4th Test: Australia v England at The MCG, 26-30 Dec

[SpitfiresKent]

Mugabe's regime should be blamed for Zimbabwe's current situation and you can't equate it with Kenya or Ireland scenarios.

Indeed.

Zimbabwe would have a decent side if it wasn't for all the corrupt guys running the cricket board. There is a lot of talented Zimbabwe players but due to financial reasons they chose to go abroad and play which you can't blame them. There is a rumour that Ireland will tour Zim some time this year which be an interesting watch.

 

[lion100lion]

Well, the news is that,
Piers Morgan has received confirmation that, the Australian fast bowling legend Brett Lee had broken his rib with his fast-paced deliveries.

Source:- Piers Morgan suffers broken rib after challenge to Australian cricket player

 

[barmyarmy]

Piers Morgan embarrasses himself, again | Peter Miller | Cricket-Stats.com Opinion and Insights

^ Why Piers is an embarrassment to everyone.

 

[PackenHols]

My dad recorded the Piers Morgan thing, and said "If you're ever upset, just watch this to cheer yourself up."

 

[War]

If you don't encourage good performances the better players are bound to move on (county cricket & England) or retire and focus on another career. Playing A games and minor league cricket does not foot the bills. As for support base, if they don't see their team getting support from ICC and get to the next level, they are bound to move on. When they see their team part of core group of cricket teams, they are more likely to support their team as they will have more opportunity to see their team play cricket against top sides. Plus you are unlikely to see an exodus of good players to counties and England in general when they know they can play international cricket with Ireland.

IMO it's a make or break state with Ireland and if ICC doesn't encourage them soon they may well go the Kenya way. I would have liked Kenya to be given a promotion as well after their decent displays in 90s and early 2000s. They beat WI in 96 WC and reached semis in 2003 edition! They surely should have been given a promotion, if you will, and we would have had another decent cricketing side by now.

Kenya went the other way owing to ICC's apathy when even a WC semi spot didn't do anything for them and I hope Ireland don't go the same way. ICC has to learn the Kenya lesson and encourage Ireland now than wait for "right time" to get them to next level coz there will never be a perfect time. Zimbabwe was a different story and the problem wasn't their players or cricketing infrastructure or their fan base but politics. Mugabe's regime should be blamed for Zimbabwe's current situation and you can't equate it with Kenya or Ireland scenarios.

Generally i pretty much agree with what you are saying. ICC has clearly not done enough in co-ordination with major boards to help any associate that has shown serious progress in recent years. And, indeed Ireland is at make or break stage & could turn into another Kenya based on this ICC negligence.

But lets be clear my suggestion for Ireland or any other impressive associates to play A-team cricket vs the major nations A-teams, is simply to aid them in their development, before their potentially progression to play test cricket.

Its not a suggestion that they should only play matches vs the A-team of major nations in all formats.

One cannot under-rate the importance of having good first-class cricket preparation before teams or players play test cricket. Historically even with the major 8 nations teams like IND, PAK, WI (since their decline), NZ, SRI have consistently struggle to be on the same level as AUS, ENG, SA, old Windies because of deficiencies in their first-class system.

Its no coincidence why in test history on WI, AUS, ENG, SA have had truly great # 1 test sides.

And because of this weak FC structure in certain area's many of those lesser nations end of picking some players too soon for tests or mainly based on performances in international ODI cricket. But, since its a proven fact in cricket that ODI performances don't equate to test success - they tend to have very mixed results with players who make the transition from ODI form to tests. These mixed player results leads to mixed team results - since teams like IND/PAK/NZ/SRI generally in history have periods when they play good test cricket & large periods when they have not.

So to promote Ireland to test based on their current situation: not playing enough strong FC cricket either in the ENG country system, vs A teams of big nations that i have suggested, no sustainable FC system in Ireland. But basically on the fact of a few world cup shock wins, inter-continental cup cricket vs association & few bilateral limited overs series in the last 5 years vs big nations - is simply not enough preparation to get test status.

They simply to no real fault of their own - are not ready to gain test status.

Surely it is to Ireland & world crickets benefit, that they can get to test cricket as well prepared as possible & not have to be like Bangladesh & most teams in history, where by instead of taking 10+ years to become a proper test nation - they can take 2-3 years to make the grade?

One cannot under-rate this major black mark in test history, of how long it took so many teams to be good a test cricket - it tended to distort test statistics for years. When people now for eg talk about players performances via stats - performances vs BANG are treated as if it never happened.


The Marleyboure Cricket Club/England back then as the cricket bosses, as i mentioned before did their best to include what were essentially their colonies into test cricket in the 20th century - so they can be excused given that's all they could do.

They did not have resources of the modern ICC to help countries financially in their development to become good a test nations faster.

Finally i also suspect associates or proponents of associates getting test status are guilty of not looking at bigger picture of world cricket dynamics - and is treating "getting test status" as the main holy grail.

Cricket as i keep saying has 3 formats - test cricket may be the zenith, but suggesting associates proves themselves in those formats in the aforementioned ways in not an insult to them.

In football in the last 20 years, you look at world cup qualifiers from around the world & gap between the major nations of the various Confederations & the emerging nations have closed dramatically - and this has a lot do with how easy football is to understand & for a population.

T20 is proving it has the ability to bring a new audience to cricket in the modern age where most sports fan are accustomed to sports that finish in 3 hrs tops.

If associates of course with ICC help, can show the kind of progress emerging football teams have shown in T20 world cups & more T20 tournaments/series vs the major nations (ODIs as well of course) - that IMO will be a major help to their entire development of cricket in their respective countries.

 

[War]

Indeed.

Zimbabwe would have a decent side if it wasn't for all the corrupt guys running the cricket board. There is a lot of talented Zimbabwe players but due to financial reasons they chose to go abroad and play which you can't blame them. There is a rumour that Ireland will tour Zim some time this year which be an interesting watch.

Its common knowledge that Mugabe messed things up for them - however before this happened the ZIM players that were emerging after the Flower brother, Streak, Goodwin, Johnson, Strang brothers, Campbell were retiring etc - was not looking good. That is why i say that was a "peak period" for them with player talent.

But of course no doubt if all was perfect ZIM could have a good team right now in all formats, if you add all their defected player to their current set-up they look would have looked quite solid

Sean Ervine has been at Hampshire for years & his brother recently started playing club cricket in ENG, Anthon Ireland & Kyle Jarvis retired to county cricket, Colin de Grandhomme over in NZ & of course ENG have Gary Ballance. While Taibu retired from cricket for religious purposes.

So something like: Mowoyo/Sibanda, Masakadaza, Taylor, Ballance, S Ervine, De Grandhomme, Chingumbura, Taibu, Jarvis, Ireland, Cremer/Utseya.

 

[Owzat]

The tiered structure won't work because only three nations (England, India and Australia) generate most of the revenue in cricket. Without these nations involved who will pay for lesser cricketing nations?

The tiered structure is the only way to go, extreme traditionalists and penny pinchers seem set against it.

There are ways around it, the problem is the cash cow mentality is flawed, those in the top tier will sustain those series while you have to ask if anyone cares enough about the likes of Bangladesh and Zimbabwe getting money, or by your argument they are leaching off the popularity of others

Of course the tiers might actually increase interest in cricket, it is fairly common for fans to increase in numbers when their team is doing well and winning, not to mention the competitive nature of the series created by having a smaller competition of only say six teams, will make it far more interesting and viewable.

If money is an issue, they can always "share the wealth" like they do in football with sharing of TV money, and indeed parachute payments.

Until such a time Ireland and their fans and advocates won't stop bleating about Test status, the only way to facilitate it and advances in cricket is to go to tiers as the current set up is "maxed out".

Until people stop putting up mindless objections and come up with solutions, it will stay in the status quo of about five decent sides and five leaches who mainly just clog up the fixtures. Without chuckalitharan and slinger Sri Lanka are nowhere near the force they were, and for your empty argument around money, what has it done to improve Bangladesh or Zimbabwe? Spent on the infrastructure? Probably not, goes into the pockets of anyone who can jump on that cash cow.

I bet sides in the football conference wish they could get money for playing Man Utd, Liverpool and Man City week in week out with no relegation and not even having to perform.

Shows some care more about money than cricket, it is a sport first and foremost, most lost track of such things with the money that sports involve.

 

[Owzat]

Poaching is an option sadly until the ICC reviews its appalling decision not to allow Ireland to play test cricket.

They won't "review" it, the last two Test nations are struggling to make any impact, the arrival of T20 has meant the schedule was added to which I doubt they foresaw.

The only way is tiers, but even fans seem as stuck in the "oh no, think of what could go wrong" mindset as those who would decide on the way forward (ICC)

You can no longer simply add more numbers to the fray, that would be like adding four more teams to the Premiership, something that would benefit them financially as chopping the Premiership down to 18 or even 16 teams would adversely affect teams outside the top flight financially.

But of course the marketability of a successful side over a side that loses all the time is something rarely considered by the nay sayers. I bet Ireland would draw a lot more interest and publicity if they were fighting at the top end of a second tier than playing the odd ODI they can get from Test nations.


I hate that players can become eligible to play for more than one country, and that countries exploit this. It should be kept simple, you are the nationality of the country you are BORN in.

Of course that will trigger the "what if you're born on an airplane" response as if that is likely to produce thousands of sportsmen, and you can easily settle that as being "then it defers to the country in which the parents currently reside" with it being narrowed down to "mother resides" if the parents happen to live in different countries at the time.

Of course it can be made simple, and of course sports can enforce rules. All this just brings to mind the stupidity of laws decided outside of the UK including right of work and the one in the news about "life sentences"

'100-Year Sentence' Dodges European Human Rights Law

I do wonder whether death sentences are frowned upon, maybe ECHR has hissy fits about countries that do still have the death sentence. Maybe we should just let horrid creatures like lostprophets singer loose among general populous in prison, and not give life sentences to those who kill him.

 

[ste_mc_efc]

The tiered structure is the only way to go, extreme traditionalists and penny pinchers seem set against it.

There are ways around it, the problem is the cash cow mentality is flawed, those in the top tier will sustain those series while you have to ask if anyone cares enough about the likes of Bangladesh and Zimbabwe getting money, or by your argument they are leaching off the popularity of others

Of course the tiers might actually increase interest in cricket, it is fairly common for fans to increase in numbers when their team is doing well and winning, not to mention the competitive nature of the series created by having a smaller competition of only say six teams, will make it far more interesting and viewable.

If money is an issue, they can always "share the wealth" like they do in football with sharing of TV money, and indeed parachute payments.

Until such a time Ireland and their fans and advocates won't stop bleating about Test status, the only way to facilitate it and advances in cricket is to go to tiers as the current set up is "maxed out".

Until people stop putting up mindless objections and come up with solutions, it will stay in the status quo of about five decent sides and five leaches who mainly just clog up the fixtures. Without chuckalitharan and slinger Sri Lanka are nowhere near the force they were, and for your empty argument around money, what has it done to improve Bangladesh or Zimbabwe? Spent on the infrastructure? Probably not, goes into the pockets of anyone who can jump on that cash cow.

I bet sides in the football conference wish they could get money for playing Man Utd, Liverpool and Man City week in week out with no relegation and not even having to perform.

Shows some care more about money than cricket, it is a sport first and foremost, most lost track of such things with the money that sports involve.

Can't believe I'm in 100% agreement with one of your posts. No matter how many times I read it I can't find something to argue against.

 

[barmyarmy]

Well of course it is. Tiers make perfect sense and Ireland, Afghanistan play mostly against Zimbabwe, Bangladesh etc but they play test cricket...

 

[C Boomer]

Well of course it is. Tiers make perfect sense and Ireland, Afghanistan play mostly against Zimbabwe, Bangladesh etc but they play test cricket...

Perhaps an option worth serious merit !

 

[War]

I know my friend Sir Owzat is BIG proponent of tiers in test cricket. We have discussed it before & its something I fundamentally disagree. I will simply repeat my alternative view why tiers shouldn't be allowed & can't work for test cricket.


Using football leagues as an example - tiers/relegation system is far easier for most teams in the world to become good at the basics of football quickly & so many teams are involved - thus it is easy promote such a system that despite your history if you struggle - you get relegated.

It didn't matter that Nottingham Forest won the league or european cup back in the 80s, that they are now relegated to a championship team. Nor does it matter in last 5 years, that despite Liverpool rich history in ENG & Europe that they have not been a top 4 team or been seen in Europe in this period.

Cricket is too small, doesn't have the wide global support base, nor the even spread of finances for this to happen - especially from a test cricket stand point

Being relegated in a tier system could potentially kill cricket in countries like WI/SRI/PAK/NZ. How could one for eg envision PAK who already can't play cricket at home due to world political dynamics, being relegated & unable to play the traditional nations?. Can't work.


This is why as i've consistently said, associates needs to prove their consistently in ODI & T20 first before they are even considered for tests.

The sanctity & tradition of what makes a good test team must be preserved. If associates like ireland, scotland, afghanistan can't successfully complete this progression then yea they should never play tests. If its has to be they are only proven to be good @ one or both of the limited overs formats then so be it. No team however must even be given the free ride into tests like bangladesh did.

Remember cricket has 3 formats: associates should not view not being able to play test cricket as a sign of the elite teams trying to block them or the end of their progression a cricket nations.

We also have to look at where those countries are with the domestic structure & national interest in the game currently in a society that lives for fast sports that finish in 3 hours.

When it comes to the latter the top 8 nations have that equally. The difference between the top 8 nations since post war 1946 has always been in the domestic structures production line in producing test standard players.

Domestic structures comparison between aus/sa/wi/eng vs ind/pak/sri/nz since 1948

Australia, England, Windies, S Africa are the only teams teams that have been legitimate # 1 teams in test history. That is not a coincidence because while they were the best teams in the world. They had the domestic structures able to consistently produce good batsmen & bowlers for tests.

West Indies of course declined in the last 15 years because the caribbean regional isn't has finally strong as the other 3 - which is highlighted by the fact they dont even have a sponsor for their domestic competitions. But once they get that back, the windies should be ok since the talent is around.

However the other 4 nations have had the same problems from the start that still affects them now.

Generally except for now & the recent gone tendulkar era of batsman, indian bats dont play pace well & they don't produce fast bowlers. Producing on 3 notable test bowlers since their inception in kapil dev, khan & srinath tells you everything. India of course given their financial power in the game have the unique ability to help fix this problem themselves - they dont need ICC help. But this problems is an age old one of indian cricket in tests, which really should have been eradicated to help them be a better test nation consistently.

New Zealand problem is that they dont produce enough players of the crowe, hadlee, bond, astle, cairns type talent at once. Its sometimes one or two such players which such great talent among some hard working players.

They need the financial help to improve their grassroots so that they can produce more special talent players collectively.

Pakistan always have talent, especially since the 70s. Pretty much the best asian team of producing a good balance of batsmen & bowers that can regularly test the non-asian teams. But corruption & nepotism is their historical problem. Their domestic teams is run by company teams instead of the provinces, which is why imran khan himself said in the 80s he stopped playing cricket in pak domestically because its very poor way of identifying talent. ICC has failed them horribly in this front due to their poor leadership as a governing body.

Sri Lanka is sort of an unknown since they are potentially coming to end of their first great era of players in the short 30 year test history. But one suspects that given they are weak financial board, their don't have the ready made domestic talent to find new a new sangakkara, jaya, vaas, murali anytime soon.



While that's the state of all of them in tests, all of the top 8 nations for example have been the best in the world in odi's at some point in the rankings or won cup/champions trophy titles since 1975. This again shows how hard it is to be good a tests, so its ludicrous to even contemplate putting nz, sri, pak & windies in a lower tier just because their test performances have been below par most of time.

ICC can do a lot financially to help them bridge the gap, since they are done the hard yards of being test nations for 75+ years & it would be better for the test game if competition between all 8 is stronger.

 

[ste_mc_efc]

you haven't actually made any arguments for why a tiered system couldn't work. The FC structure one is easily countered by, you know, helping non-test playing countries develop first class structures.

The idea it could kill off the weaker current nations is flawed too. It'd only kill them off if they ended up tapped in the second tier for a long period of time, this wouldn't happen unless the other sides in that tier were better than them. If the other sides in that tier are better, then either they deserve to be playing tests, or the side you want to protect doesn't.

As for cricket being too small the real issue is how big it could potentially be? Is the world saturated? I'd argue not, but it may as well be if you don't try to grow it.

It reads like you are against it and then filling in your reasoning afterwards.

 

[War]

you haven't actually made any arguments for why a tiered system couldn't work. The FC structure one is easily countered by, you know, helping non-test playing countries develop first class structures.

The idea it could kill off the weaker current nations is flawed too. It'd only kill them off if they ended up tapped in the second tier for a long period of time, this wouldn't happen unless the other sides in that tier were better than them. If the other sides in that tier are better, then either they deserve to be playing tests, or the side you want to protect doesn't.

As for cricket being too small the real issue is how big it could potentially be? Is the world saturated? I'd argue not, but it may as well be if you don't try to grow it.

It reads like you are against it and then filling in your reasoning afterwards.

I've been making the simple argument for the last 2 pages: the length of time it takes nations in 135 years of test cricket to become good at test cricket.

Yes of course you, the ICC, would have to help the associates prepare better FC systems before they potentially play test cricket - along with their progression through limited overs cricket. But i'm saying before they do that, the ICC needs to have done that with the weak financial boards of NZ/WI/SRI/PAK/BANG first - before they do that with associates.

It disingenuous to call for WI/PAK/NZ/PAK to be relegated in a tier system, when you haven't done this. The imbalance in the test nation is the major ICC faux pas historically in this small cricket world. Thus we need to get all 8 on even financial, structural and domestic level - before we can get to a point where football leagues are, in which the meritocracy of relegation/tiers is possibly considered.

The financial lopsided of world cricket means that WI/PAK/NZ/SRI can't go without playing AUS/ENG/IND in bilateral series for too long. I know for example windies only make money from home series when they host IND & ENG & money from those series is key to them balancing their budgets and investing back into local cricket.

You put them in a 2nd tier for any length of time - you could mess up the entire WICB financial structure. This is why their new Caribbean Premier League is important to them from a financial standpoint - but big returns on that league investment aren't expected soon.

CSA have already mentioned that IND shortening their recent tour has affected their finances.

While NZ upcoming home series vs IND, is so key to the NZC finances that notable NZ commentator said that their NZ coach request to have greentop wickets, is unlikely to happen so that they BCCI & broadcasters are not upset.

Cricket world can certainly be big, but it doesn't have to grow via associates gaining test status in ad hoc manner.

Surely it is to Ireland & world crickets benefit, that associates can get to test cricket as well prepared as possible & not have to be like Bangladesh & most teams in history, where by instead of taking 10+ years to become a proper test nation - they can take 2-3 years to make the grade?

As i keep saying cricket has 3 formats - making it the most unique team sport in the world - only rugby can compare. T20 cricket is means by which the game will grow & 50 cricket - associates can also view to progression through the formats as a major achievement & developmental coup.

Right now this timely article came on cricinfo Ireland Cricket Features: Ireland's special relationship with West Indies | ESPN Cricinfo

Associates need to be playing more bilateral series like this via ICC leadership & guidance - but they have failed the associates. When last has Ireland toured anyone for a series? I don't blame boards for not wanting to play them due to the well documented financial peculiarities of hosting teams.

 

[ste_mc_efc]

I've been making the simple argument for the last 2 pages: the length of time it takes nations in 135 years of test cricket to become good at test cricket.

I don't think anyone is suggesting giving another 4 teams test status tomorrow.