Skilful decisions needed by ECB
Sir Allen Stanford may or may not stay with cricket, but the events of the last 24 hours and the conflicting statements about his intentions - first he was evaluating his options which suggested he was on his way out of the door, then he announced he was committed to English cricket - merely reinforcing the impression I formed last November after the highly-publicised million-dollar match in the Caribbean.
I returned from Antigua extremely doubtful that the Stanford Super Series would do anything for West Indian cricket and utterly convinced the England and Wales Cricket Board had taken a wrong turn.
This marriage between the Texan billionaire and England was a hasty wedding conceived for the wrong reasons. It was driven by naked money-making ambitions yet clothed in high-sounding talk of doing good for our fellow men and reviving West Indian cricket in particular.
English cricket insisted it was not getting into bed with Stanford simply to seek compensation for its decision to shun the Indian Premier League. According to Giles Clarke, head of the ECB, it was also doing its bit for West Indian cricket. After all, what could be more noble than helping restore that once great cricket power, one we all love whatever our allegiance, to its rightful position high up in cricket, lovely, cricket?
Now let me make it clear, I am an old romantic when it comes to West Indian cricket. My formative cricket years are full of memories of Gary Sobers, Rohan Kanhai, Wesley Hall, Lance Gibbs, Basil Butcher, even that wild man Roy Gilchrist, the most fearsome fast bowler I have ever seen. If I had had a son, I would have named him Rohan. I wanted to bat like him, complete with falling hook and all.
Nobody who grew up in the 1960s, as I did, can deny the huge influence of West Indian cricket:
How the 1960-61 series against Australia, which saw the first-ever tied match, revived Test cricket when everybody thought it was dying.
How the West Indian tour of England in 1963 so utterly changed English cricket that from the mid-60s there were twin-tour summers and a relaxation of the rules for overseas players in county cricket.
And, of course, anyone who has read CLR James's Beyond A Boundary, the greatest of sporting books, will be aware of the enormous influence sport can have on the social and political life of nations.
To see a mighty West Indies again would be marvellous. But don't kid yourself. Even if there is a revival, it will make no difference to the modern economic realities of the game.
I know how much sports fans hate talking of the business of sport but cricket is big business and it is controlled by India. West Indies is a collection of disparate islands.
There is no West Indian nation, no integrated economic unit to match India, the second most populous country which provides such a large chunk of world cricket's income.
If West Indian cricket is to be revived, it will need to address the way it is run. Even before the lucrative Stanford match, there were signs that the very structure of West Indian cricket - many competing islands in an unwieldy board - was so flawed many prominent West Indians were in despair.
Sir Vivian Richards, among others, felt all was not well with Stanford and the West Indian board. He told me that some of the money the Texan wanted to invest had not been handed over because of problems with the board. Indeed, Richards went on to say that he feared for the game in that part of the world because of the way the board functioned, or rather did not function.
Stanford himself was less than happy after a court ruling in London before the Stanford Super Series denied him the opportunity to do business with the sponsor he had lined up. The result? Lost money all round for the game in the West Indies.
It is interesting to note that, following the match between England and the Stanford Superstars, the media made much of the latter's 10-wicket victory and how this would help revitalise the game in the West Indies.
Stanford, however, seemed to make little of the triumph. Now we know why. He was clearly rethinking his options. He has already disbanded the Stanford Legends, an ambassadorial vehicle that he used to bring together such West Indian greats as Hall and Richards.
There was also talk that Stanford's Twenty20 competitions would help take cricket to the United States, a long-held dream. It was always unlikely - and the evidence is that they have thus far made little or no impression. The conclusion is obvious: it is not that easy to break into the American sports market, as football knows only too well.
In essence, however, the most fantastic ambition of this misconceived marriage was that English cricket would emerge with a Twenty20 format that could prove a viable rival to the Indians.
We have never been given details of how this was going to be done, and I am told that even some on the ECB board have not heard them. It is hard to envisage how England and Stanford could take on the Indians and the rest of world cricket. The Indians, to their credit, have devised a domestic cricket format that works.
Cricket is that odd team game where most of the money, if not nearly all, is generated by international matches. It is international cricket that nourishes the domestic game. That is what happens in England and all over the world.
The IPL is more like football's English Premier League, on which it is modelled. It has also managed to marry cricket with Bollywood, a more powerful and enduring alliance than the one between English cricket and Stanford.
The whole Stanford issue raises questions about English cricket's decision to take such a disastrous wrong turn last summer. Whatever happens, it will take a lot of skill to ensure they get back on the right track.
I'm 
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
I am told, or I was when growing up, that telling tales is rude, unless you name names and give times, venues etc.
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I live in Antigua, and unfortunately see the decline in interest in cricket here is deep and will not be easily changed. Basketball and football are on the up and the ludicrous decision to move cricket away from the ARG combine to unfortunately hasten the demise. Whatever Mr Stanfords ambitions are, which I think are unclear, it does require money (who else is offering it), and dedication to revive WI cricket. Unless India include the WI in their plans Mr Stanford is the only hope there is.
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Wow Mihir has really come out with some enlightening analysis here.
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ECB can do lot more and lot better if they can clearly see the big picture. The English players are the ones suffering at the moment.
As far as WI Cricket or, for that matter American Cricket is concerned, it's run by corrupt administrators who see cricket as means to enhance their pockets.
West Indian cricket needs good administrators, who are disciplined and carry a genuine passion to improve cricket. The important task ahead of them is to ignite the passion at grassroots and nurture it, and world will certainly see another VIV (Richards) or an ANDY (Roberts).
In America, Professional sports is overly marketed and squeezed out all juice. For Cricket to make an impression and snatch crowds from other established sports like Football (American), Baseball or Basketball, is simply not possible with the existing setup. Whoever is thinking of bringing cricket to America is seeing certainly disillusioned.
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Oh dear - back to form for Mihir - thought after the last blog we were going to see a steady improvement - you really are the Harmison of the BBC sports department! Anyway, just to correct you, the IPL is nothing like the EPL - it is a franchised based competition, with player bidding etc - it is loosely based on the NFL - the only similarity between the two is the name.
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Oh dear... But why am I not surprised. The ECB gets into bed with an American trying to throw money at a game that no one in America wants.
That should be the angel of the blog chap. Why did the ECB go with Stanford? because they were outflanked, out gunned and maneuvered by the Indians. The future of the British game is by all accounts in decline because the ECB make such out of touch and outlandish decisions.
Time for an overhaul in the Long room. But I guess that wouldn't be cricket. I suggest everyone starts a mexican wave in the next test at the home of cricket... keep it up for an hour!
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hifirob,
I stand by my statement that the Indian premier League has been modelled on the English Premier League. I do so because I know the business planning that went on for the IPl. This started well over two years ago and the Indians closely studied English football's most successful product in modern times. Their economic analysis and other business studies concentrated hard on the way the EPL functioned and the returns available.. It is also a fact that one of the motivations for launching the IPl was the worry in India that the televising of Premier league games was so successful that future generations of Indians may be attracted away from cricket to football. While football has always been popular in India, it has never had the cache of cricket but televising of English and Champions league football is threatening to change that. Yes, the IPl also looked at the NFL. But then before the Premier league was formed the then barons of the English game eager to have a breakaway super league,also studied the NFl . Some of the NFL ideas of marketing and collective selling of televised rights were copied. Franchising is a common theme of the NFL and IPL,, and one not shared with the EPL, but that is only one strand in this model, not the only thing.
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OMG! Mihir replied to some comments!
Notwithstanding that the IPL planners "looked at" the EPL, this doesn't mean that the IPL was based on the EPL. I might look at Buckingham Palace when I build a loft extension - doesn't mean my new attic is based on Buckingham Palace.
The commenter was correct - the IPL is a franchise-based system where there is no relegation/promotion, with the most successful teams meeting in a grand final. The EPL is club-based, has promotion and relegation, and the winner is the one at the top of the league, not the winner of any play-off.
There are some commonalities in marketing and business planning, but then, by that logic, the NHL, NBA, EPL, SuperLeague and USPGA are all interconnected.
Thw whole Stanford exercise was a miserable, poorly planned mistake. The wise thing would be to start re-arranging the domestic cricket schedules so that the IPL can become an extended northern hemisphere competition, including England, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. England could be represented by regional teams if necessary.
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I have a suggestion on how to make the WICB work for west indies cricket .Cricket can be an economic booster for the west indies , why not have the sports ministries of the governments of the west indies countries come together and form the WICB that will be accountable to the governments? This way all their workings will be transparent .
If the job of nurturing west indies cricket is not done properly they will be voted out of office just like the politicians? At the moment the WICB is made up of people, who based on their actions have shown to be ineffective as the guardians of West Indies cricket;and what makes it even worst is that they are not made to be held accountable by anyone or anyother oversight body. The WICB and its rulers are analagous to Zimbabwe and Robert Mugabe.
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EHHH BOSSSE!!!
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