ICC and the 2015 World Cup: 10 teams and a massive joke!

News today that only the 10 test playing cricket nations will be represented at the 2015 Cricket World Cup in Australia and New Zealand is frankly a knee jerk reaction to criticism about the length of the 2007 and 2011 tournaments and again shows just how narrow sighted the ICC are.  If they are not being narrow sighted then this is the most obvious case of cutting off ones nose despite ones face you could imagine.

The decision seems so much like a bad joke that I had to check the date to make sure I was not being sucked in by an April Fool's Day hoax.  It is even more of a joke that it is not such a hoax.

For the record, the following nations are test playing nations:  Australia, New Zealand, England, West Indies, Pakistan, India, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe.

From the most recent Cricket World Cup, the following nations will miss out: Ireland, Canada, the Netherlands and Kenya.

At the outset, my view is that the failure to include Ireland as a full cricketing nation as well as it not being in the next World Cup is a disgrace.  Nothing less.  The sooner Ireland is placed on the track to becoming a full cricketing nation, the better.

That said, what should be done about the 2015 World Cup, aside from including Ireland as a full cricketing nation?

I come back to the theme of a previous post.  Teams such as Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe were once (and some would say in the case of the last two teams still are) "minnows" or associate teams.

The story of Sri Lanka's rise from "minnow" to being one of the powerhouses of the game is a great story and is instructive as to why the ICC's decision is just so wrong.

Sri Lanka's initial exposure to international cricket was in the 1975 World Cup (they lost all three games they played).  Then they did not play in another international tournament until the 1979 World Cup (where they won their first game against India and had a match abandoned as well as losing one game).  After the 1979 World Cup, Sri Lanka began playing in Test Match Cricket on a limited basis in the 1981/82 season and played in a limited number of one day tournaments in the meantime.

In the 1983 and 1987 World Cups the Sri Lankan team failed to record a victory from 10 games.  In 1992 the results of the Sri Lankan team started to improve with 2 victories and a no result the positives from 6 games of cricket played.

The tale of the tape then is that before the Sri Lankan team won the 1996 World Cup it had won 3 games from a total of 22 played at World Cups.  Importantly during this period Sri Lanka was offered and maintained test status and started playing cricket regularly.  There is no need to continue to expand on Sri Lanka's results since 1992 - they are one of the dominant forces in the game.

Why shouldn't the current associates be given a chance to emulate what Sri Lanka has done with its chance.   If at any point in those formative years upto and including 1992 the ICC (and its predecessors) had have made a decision like the present one what state would Sri Lankan cricket be in now?  Is it possible that names such as Sangakarra, Malinga et al would have been lost to cricket?

Equally, questions need to be asked as to why Zimbabwe and Bangladesh, as test playing nations, receive an automatic chance to play in the "big show" when their respective results are no better than, for example, Ireland.

Zimbabwe, the country and the cricketing team, are not worthy of a place in the "Top Ten" cricketing nations in the world.  The ICC has always gone against public and moral opinion and kept them in the game (albeit with a reduced role) for no cogently explained reason.  It can't be about money, because playing Zimbabwe could not be making anyone any money.  This blog is not the forum for an in depth discussion of this issue.

The inclusion of the Bangladesh team presents even more of a conundrum because they have been playing test cricket regularly but they are not, lets be honest, competitive.  Equally the reasons for Bangladesh's inclusion in the "Top 10" are clear - Bangladesh has a fanatical base of supporter, a large TV market and form part of the all conquering Asian bloc of international cricket.  Whether one likes it or not the Bangladesh cricket team is in the "Top 10" to stay.

So in the current "Top 10" we see 2 minnows of the game who will be at the next World Cup.  Frankly, Zimbabwe do not deserve to be an automatically selected team for the next World Cup by any measure.   Setting aside the problems with the regime in Zimbabwe, the Zimbabwe cricket team is a minnow by any measure and, indeed, has not played a Test Match since 2006 and has only been involved in a limited number of limited overs matches in recent years.  

It is abundantly clear from this decision that the ICC wishes to limit the number of teams at the next World Cup to 10 teams.  If 10 teams is the maximum (I for one do not believe that 12 teams would be out of the question but will focus on the 10 team scenario for the moment) then the answer must be for their to be a qualifying tournament before the World Cup to be held with each of the associates, including Zimbabwe, Ireland and the Netherlands playing off for the final spot in the "Top 10".

Any tournament that includes a team of Zimbabwe without at the very minimum allowing teams like Ireland and the Netherlands to compete with it for the last spot in the tournament is, simply, a joke and the sooner the ICC reconsiders this ridiculous decision the better.

World Cup 2011 - some lessons and the Team of the Tournament

The Cricket World Cup is finally over after spanning 46 days and many many games that really did not seem to mean anything.  India won what really was a great game of cricket.  What lessons have cricket fans learnt from the 2011 World Cup?

After pondering it overnight I have come up with the following:

1. The best team won in the end.  India may not have had the best bowling or fielding line ups but their powerhouse batting, coupled with an excellent captain and seemingly cohesive team spirit won out the day.  They lifted in the field when it counted.  Forget the ICC ratings – this is the best team in all forms of the game at the moment.
2. Australia simply picked the wrong bowling lineup.  Fast bowlers on the wickets of the subcontinent were always going to be hit and miss and in the big moments the triumvirate of Lee, Tait and Johnson were simply too wayward and, if it makes sense, fast to win those big moments.  The selectors “jobbed” it and the captain has taken the blame.  Sad state of affairs in Australian cricket at the moment.
3. None of the New Zealand players would make a world’s best eleven (Ross Taylor the possible exclusion) but they are a united team.  They played as a team and, as always seems to happen, they sucked every bit of talent they had out of their team.  How good is it to see Jesse Ryder get a run and go well – make one ponder what might have been for M Cosgrove in the Australian line up.
4. Sri Lanka is one quality batsman away from dominating the cricket world.  They have a replacement, of sorts, to Murali in Mendis (their failure to select him in the final may have been decisive) and have a great top 4 in the batting order.  One more batsmen of the quality of Yuvraj Singh or Ross Taylor to support Sangakarra and Jayawardene and they would truly be dynamite.
5. In the form of Dhoni, Sangakarra, Afridi and Vettori the four teams in the finals possessed the 4 best captains in the tournament.  Afridi has bound together a notoriously fractious team into a united outfit with weapons across the park.

The above is the top 5 lessons I came up.  I have culled about another 10 which are likely to become the fodder of later blogs (indeed one already has been in a blog regarding the place for the “minnows” in the World Cup).

Before this tournament many pundits considered the 50 over game to be dead but some of the games of cricket we have seen over the last month and a half will go down in the annals of limited overs cricket as classics.   We have also seen the end of an era inasmuch as the next World Cup will be played without the names Tendulark, Murali and Ponting in the teams lists.  

All that is left then, aside from saluting the victors, is to pick my “Team of the Tournament”.  What follows is the team that I consider to be the best team from all of the players who played in the World Cup.  It is not a collection of the 12 best players of the last 12 months nor is it supposed to represent the best one day players in the game.  Simply I have tried to pick the best team solely based on performances in this tournament.  In batting order, my team is:

1. Tendulkar: simply the best ever.  I am sorry Sir Don but he just is and his batting this tournament has shown age has not wearied him.  The biggest wicket in any game played.  Nothing more needs to be said.
2. Dilshan: was dominant at the top of the order for the Sri Lankan’s and scored the most runs in the tournament.  Can not look past him to partner the Great One.
3. Sangakarra: plays as a batsman in this lineup given that Dhoni is selected and gets picked at 3 because he is the best number three in the tournament and in the game.
4. Jayawardene: Scratchy tournament really book ended by two hundreds but his hundred in the final was sublime.  The innings of the tournament selects him in this team.
5. De Villiers: despite South Africa going out early had a tournament that showed just how good a player he is.   353 runs in 5 knocks is evidence of that.
6. Singh: have never really been a fan till this tournament but with the bat and the ball was the quality allrounder of the tournament.  Lifted in the field in the final and was in everything.
7. Dhoni: Bats low in this lineup and already have Sangakarra but he gets picked because he is the best captain going around.  Enough said.
8. Afridi: Most wickets in the tournament, streaky with the bat and a great leader.  Gives great balance, on the pitches the tournament was played on, to this lineup.
9. Khan Z: Has there been a better spell in a World Cup final than the first 5 overs Zaheer bowled last night?  Left arm and fast with swing.  To good.
10. Riaz: The find of the tournament.  How much does this guy remind one of Akram?  Brilliant spell in the semi final after getting a run in front of Ahktar.
11. Murali:  Everyone knew the old stager had one more big tournament in him and on one leg he did not disappoint.  Forget all of the crap that has gone in Australia about this bloke – he is a legend.
12. Roach: I know he got 6 for and his hatrick against a minnow but he is quick and bowls straight without a lot of the waywardness of other allegedly express bowlers.

So that is my tournament lineup and some thoughts about the tournament.  Comments and alternate selections encouraged and, indeed, welcomed.