AGB Cricket

PAWAR WITHOUT GLORY

Gideon Haigh takes the long handle to the ICC, and shoves it right up their majority:

Cricket's fig leaf of democracy

I'm not worried because it's a democratic organisation," said Sharad Pawar, the International Cricket Council's new president, after last week's executive board meeting in Singapore. The mystery is which organisation he was talking about. Amnesty International? The Boy Scout Movement? It certainly can't have been the ICC.

And then there's this accurate prediction:

"Why pick on India and Pakistan, apart from the fun of seeing the comments section phosphoresce with fury?"

DULWICH HILL HOWARD?

Interesting article by Peter Della Penna about baseball commissioners:

Reason for blocking John Howard's ICC nomination is absurd

While I generally frown on comparing cricket to baseball, cricket could definitely learn something from America’s pastime in regards to how to govern the game. Throughout its history, Major League Baseball has shown that not only is it acceptable to bring someone in from outside the sport to control the game, but it can be the best way to control the game.

Obviously it is impractical to conclude that just because MLB has a Commissioner of Baseball, the ICC should also have a Commissioner of Cricket, but there can be no doubt whatsoever that the interests of cricket would be significantly better served by appointing chairmen with names like Kenesaw Mountain Landis and Happy Chandler.

CHOC A BLOC

Despite the odd concern - and the inevitable "Howard had it coming" pot shots - the Aussie press has pretty much come out and shit-canned the ICC as a committee crammed full with spivs, thugs and criminals.

Peter Roebuck:

Tragic cricket failure as Howard sent to the pavilion

NO ONE emerges with the slightest credit from the debacle over John Howard's failed nomination for the deputy presidency of the International Cricket Council. Although dressed in the clothes of rectitude, it has been about power and patches, control and coins.

Most of all it's about governance and the lack of it, and the endless soft soaping of the scoundrels running Zimbabwean cricket.

Mal Speed:

Howard would have sustained ICC

THE decision of the International Cricket Council to reject John Howard's nomination for the ICC presidency is a disgrace and an insult to Australia and New Zealand.

Rest assured, he was not rejected because of his lack of experience as a cricket administrator, his strong opposition to Robert Mugabe's disastrous regime in Zimbabwe or his outspoken views about Muthiah Muralidaran's controversial bowling action. There is more to it than that.

Malcolm Conn:

Cricket Australia may push on with John Howard nomination for ICC role

CRICKET Australia has refused to rule out resubmitting John Howard as a candidate for president-elect of the International Cricket Council.

Crash Craddock on SEN this morning, along with Spanky, Speed and Conn, are adamant that John Howard did not get knocked back because of his objections to Hell-state Zimbabwe, comments about Chucker Murali, support for apartheid or lack of a cricket background, although that can't have aided his cause. According to them, the Black Ballers voted against John Howard because the gangsters currently ensconced on the ICC (many of whom are or were also politicians with rock all cricket background) gravy train were threatened by the prospect of a so-called clean-skin and political heavyweight outsider upsetting their sweet deal.

Which prompts the odd question. If they were against John Howard and presumably for John Anderson, does that mean they felt Anderson would have been more amenable to their lurks? Did they see Anderson as a potential fellow traveller? A sock puppet? Did New Zealand, pissed off that the Aussie nominee won out over their Kiwi nominee, give a nod and a wink to the ICC?

Fingers crossed CricAussie do what Malcolm Conn says and re-nominate Howard. I mean, if Australia's members in the past have held their noses when they voted to accept other countries stinky candidates, then it's only right that other countries put aside their objections when it's their turn to support Australia's candidates.

Or do they have too much to lose by having Howard in the top job? They must, if they are prepared to so brazenly fvck over Australia.

BLACK BALLED

Up yours, Australia:

Afro-Asian bloc rejects John Howard's bid for ICC presidency

JOHN Howard's bid to become president of the ICC has failed, creating an administrative crisis in the game's governing body.

While an official decision will not be reached until later today at the International Cricket Council's executive board meeting in Singapore, the former Prime Minister was rejected overnight by the majority of Test-playing countries.

Six of the 10 major cricket nations signed a letter opposing Howard as a candidate while a seventh, Zimbabwe, did not sign but is one of the main agitators against him.

Howard's only supporters were the three white nations: Australia, New Zealand and England, reinforcing the power of the Afro-Asia bloc in world cricket.

THE CHOPPING BLOC

Looks like I was wrong. The balls have been ratified black:

Howard fails in ICC vice-president bid

The ICC has demanded another vice-presidency candidate after John Howard's nomination was rejected by its executive board in Singapore. A move which began with board members from six countries signalling their intention to block the appointment on Tuesday turned into an official rejection of Australia's former prime minister today.

JOHNNY BE GOOD

Will John Howard be a good ICC president? I don't know. I hope he makes a good fist of it; especially with so many people, both in and out of the cricket community, set to pounce. The worst thing about the appointment will be listening to the Howard haters whinge about whatever he does at the ICC, despite knowing rock all about cricket.

Post-tenure, how will we know he was a good president?

Spanky Roebuck knows a bit about cricket; he also knows how to backtrack. So much for his original rant shit-canning Howard's proposed nomination. Now that Howard has been nominated Spanky has a mostly sensible article which is broadly supportive of Howard's appointment - excluding the usual hints at darker doings - and he touches wood that the appointment doesn't go tits up:

Howard can bring purpose to the fraught and fractured game

JOHN Howard's nomination as the next vice-president and eventual president of the International Cricket Council provokes a curious mixture of regret and hope.

Why didn't Spanky write that first time around? He ought to... sorry, he must count to ten before he files his articles.

Ian Chappell thinks Howard is the wrong bloke for the job:

Mr Howard refused to respond to comments by former Test captain Ian Chappell that his appointment would politicise cricket and damage Australia's standing in the game.

Chappell warned the former prime minister was the wrong person for the job.

"I would have thought a lot of people would have been better suited than John Howard," he told 3AW.

"There are enough countries have politicised the game and I don't think Australia should be one of them.

Chappelli inadvertently raises an interesting point: are former politicians suited to this kind of appointment? If, during his tenure, Howard never comes within a bull's roar of a political issue he would still be accused of politicising the ICC. So far the only people politicising the appointment are the people who accuse Howard of politicising the appointment.

"CRICKET ADMINISTRATION ISN'T EXACTLY ROCKET SURGERY"

Ostensibly, John Howard, a bloke who has run a country via internecine political maneuvering, dog whistling, wedging and all-round skullduggery would be ideally suited to plate up to the step and assume the chair at the ICC.

Not according to Peter Roebuck, a columnist more accustomed to resolving diplomatic disagreements with the flat side of a bat:

Howard choice is the wrong way to go

Cricket Australia's decision to nominate John Howard as its candidate for the top job at the International Cricket Council is as pitiful as it is disrespectful. Howard's knowledge of cricket is more characterised by enthusiasm than depth or imagination. Plain and simple he is not qualified for the job.

Is Howard the wrong man for the job?

He would attract the same partisan vitriol that dogged, say, Peter Hollingworth. Just look at the comments. But how much of an impression does the Fairfax frothing (and the ABC) make on world cricket. I'm assuming that is where the vast majority of Australian criticism would come from. And doubtless Anthony Albanese is already working the rooms at CricAussie to make sure they don't nominate Howard.

That Howard does not have any obvious experience running an international cricket organisation should not matter; he has the necessary administrative and diplomatic skills. Nor should it be seen as a disadvantage that Howard is not an insider. Andrew Jennings has written at length about the Olympics and FIFA, revealing how the in-house, nudge-nudge nature of both allowed them to fall feet first into corruption, contra and dodgy deals. Is the ICC any different? Don't answer that. Maybe the ICC could benefit from "an outsider" instead of, in Arthur Daley's vernacular, "one of our own".

Maybe Howard will conspire to have Murali's wickets erased from the cricket record books.

By the way. The perceptive among you may have read Spanky's article and then suddenly scratched your head when you got to the part about "All the more reason to accept New Zealand's long-standing and impressive candidate, Sir John Anderson." (Spanky does not reveal why Anderson is an "impressive candidate", either off or on-line.)

All the more reason?

Well, it transpires that The Age online version has mysteriously omitted the previous paragraph:

Australia's position has been well-nigh indefensible. Unable to produce a serious candidate of its own, Cricket Australia ought to have graciously withdrawn. Its reluctance to back Jack Clark, its own chairman, told the tale. Clark is bright, likable and committed but lacks the gravitas and discretion required by the position. In other words he likes a drink and a yarn. Rather than withdrawing, though, Cricket Australia considered presentable internal candidates and thoughts turned to Mark Taylor and Dr Hari Harinan. Taylor counts among the most highly regarded of the games thinkers. Furthermore he can flog environmentally friendly air-conditioners without breaking into a sweat. But he has a young family and a large television contract and it was too early for him. Harinan's ambitions know no bounds but he lacks stature and exposure.

In other words Clark is a loud-mouth piss-head. Tubby is too young and, by the way, remember that ad in which you can't understand what he says? Hint. Hint. Harinan is a rabid climber.

Can't think why they left all that out.