The World Cup is in its embryonic stage and hasn’t it seen the unexpected happen and the unpredictable reign? And also some of the bigger names put firmly in their place? One really doesn’t have to look too far but just look at England! I think the Englishman have been embarrassed and then humiliated! Embarrassed when they had to struggle to beat the Netherlands who were on a role with Doeschate leading the way with a sparkling hundred!
Hadn’t it been for some poor bowling by the Dutch, England would have struggled to over haul the target. Not that they didn’t on that day but it could have been far worse. Then the defeat against the Irish was too much for the English to stomach and the battle is uphill for the Englishman in the World Cup. They may yet get to the quarter finals but not in a manner which would favour them.
Despite the heroics of the Irish against their rivals the English none of the other minnows have made too much of an impression. Whilst Canada and Kenya have been far below par in the big league the saving grace for the ICC associates have been the Netherlands besides the Irish of course. If the Associates have been bad, what about more established teams such as Bangladesh and Zimbabwe? They haven’t been too inspiring either. Though the Tigers were decent and impressive in the first game against India their performances have generally being down hill. Zimbabwe on the other hand has struggled and never looked a serious enough threat to the more established teams. The assumptions however are based on the games that have been completed though upsets can never be ruled out!
With that kind of a performance my point is, has the ICC made the proper decision to leave out the minnows from the next World Cup? A bit on the subject would reveal that on face value when the World Cup commenced most people did expect dead games with very little or no interest involving the minnows. Surely who would want to watch Canada play Kenya other than their own supporters? This is being said with due respect to both teams. But despite this belief the performance of these countries surely has been notable and also in some cases truly noteworthy. Hence there could be a school of thought that such teams should be allowed to play. But does it do any good to the game? Is the level of competition of the mega event of cricket which is held every four years good enough? How much of interest does it generate amongst the paying spectators? These are some of the areas which need a close study. The positives of including such teams will be the huge boost cricket would acquire in such countries and the experience the cricketers of the said countries derive. Hence it could be termed as a more development strategy than anything else.
If development is the key, should the World Cup be used to further it? My suggestion to this whole episode, which doesn’t involve any rocket science will be to look at having just the two top teams of the Associates and not muddy the waters with too many and the four teams in the current World Cup is definitely two teams too many. The ascend to the next level should be made as hard as possible to the lower ranked teams which will then ensure proper development of the game in their respective countries. On the subject of development it was interesting to read the comment of the Irish seamer Trent Johnston who felt that the level of competition in Ireland is far too low when compared to the international level. Though no country can boast of a system on par with the standard of international cricket, all major countries posses a good enough systems that permit their players first-rate competition which in return helps in the development of the respective individuals too? One major issue surrounding the minnows was the approach and the level of professionalism which exists amongst the players of the lesser known nations. This is mainly due to the fact that most of the said players are semi professionals and have to do a great balancing act with the sport and of course their respective professions.
It is a fact and a welcome attempt by the ICC to globalize the game. But should it be done at the expense of the lowering of the overall standards? Thankfully these minnows don’t play the longer version of the game and had that happened there would have been cricketing record books being rewritten in every series. Remember the series between Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka just before the former lost their Test status tag? The Sri Lankan batsmen were making merry at the expense of the hapless and rather innocuous looking Zimbabwean attack. And many top batsmen from around the world would have queued up to face the Zimbabwe bowling for obvious reasons had the ICC not intervened.
As such the ICC should ensure that the thinking be based on those lines and make every attempt to maintain the level of competition at every stage of cricket amongst the top nations. They should also avoid trying to confuse the issue of globalizing cricket and maintaining the level of contest at the highest level. Hence my suggestion is to promote the top two teams of the competition amongst the associate countries to the big league when the World Cup is played which will make the contest an affair involving twelve teams only which will be the perfect number for a World Cup. This would naturally make the entire tournament a more competitive and attractive affair and will also cut out the dead games allowing sufficient time for a second round of cricket. The current World Cup which has the sudden death from the quarter finals onwards definitely takes the gloss off the tournament and would not give a quality team a second chance to overcome an odd bad day in the office.
True the next World Cup is four years away but preparation should originate ahead and hopefully a more competitive and a tougher event will be the order of the day!
Roshan Abeysinghe is a leading
cricket promoter and an
international cricket commentator |
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