I blogged about it Will (see post here.

Summary of what I said would be…yes I do Will, I do ‘care’ about the minnows. I am a big funs of the underdogs in any circumstances, but seeing some of these minnows is extra fun, for all sorts of reasons. Remember when USA was playing Australia once in the CT? Remember all the hilarity that resulted, and I enjoyed seeing the Kenyan team last time, good spirited side, and I loved their celebrations especially.

Just so long as they don’t cause an upset against Pakistan I’ll be happy seeing any number of associates sides play in the World Cup :d.

Yes it makes it long and brings along some one-sided games, but we’ve got to be less selfish and think of these teams as well, they have virtually no other international exposure apart from the World Cup. I also don’t buy in Holding’s theory that they don’t learn anything by getting thrashed, they learn a lot just by being there!

And it happens in nearly every other sport, its never an issue for people in football for example, I know the qualification procedure is way more competitive there but still, we’ve got to realize that this exposure helps these sides, not only with their cricket, but with their confidence and everything too.

The Kenyan tournament was waaaay more exciting than the Ashes and the early one-dayers down under. Finally, the ICC has recognised the importance of getting Netherlands, Scotland, Ireland, Canada, etc, playing each other, and regularly. Remember the preparation for the last World Cup? It was non-existant. No wonder they got thrashed.

If cricket is to develop, these teams must continue to play each other and start getting big one-dayers and 20-20s against England and the like. There are plenty of cricket fans in these countries, but we have been starved! No more excuses. I’m not saying Test cricket in the near future, but bloody hell, is anyone else getting bored of Aus playing England, Aus playing NZ, endlessly?

Getting into the WC is the only way the govts of these countries are going to take notice and plough money into kids taking up cricket. And sponsors will start jumping on board too. We’ve seen a minnows upset every WC for the last few tournaments, and this time they’re much better prepared. Who wouldn’t love to see a minnow rattle a big boy next month?

To be fair, all I’m interested in is a competitive game. I don’t want to see South Africa thrash Bermuda, but a close tie between Kenya and Scotland is fine. Unforunately, in the World Cup, it’s going to be a lot of the former and none of the latter. And again when two ‘minnows’ qualify for the upcoming Twenty20 tournament.

Of course, the minnows need some kind of target to aim for, and qualifying for these international competitions is a good one. If you are going to exclude them from things like the World Cup, I don’t know what else you can replace them with.

Maybe, as Holding suggested, having only one or two of the better minnows qualify is a suitable compromise, rather than having six of them.

I’m REALLY disappointed in the lack of support given to Kenyan cricket in the past few years. They made the semi-finals in 2003, and what help did they get from the likes of Australia? Nothing.

What would have done Kenya some great service is a tour to Australia, playing a couple of four-day games against the weaker states, and a series of 50 over games as well. And Kenya is ideally suited for a pre-season warm up tour by a state side as well.

Hey Will,

I understand the problem that Cricinfo face with covering associate cricket and it’s lack of commercial viability. I’m really not trying to play the blame game here, and I’m sorry if thats the way it appeared with my previous comment. Martin’s response was great and it answered most of our concerns about CricInfo and we have come to understand and respect that fact. Cricket Europe clearly has a different financial model, and I’m relatively happy as long as the cricket is covered somewhere! Personally, I’m not one to play the blame game anyways.

As for publishing your comments on our blog, I’m not sure what you’re talking about - unless you have provided some kind of feedback to Andrew. The comments as such on our blog our unmoderated - so basically they are all published instantly (or at worse with a time lag of upto 10 minutes). Hopefully, it hasn’t got stuck in our spam filter Otherwise you can e-mail us @ btb at caughtbehind dot com

Cheers!

I wasn’t particularly, except for the fluorescent nature of the Netherlands. But I followed the WCL for an article I had to write, and found myself more and more interested. So I’ll be watching them in the World Cup for one.

Oh, disregard my last. That would be the ICC Intercontinental Cup, then.

I’ll get me coat …

I think ‘competitive game’ is they key here. Everyone is for the game developing, everyone is for getting more countries into the cricketing fold and spreading the game. But as you mention Will, cricket involving the associates is not too popular, and there is invariably a reason for that- it would be great to see a competitive match but seeing an associate getting thrashed beyond recognition just offers no reason to be watched. i do beleive that 6 is at least 4 too many for the WC. They need to play each other far more often, and face A teams and state/county sides…

Excellent Wraye.

my word wraye, that excellent!

Thanks. All credit goes to the girls. Grass roots cricket is the future for the minnows as well as Test nations. It took Sri Lanka and New Zealand et al a while to get going, so give the minnows another 20 years, then we will stuff Australia too (sorry Scott!)

Right on, coltext. Cricket is a funny game. Bangladesh beat Australia, Scotland beat Bangladesh, ergo Scotland can theoretically beat Oz. These upsets make the game so exciting, dontcha just love ‘em?