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Cricketing minnows and then what?
History is repeating itself. At present the high ups of the ten Test playing nations are in the process of taking the decision or have already taken one on the fate of the present cricket minnows - Bangladesh and Zimbabwe.

The reason being that these two countries are uncompetitive and are commercially unviable. What the incumbent chiefs are trying to do is to have in addition to the current FTP - (future tours programme) that sees all Test playing countries play each other once at home and another away in a five-year cycle, a number of options over a four, five or six-year cycle have been identified for the board to consider should it believe that it is necessary to move away from the current system.

This is the current dilemma of the cricket chiefs of the world. The present grouse is that Zimbabwe and Bangladesh are struggling to compete with the rest of the Test playing nations. Leading players of the world arena are complaining of fatigue and injuries as a result of demanding schedules. The attendance is also falling at Test grounds around the world, while games involving mismatched teams are ending well inside the full distance and thus making these games economically unviable.

This complex problem has many facets. Stubborn facts in this situation are - Bangladesh has lost 31 of their 36 Test matches. Their only win has come against Zimbabwe at Chittagong in January 2005. At the same time Zimbabwe have lost 16 of their last 20 test matches. Their last win came against Bangladesh in Harare in February 2004.

First, the question that comes to the mind is what yardstick was adopted when these countries in question were awarded the full membership of the ICC. Did the hierarchy of the ICC, go through a proper analysis to ascertain if these countries could sustain themselves in the 'big league' from that point onwards where they were given the full membership? Did they study the mere infrastructure, political climate (which now has become part and parcel of sports of any nature)?

On the other hand doesn't it take time for a fledgling nation to come to terms in the real world? It was not many moons ago that Sri Lanka as minnows were awarded approximately 38 Test matches in their first ten years of Test cricket with West Indies not even bothering to give one while England who played the inaugural Test played only another three Test matches on three separate occasions? Out of the 38 Tests played during that time only our good neighbours India and Pakistan had met us on 20 occasions (more than half) than the rest of the other countries. That helped to sustain ourselves. Even Sri Lanka's first two Test wins came against these two nations.

To get the real Sri Lankan viewpoint of the matter The Sunday Times sought the ideas of its incumbent president Mohan de Silva. The SLC president agreed: "I think it is unreasonable, now the agenda is that these countries will only get home series. But it is not going to help their cricket at all. By playing only in home series will they get the necessary exposure?"

Then the next question put forward by us was that even looking at our own past where we were helped by our neighbours to sustain ourselves, at present we are not responding to the new challenges the others are facing. After we take on Bangladesh in September 2005 on two Test and three one-day series, Sri Lanka is not billed to meet Bangladesh till 2010. We asked him the reasons for it. The SLC president in turn said : "The reason for this situation is that they were not able to honour their last engagement. This situation arose as a result of that. But, we are looking for a way of accommodating them at a time when our cricket is not too busy and when they are also free".

The present predicament of the ICC is that they are looking at expanding the game out of its present realm. Besides the 10 full-member nationals there are another 26 Associate members who have votes in the ICC. Along with the mentioned 36 members there are also another 55 members who registered as affiliate members.

If the ICC's main aim is to develop, stabilize and nurture the game of cricket in these lesser known 81 countries while sustaining the levels in the ten full member countries, they have a task at hand.

However what cannot be understood is, by segregating even the incumbent top cricket playing countries, what are they trying achieve? Now at present Australia is leap-frogging its cricket at a pace that no one could come close to. In the last limited over series they played against the number two ODI players -- New Zealand, Australia thrashed them 5-0 after drubbing them in the test series too. At present there is seemingly no other side on earth who could cross swords with them on equal terms.

As a result are we going put them on another pedestal and keep them ready without any engagements till another side improves their skills to match the skills of the Australians? They certainly are not going to do that.

The question now is, what is the kind of commercially viable cricket the ICC is trying to impose on the lesser known countries? Could they ever be brought up to the level of the top ten nations? At the same time under the present circumstances could they enhance the number of Test playing nations who play real cricket?

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