Dominic Sayers

South Africa bids to join the big league

Cricket South Africa (CSA) has made a strong move in the war to be the most ridiculous cricket governing body in the world. Don't forget this is big-league stuff - cricket's governing bodies are strong contenders for The World's Worst Sports Governing Body. Following on from brilliant efforts by the ECB[1], the WICB[2] and the ICC[3], CSA have appointed the likeable Ashwell Prince as the stand-in captain for the next Test Match then relieved him of the captaincy 24 hours later, appointing one of the world's least popular cricketers in his place - Jacques Kallis. This is on top of moving him from his favoured middle-order position to open the batting in place of the injured Graeme Smith. And dropping Neil Mackenzie for the crime of scoring 1073 runs in 2008 at an average of 50+. Moves like this always reveal underlying tensions in the governing body and team management. In this case the arrival of Mike Procter as the head of selectors seems to have been the catalyst. But it's unfair to blame Procter for this collapse into incompetence. Somebody appointed him (Gerald Majola presumably). CSA needs to get its act together quickly, or the relocated ICC Champions Trophy will join the long list of international tournaments that have made cricket a laughing stock in world sport. [1] The England & Wales Cricket Board (ECB) quite appropriately conceals the Welsh element from its abbreviation since cricket is a long tail sport in the principality. Notwithstanding this, the ECB have chosen the hotly-anticipated 2009 Ashes series to introduce a new venue to the Test Match roster. One that is smaller than all the other venues on the circuit. One that is not even the largest stadium in its town, or even the second largest. One that is in Wales. [2] Where to start? The West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) is responsible for squandering the revenue from the 2007 World Cup and Sir Allen Stanford's brief flirtation with cricket in the region. The result has been white-elephant stadiums in places that ordinary West Indians can't get to and which aren't even fit to play the game. CLR James would weep, as should everybody else. [3] Venal and incompetent, the International Cricket Council is dominated by Indian television revenue making it difficult for it to take a neutral view of world cricket. Incapable of running a decent tournament itself, it tries to avoid blame for other international cricket disasters by disassociating itself from, well, international cricket.

Schism

I haven't missed an England tour to the Caribbean since 1990. I won't be able to make it this time, which irks me, but I've had two children since the last tour. And the global financial system has virtually collapsed which makes paying my mortgage more of a priority than jaunts to balmy islands. So I won't be in a position to tell you what ails the England team at the moment. I'd like to be able to report back from their training sessions and tell you exactly what Kevin Pietersen and Andrew Flintoff's body language tells you about their rival factions within the team. Sorry. I was there when Curtly Ambrose bowled England out for 46. In the next match Alec Stewart scored a century in both innings and England won by 208 runs. I hope that's some comfort.

Not the whole story

The International Cricket Council (ICC) has today decided to revert the result of the 2006 Oval test match between England and Pakistan to the original one decided by the umpires: an England win due to the match being forfeited by Pakistan as a result of them failing to take the field. A footnote in cricket history - the series was won by England anyway and this merely changes the series score from 2-0 to 3-0. And an outbreak of common sense since the earlier ICC ruling to award the draw to Pakistan gave losing teams the Get Out Of Jail Free option of simply refusing to take the field. But little is straightforward in international cricket and there is surely more to the timing of this than meets the eye. On the same day, the ICC also announced that Pakistan would not host the 2009 Champions Trophy. Again, this was on the face of it a common sense decision based on legitimate security concerns in Pakistan. It's the timing that smells of politics. I don't know enough about Indian and Pakistani politics to understand what's going on here. The interesting thing to me is that nobody seems to be commenting on this. Cricinfo and the BBC are simply reporting these two stories as unrelated press releases following a routine ICC meeting. That's surely not the case.

A thought experiment concerning the Laws of Cricket

This kernel for this post was the reaction to Kevin Pietersen's "switch hitting" exploits in the recent One Day International against New Zealand, but this post is not about switch hitting as such. The thought experiment was suggested to me by a friend (and now team mate) Graham Pontin and it is an interesting one. The furore caused an examination of Laws 36 (Leg Before Wicket) and Law 41 (The fielder). Law 36 says the Leg Side is where the batsman's legs are when the ball comes into play (at the start of the bowler's run up). Law 41 says that there shall be no more than two fielders behind square on the leg side when the bowler bowls the ball. Here's the thought experiment: imagine I am a well-known international right-handed batsman in a Test Match (I said it was a thought experiment - use your imagination!). The field is set - there are two slips and a gully. At the start of the bowler's run up I take a left-handed stance. During the run-up I change round to my normal right-handed stance and play a normal shot. If the slips had lined up for my initial left-handed stance then I have taken them out of the game by turning round; it's a free hit. If the slips had lined up for a right-hander then it would be a No Ball on account of them being behind square on the "leg side". If I am struck on the pad by a ball pitching outside what is effectively my off stump, it's Not Out on account of the Law saying it's actually my leg stump. It seems like I am getting a clear advantage by lining up the wrong way then turning round as the bowler approaches. The question is: what should the bowler do? Or perhaps, being a bowler and therefore somewhat dim, what should his captain tell him to do? 1. Bowl outside the (right hander's) off stump Bad tactic because there are no slips or gully. 2. Refuse to bowl until I turn round There are big fines for slow over rates these days. You've got to bowl sometime. 3. Bowl wide outside the (right hander's) leg stump This seems to be the most promising tactic - the umpire ought not to call a Wide since it is legally still the off stump. However, this is stalemate - you can't get me out like that. And I could still improvise a shot if I know this is the tactic you have chosen. Does the Law need to be changed? I think not - there's always Law 42 (Fair and unfair play). As an umpire I would be quite happy to say that the imaginary batsman is not acting within the spirit and traditions of the game, and to impose the sanctions described in law 42.10 (Batsman wasting time) - one warning to the batsman then for a second offense five runs to the fielding side. I didn't actually know this sanction existed - the runs are added to the fielding side's previous innings. Does anybody know if this has ever happened? This is not to stifle innovation - Kevin Pietersen's exploits are admirable and an adornment to the game. But a batsman attempting to exploit the Laws in a legalistic way is certainly wasting everybody's time and should be penalised. There's your answer, Graham.

The inverted grip of Kevin Pietersen

If you're not a cricket follower you may have missed reports of Kevin Pietersen's unusual feat in hitting two sixes in a recent match with a reversed grip. In other words he turned himself into a left-handed batsman just before the bowler bowled and scored a maximum not once but twice. If you're not a cricket follower the rest of this article probably won't be interesting anyway - move along, there's nothing to see. If you're interested enough to want to know what I'm talking about, here's a video capture of KP's coup de theatre: [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AU354DdX6Eg] Despite the furore surrounding this latest example, it's not a particularly recent innovation. Here's a video of KP hitting Muttiah Muralitharan for six with a reverse grip two years ago: [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dnShx-eALhY] And again last year in the World Twenty-20: [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipB1jFcOgxs] It happened in a game I played in myself about twenty years ago. A batsman saw the opportunity to take advantage of a very short offside boundary by converting it into a legside boundary. He turned round and reversed his grip as the bowler ran in. The bowler saw him do it and tried to bounce him. The result: a perfect reverse pull for six. Magnificent. Thanks for the memory, Taffy. If you still can't see what all the fuss is about, here's Sachin Tendulkar playing a brilliant reverse sweep without altering his grip. This shot has been around for a decade or more and any initial controversy has long since died away. Indeed this shot is now taught by coaches, initially by the late Bob Woolmer in the 1990s. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nk8jY5d9zaA] BBC Cricket Correspondent Jonathan Agnew believes that the reversed grip should be outlawed forthwith. And indeed the MCC (the guardian of the game's laws) is meeting today to discuss the matter and possibly act to prevent any batsman from attempting it in the future. If I may say so, this is entirely typical of both Agnew and the MCC. The MCC failed to act on, or even notice, the new shot when it was introduced. Now they are responding to a tabloid-style drama created by journalists such as Agnew. I'm afraid I must add them to my list of low-quality sports governing bodies. I think it's because a player is doing the innovating, rather than the governing body, that the response has been so negative in these quarters. Governing bodies are there to control and when innovation happens elsewhere it demonstrates how tissue-thin the veneer of control actually is. It is threatening and their reaction is understandable. Nothing will happen as a result of the MCC's meeting today and I'll tell you why. Firstly, governing bodies are good at one thing and that's inertia. To change the law because of one player is almost unheard of (although Trevor Chappell and Harold Larwood spring to mind because of their captains' instructions). But mostly because there is no mechanism for punishing a batsman except by dismissing him. To add "reversing the grip" to the other ten methods of dismissal would be a seismic overreaction. Ungoogleable cricket question (I've tried): when were the ten methods of dismissal introduced? Were they all in the first set of Laws published? I don't know the answer but I'd like to. Edited to add: I should have said this post was provoked by my former colleague JP's thoughts on the subject.

World's worst sports governing body

I have in mind a post about various governing bodies of world sport, comparing them to see which is the worst. Every time I sit down to write it, another governing body makes a spectacular arse of itself in some way and puts me back to square one. The obvious candidates are these (in no particular order at the moment):

• The Federation International de l'Automobile (FIA). Max Mosley. nuff said. But the historical track record of the FIA is not good either, having been in Bernie Ecclestone's pocket for a long time (for sound financial reasons of course).
• Any international governing body of professional boxing (e.g. IBA, IBC, IBF, IBO, IBU, WBA, WBC, WPBF, WBF, WBO, WBU). It's not a crime for a sport to have many governing bodies, but to have so many ineffectual ones that have no interest in the participants' welfare is remarkable.
• The International Olympic Commission (IOC). Has there been another governing body whose members are so willing to be induced?
• Oh yes, the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA). The rot starts at the top.
• And so we come to the International Cricket Council (ICC). Supine in the face of political awkwardness and dominated by self-interest, this organisation is ill-equipped to govern a rapidly-changing sport.

So there's a lot to write about, and my thoughts are not really in order yet. This pilot post is to ask if anybody can answer the following questions:

1. Is there a world governing body that does a good job, i.e. acts in the long-term interest of the sport without favouring any subset of its exponents?
2. Have I missed any obvious bodies from my initial list?

Answers on a postcard.

The end of 50-over cricket

This is a blog post - I wish I had more time to do the research and make it into an authoritative article but I'll have to rely largely on my own memory. I will gladly accept corrections and additional references. Test match cricket is a mature product. It is enjoyed by the knowledgeable consumer of cricket and it is not currently under threat from innovation or other market forces. Test match revenues grow and shrink - other sports become popular in some regions, poor results cause the dilettante to lose interest in others - but the product is sustainable. It was thought in the 1960s and 1970s that the popularity of One Day Internationals might threaten test match cricket, but it has survived. Instead, it is the One Day International that is under threat. The disruptive influence is Twenty20 cricket, which has moved from your local sports centre to the international stage in a trice. With hindsight, the One Day International looks a bit like the early plastics that were used in consumer products in the mid-twentieth century. Unsure what to do with the new material, designers tried to make it look like something familiar; wood, for example, or metal. Later when designers grew in confidence, plastics got their own identity and became part of the vernacular of product design. In cricket, Twenty20 represents the artificial product that is happy with itself and does not try to look like anything else. The 50- or 60-over One-Day International is a compromise - short enough to finish in one day, but long enough to allow recognisable cricket to be played. Batsmen must build an innings in phases, bowlers must think batsmen out, captains exert pressure over time. These are all attributes of test match cricket that the designers of the One Day International thought were important elements to retain in the abbreviated game. It turns out they were needlessly conservative. The Twenty20 format has all the good things about longer One Day Internationals and none of the ill-fitting compromises. We no longer need to introduce ridiculous constructs like the PowerPlay to liven up the boring middle overs of a One Day innings - the PowerPlay is the whole match. And the best thing for test match cricket is that the Twenty20 format is even less of a competitive product than the One Day International. It's a tweet alongside an Economist article (which makes the One Day International the equivalent of a blog post I suppose - is blogging an ill-thought-out compromise?). If I am right then the fault lines in cricket should by now be becoming visible. And what fault lines they are! In the West Indies an incompetent official governing body has been steamrollered by Allen Stanford's unofficial Twenty20 competition. But this is a sideshow compared to the big beasts battling for control of India's massive cricket revenue. In a remake of the Kerry Packer movie, but with 100 times the budget, the BCCI are in a face-off with a major TV company for the wallets of a billion cricket fans. The root causes of each disruption are entirely different. Allen Stanford's motives are unclear, but it is possible he sees Antigua as a potential offshore tax haven in the making, not just for himself but as the basis for an entire industry. He has followed the traditional path of rich people buying political influence in making contributions to many aspects of public life in Antigua and other parts of the West Indies, including the West Indies Cricket Board. Here may be the key to his thinking with the Stanford Twenty20 competition. Cricket is still a powerful cultural feature of the West Indies, and a sure way to win hearts and minds is to be seen to improve the standard of domestic competition and the international team. Sir Allen at first attempted to do this by making major contributions to the WICB. When he discovered that the WICB were capable of absorbing almost any amount of money and still not delivering anything of value to West Indies cricket he decided to do it himself. This has brought him into a slightly uneasy relationship with the WICB but such a helpless and hapless body is it that it has no choice but to work with him. Sir Allen can only succeed in the West Indies and Twenty20 will therefore become the major audience-drawing format in the region very quickly. Who will then stump up the money to sponsor a West Indies domestic 50-over competition? In India, the battle is far less one-sided. On the one hand is the BCCI, with its massive established revenues and its control over the international governing body, the ICC. On the other side is the Essel Group (aka Subhash Chandra) which has launched a direct challenge to the BCCI's authority with the Indian Cricket League (ICL). Now this is much more like the Kerry Packer experiment - entertainment mogul fails to win contract to provide TV coverage of cricket tournament so launches his own competition. Recruits squadron of has-beens and soon-to-retires with good name recognition. Pumps money at players. Players do what they are told. Who will win? History shows us that when the governing body is threatened it will at first try to resist stoutly all innovation. Players will be threatened with a binary choice of career. Lawsuits will happen. For a time the professional entrepreneur will look like he is winning against the fuddy-duddy amateurs and politicians of the governing body. Then, when enough sabre-rattling has happened, the governing body will find that it is easier to embrace the change than to continue to fight a war. The BCCI has already announced its own Twenty20 competition to take place in October 2008. It would not have done so without Chandra's intervention. Whoever survives the battle royal in Indian cricket, Twenty20 will be the winner. Room will be made for it in the regular domestic and international calendars. It will not be test match cricket that gives way to make room for it. Goodbye 50-over cricket. You will not be missed.

Ottis Gibson

England are taking Ottis Gibson to Sri Lanka this winter as a bowling coach, mainly because Allan Donald is unavailable due to TV commitments. This is good news - Gibson has done very good work with Durham's pace attack: Steve Harmison bowled very well for Durham until his back injury ruled him out for the rest of the season, Liam Plunkett made it into the England team and Graham Onions was often mentioned in dispatches. However, Durham's best bowler didn't make it into the England squad at all this year. Gibson himself has racked up 75 first-class wickets at an average of just over 20, taking 10 wickets in a match 3 times. In fact he's been the best bowler in England this summer (Muralitharan notwithstanding). Two things have counted against him: he's 38 and he's West Indian. Neither, I believe, is an insurmountable obstacle to him playing for England. Add to his wickets the 577 runs he has got at an average of nearly 30 and you have the best all-rounder in England (Flintoff definitely notwithstanding). Full marks to England for taking him to Sri Lanka but what a joy it would be to see such a nice man enjoying a final hurrah to his playing career on the international stage.

The compression of history

It's a generalisation but the history of most of the world's sports goes something like this: 1. The English spot a grass-roots pastime 2. We codify its laws 3. We create a professional league 4. We encourage the natives of the colonies to play and applaud patronisingly when they achieve some modest standard 5. When the overseas nations create an international competition, we decline to take part on the basis that it would be unfair to the other participants 6. We belatedly notice that there could be some money in it 7. We join in and realise that oops, British teams are not quite as good as we thought This history is largely true for football, rugby, cricket, skiing, lawn tennis, darts and conkers. And I am being quite careful about my use of English and British, for the record. This sporting lifecycle has achieved its ultimate expression in Twenty20 cricket. The game that you and I play on Wednesday evenings has suddenly become a major international sport. The examples listed above took between 50 and 100 years to play out, but for Twenty2o cricket the whole story has taken place in four years. The game where we beat Australia by 100 runs in the second ever international has now developed so that England occupy their traditional place in the pecking order: at the rear of the peloton. CLR James writes eloquently about the cultural importance of the Victorian sporting code and its effect on the countries that adopted it. Now, while the English are still able to innovate we can no longer claim to be in a position to export anything other than raw ideas for others to develop.

Twenty20 cricket - a disruptive technology

I started to post this as a comment on JP's blog, but it got a bit out of hand so I'm posting it here: I think Twenty20 cricket is classically Disruptive in the sense that it was not conceived as a replacement for other one-day formats but will inevitably replace them. All the futile tinkering with one-day cricket, like PowerPlays (yech!) and the Pro-40 competition, is the equivalent of management-driven technology "innovation". The real action is somewhere else altogether. Allen Stanford in the West Indies and the Zee media group in India got it, and launched their own Twenty20 competitions outside the official management structure. Now, belatedly, the national boards and the ICC are coming to the party with their World Twenty20 Championship, mere months ofter the disastrous 50-over World Cup earlier this year. 50-over cricket might survive a few years longer, but the money is in Twenty20 right now. 50-over cricket can't survive without sponsorship.