, streaming on Stan

Siobhan Finneran is a brilliant actor. She’s starred in two of the biggest UK dramas of the past decade — Downton Abbey and Happy Valley. And now she’s front and centre, playing a detective in this drama that looks at the world of witness protection.