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By Will last year, at the start of April Leave a comment on this post
What a World Cup is has been so far, a tournament memorable for all the wrong reasons. The gestapo-like restrictions have been mentioned before, but such incredulity needs regular airing.
Vaneisa Baksh writes:
On my bookshelf there are three or four unused tickets that will serve as my pretty World Cup souvenirs. As much as I love the game and want to support it, I couldn’t subject myself to absurd restrictions that tried to masquerade under a security umbrella.
West Indians sensed early that this World Cup cared little for their company, their culture, and ignored the realities of life in this part of the world. So they are staying away from all the grand stadia their governments have spent so much of their money to prepare. It just hasn’t been enough about West Indians; can you blame them?
It is, very nearly, a complete disaster. The only hope for the locals is if, by some strange twist of fate, West Indies make the final. They won’t, though, and the public will stay at home. That feeling of revitalisation - a spring hope that the region would be injected with cricket fever - a few weeks ago has dribbled away. This is largely due to, but not solely restricted to, the ICC’s blind greed, their suffocating marketing tactics and a complete lack of interest, or knowledge, of Caribbean culture. They have distanced the very people that should be instrumental (in every sense of the word) to the tournament’s success. That is quite some feat.
Mike King says:
Locals, alienated by the prices and culture of this global event with its Alcatraz-like policies, have stayed away from even those games featuring the home side.
Long queues for tickets and expensive food have resulted in short tempers, paltry crowds and complaints at every turn.
Prior to the tournament, organisers were boasting of sell-out grounds and marketed the event as the best World Cup ever. To say they got it wrong is an under-statement of gigantic proportions.
The ICC cannot be blamed for the cricket on show - and perhaps that, more than the event’s planning, has affected the region’s apathy. West Indies have, as we all suspected but wished wouldn’t happen, been caught short and exposed. But this tournament has been in planning for over five years. Why, then, has it been such a shambles and who will be called to account?
Tags: 2007-world-cup, Alcatraz, caribbean, greed, ICC, Vaneisa-Baksh, west-indies |
The short answer to the question posed in the last line, Will, is likely to be ‘No one’.
There will be the usual spin placed upon the outcome by those with a vested interest in not accepting responsibility, with buck passing of the highest order. The teflon coated panjandrums in Dubai will not be anywhere near this if it turns out badly. I fear that the Windies players will be left holding the aforementioned buck.
BTW - what is a buck, and exactly how is it passed?
Yep,
The ICC strikes again!First sack Hair for enforcing the games rules to placate the very countries who are at the heart of corrupting the great game and now this. Sell the game to the highest bidders and bugger the punters. First they come up with a bloated format and then cunningly make sure all the colour and vibrancy we expect in the Windies is removed by pricing out the locals and imposing Nazi rules banning musical instruments food booze etc. What is left? A bland tournament where the fans have been sold down the river. Hey, but do you think the ICC gives a monkeys-no way its all about $. Speed and the rest of the ICC dickheads have ‘bunker mania’ hunkered up in their glass towers in a non cricketing tax haven. I was so looking forward to this and those tosspots have ruined it. Good on Botham commenting the NZ v Bangladesh that the ICC had got it wrong in a big way.
Can we fire the ICC? They’re utterly pisspoor. I have a friend from St. Lucia who’s family has been unable to attend any of the games - even though they live practically next to the ground - simply because they can’t afford the tickets. It’s shocking to see grounds so consistantly empty. This is supposedly the flagship cricket event and every ground is at best half full. If there are seats free on match day, why don’t they sell the tickets at knock-down prices on the gate? It does more harm to the image of cricket to see empty grounds than to worry about the money. But that wouldn’t occur to the ICC.
Heads should definitely roll at the ICC - talk about not being in touch with your customers!
Is it correct that instrument, horns, etc. could only be taken into the grounds if the owner applied to the ground in advance? (this was mentioned on the radio commentary)
That’s really going to happen isn’t it?!
I have a friend going over there in 2 weeks time, and he’s quite ambivalent about it now. It’s hardly the “carnival” that was promised is it?
This CWC is such a disaster that the ICC will hold an enquiry. The enquiry will find great fault with the WIndies management of the tournament and will also criticize the inadequate preparation by the Pakistani and Indian teams. Criticism will also be directed towards the varied character of pitches and the choice of this time of the year regarding the weather. This will take a committee of 5 about 2 months to write in about 15,000 words. Then Malcom Speed will make a press release thanking the committee for their incisive analysis and announcing the formation of another committee to discuss how best to implement the recommendations. This will all happen but what I’d really like to know is how and when the smurfs took charge of the ICC. Obviously they had to change their skin colour from blue and stop wearing those silly pointed hats, but why didn’t anybody notice? Is there something I’m misunderstanding here?
The ICC are not the only culprits …..where ever a large public event (Olympics) for instance is being organised,it becomes a signal for every money grubbing person and organisation to up their prices(for everything)……it also brings all the “Health and Safety crackpots!” crawling out of the woodwork to enforce their draconian rules on us all!
And then there are all the religious/political factions who decide that they can further their causes by blowing some of us up.
And then there are the majority of people on this chunk of rock ,hurtling through space,{Who are too idle ,or too afraid?}that just sit on their butts and hope that some-one else will sort it all out ….to our advantage.?????????????….Come on …it will never happen.
Ye Gods….I did not realise how cynical I have become.
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