Virtual advertising has so far been a novelty feature of live sports, where football players tackle each other in front of make-believe billboards and soccer players run across plausibly real trademarks. For example, the games of three Major League Baseball teams—the San Francisco Giants, Philadelphia Phillies and San Diego Padres—include virtual ads this season.

Welcome to the wonderful — and controversial — world of virtual advertising.

Using the latest technology, television networks can custom-make the advertising their viewers see, regardless of what is actually at the event. All it takes is a well-trained computer operator to transpose the advertising wherever it's required.

English cricket fans may feel they deserve a little virtual reality after the actual horrors of following the team — and the good news is they may soon experience some. The bad news is that it will not apply to how the team play, but to adverts projected on to the outfield during televised matches.

Virtual advertising, using newly developed computer systems that cast images on to a surface, is expected to prove particularly effective at major sporting events which attract worldwide TV audiences.