The average metropolitan TV audience for the final session of day one of the Australia-New Zealand Test was 1.46 million, while it peaked about 1.84 million.

"I feel sorry for the people who didn't watch it," said Steve Crawley, Nine's head of sport. "It was something ... that was just a beautiful thing."

Crawley said in almost three decades of sports broadcasting he had never experienced such an overwhelmingly positive response from viewers to something new as what occurred with its coverage on day one.

"I like to be involved in something that works, and I think it was 'Warney' [Shane Warne] who said yesterday 'This works'," Crawley said. "The best thing was when the lights went on and when the sun went down - because that was new, that was history.

"And it was here. There's a statue of Don Bradman outside, and the people walked down from the town. I don't know if it would fit this well elsewhere, but I know other venues will [want to] take on day-night Test cricket ... and that's exciting."

The Nine cricket chief said the significance of the occasion was appreciated by its commentary team laden with retired cricketing greats.

"I called the commentators up last night and we just sat around for a while [discussing it]. We didn't make speeches or anything. We just wanted to celebrate the day," he said.

"I see the local paper said yesterday that it might be the saviour of Test cricket. That's positive for all of us. It's good for you [in the media] because it's what you do for a living, it's what I do for a living."

Crawley did not dispute that the pink ball looked better on TV that it did live at the venue - he said it was "incredibly visible" under floodlights - but stressed that was not uncommon when it came to major sporting events played at night.

"State of Origin and AFL, the great games, some things are made for television," he said. "I think the white clothes at night with the pink ball is really good on the eye ... a really good mix."

Crawley was relieved that testing Nine had done during last month's day-night Sheffield Shield match between South Australia and NSW had been enough to calibrate the Eagle-Eye ball-tracking technology used for the decision review system. "Alarm bells were going out about it, that it wouldn't track. But it did," he said.

The first day of day-night Test broadcasting was enough to cement Nine's desire to do more of it beyond this season.

"Oh, absolutely. They [Cricket Australia] have been terrific," Crawley said. "All governing bodies are criticised, but if there's a world leader in governing bodies in cricket it's this one. None of us sing their praises, or certainly make a habit of it, but it [preparedness to trial day-night Tests] is pretty cool."