I'm certain if India somehow fell out of the top 8 they'd change the rules for them, imagine a world cup without India?? fraction of the revenue
Yes but thats like saying when the US economy and global prestige drops below Zimbabwe's, the UN will rethink America's permanent seat on the security council.
India will never fall below 5th in the ICC rankings. Even in the 1960s when India was a relatively poor side, they were never ranked outside the top 5 or 6.
India were ranked below Zimbabwe at one point in the ODI rankings in the 1990s. They were really quite a wretched team, particularly away from home. It is hard to see India ever plummeting that far now, they seem to be very consistently one of the best teams, much like Australia.
India have historically been good at bating but fail hard at fast bowling.
Some of those cracks have been papered over because of that Bumrape guy who is a pretty good,and quick bowler, but remains to be seen if they can produce more. Not many 140+ bowlers out of India.
Too much vegetarianism, not enough protein.
Cricinfo profile of the 'James Bond' of cricket:
FULL NAME: Angus James Mackay
BORN: 13 June 1967, Harare
KNOWN AS: Gus Mackay
The ICC would never allow for Pakistan to not qualify. Over 700k applied for tickets to a 26k seater. Over 1 billion people watched the game on the telly. It's too valuable for the ICC to let Pakistan or India fall down the pecking order. It poses the question that perhaps this is why the ICC don't really do much to support the sides outside the top 8. If these sides are not supported, they can never trouble Pakistan or India dropping that low, but it keeps up the facade of growing the game to have these other sides have test status.
India could see the benefit in this qualifier because it will obviously generate more revenue for them. Indians would watch cricket every single day if they could. Any opportunity to watch more matches for them is one they will take, and the money that would come from sponsors and broadcast revenue would be more beneficial than if they sent a side to the Caribbean or Zim or even to Ireland (now that they have test status).
On a side note of Khan, I think last night we saw a side that that is brimming with confidence. Khan is a quality bowler but also made up by hype. The more he gets hyped, the more you go in to the game expecting him to threaten you. The mental battle is half the battle. England didn't buy in to it. To them, they are the favourites. They are playing on home and everyone expects them to win. They have been in good form and they were showing everyone that even the guy rated so highly will not threaten them. Morgan just looked like a guy who was oozing confidence and it didn't matter how right Khan was going to get it, he was going to be better.
Looks like Colin de Grandhomme had a marvelous day yesterday even as his countrymen were suffering a humiliating defeat a few hundred kilometers away. Excellent show with both bat and ball. that knock of 60 was massively crucial.
Just gutted that South Africa can't progress at these tournaments.
We have a gun South African this year at our club in the Premier League, and I asked him what the issue is.
He said the Franchise structure is fine, it's solid and it's breeding goof FC cricketers. The issue is the levels below that, the provincial levels and below. Her said his school was littered with players of AB De Villiers' talent (when he was a similar age) with the bat and genuinely quick bowlers, who couldn't get a look in due to the quota system. Players of colour and heritage are getting the nod ahead of them. He admitted they usually turn into good cricketers but nowhere near good enough to play for the national side, where as the naturally talented players who could have developed quicker and with more fluidity leave the country; that's the issue.
Googly will attest to this, but he said there's no Markrahms coming through, or Rabada's. Sipamla looks decent for a 20 year old mind.
Our pro mentioned a lad called Van Tonder? and Hamza, who's played a test match, as two decent players.
I don't think they'll fill the hole that ABD, Steyn, Du Plessis, Duminy and Amla are going to leave. Rassouw could always return and he would be a big addition, but there seems to be some bad blood there
Just gutted that South Africa can't progress at these tournaments.
We have a gun South African this year at our club in the Premier League, and I asked him what the issue is.
He said the Franchise structure is fine, it's solid and it's breeding goof FC cricketers. The issue is the levels below that, the provincial levels and below. Her said his school was littered with players of AB De Villiers' talent (when he was a similar age) with the bat and genuinely quick bowlers, who couldn't get a look in due to the quota system. Players of colour and heritage are getting the nod ahead of them. He admitted they usually turn into good cricketers but nowhere near good enough to play for the national side, where as the naturally talented players who could have developed quicker and with more fluidity leave the country; that's the issue.
Googly will attest to this, but he said there's no Markrahms coming through, or Rabada's. Sipamla looks decent for a 20 year old mind.
Our pro mentioned a lad called Van Tonder? and Hamza, who's played a test match, as two decent players.
I don't think they'll fill the hole that ABD, Steyn, Du Plessis, Duminy and Amla are going to leave. Rassouw could always return and he would be a big addition, but there seems to be some bad blood there
I think we in this forum have all seen this coming and know of it. These people who leave SA aren’t going back. This country has done a good job of alienating expats so much, they don’t even want to return for a holiday. Even my Safrican boss told me just today he only wants to visit Zimbabwe now when he goes back. He’s not a zimbo.
ICC are partly to blame here. We have seen how they have treated Zimbabwe and the associates, but they are more than happy to let teams outside the big 3 slide. They could easily implement a rule against quota and political interference like soccer does. They don’t.
Apart of me just thinks it’s a ploy to ensure Indian dominance, and to maintain two worthy opponents so India itself doesn’t lose interest.
We have already seen the circle jerk that is an ashes every two years, and an India Oz Test, and the odd town appearance outside that. International cricket need to be stop being run like an exhibition boxing match. India isn’t Rocky and the associates aren’t Drago and his son.
Cricinfo profile of the 'James Bond' of cricket:
FULL NAME: Angus James Mackay
BORN: 13 June 1967, Harare
KNOWN AS: Gus Mackay
Indeed.
There’s going to be a lot of dissecting and recriminations in SA. I saw a really disingenuous tweet from a BEE adherent just now. It was showing the stats for the current crop of black bowlers vs the white guys from a few years back. They were almost identical. Then there was a statement about the fact that it was the white guys who were failing with the bat, also true as a stand alone comment. But as Sloan points out the issues now start at school and provincial level. SA will always produce hugely talented schoolboy batsmen, but they’re just not getting a look-in to the age group provincial stuff, so if an exceptional one comes along the parents immediately think of getting them elsewhere. Then of course their club cricket has more of the same issues, it’s following a very similar path to our cricket and somehow hoping for a different outcome. There’s a name for that
They’re big enough to keep blundering on in their imploding economy and it won’t be a crash like we experienced but it’s sliding fast. All these top teams now have two or three superstars and they’re getting younger and younger. I don’t see SA being in the top 4 in any format ever again. Zim has always had that big brother attitude towards SA so there are many glum faces amongst my friends today, but it was inevitable. I watch that SA cricket program Inside Edge quite a bit and I see that they’ve gotten rid of all the white guys there as well. There’s still some interesting stuff, but the intention is clear, they want to control every aspect of anything that spins cash, it’s always more to do with money but the guys behind it play the race card to further their own agendas and the disenfranchised guys wholly support it.
The financial looting of CSA is biblical as well.
Will the T20 World Cup be more exciting and more watched than the IPL?
I hugely prefer watching 50 over stuff to the T20, I wonder if we’ll see the day where we have an international tournament that is played by franchises?
I think part of the reason why they had this ten team format was so as not to expose the gulf in money given to some teams and not others. We’re a long way behind the world standard now, it’s depressing.
