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Kolpak era coming to an end?
By Will 3 months ago, 2 Comments »
There are undoubtedly a number of quality cricketers who have qualified to play in England as Kolpaks. Murray Goodwin, Deon Kruis and Jacques Rudolph come to mind. They are in a minority, however; the vast majority lack international experience and are keeping out young England-qualified players. I’m pleased to hear that the era might be coming to an end.
2 Comments »The European Commission is poised to close the Kolpak loophole and allow the ECB to limit the number of non-European players taking part in county cricket.
At present, several countries, most notably South Africa and some in the Caribbean, are signatories to the Cotonou treaty with the European Union, which was agreed in 2000. This has, until now, been interpreted as allowing freedom of labour for people from those countries inside the EU, and that has led to an explosion in the number of Kolpak players in county cricket. At present, there are approximately 64 on contract.
At a conference this week, Michal Krejza, the head of the commission’s sports unit, said: “It is the decision of individual member states to admit Cotonou players, not the European Union.”
The Indian dimension
By Emma 6 months ago, 1 Comment »
It has been somewhat of a double whammy for county cricket, and not one that could have been predicted by the end of last season. As Sussex were celebrating their second consecutive Championship victory in September, the only possible concern Chris Adams and co. could have had about their international berth would be which player to keep. Now, thanks to the incomprehensible forelock-tugging and deference that boards around the world are giving to a Test nation that only woke up to Twenty20 when they won the World Championship, having already let a private enterprise set up in the format they had snubbed, Mushtaq Ahmed may well have worn a Sharks shirt for the last time. But with only a month to go until the season starts, the nearest to clarity I’ve seen for clubs on the ICL is Andrew McGlashan’s list over at Cricinfo. The medley of pre-stance Kolpaks, post-stance Kolpaks, UK nationals, EU nationals and Internationals requiring NOCs has left a bit of a muddle.
So what does this spell? Well, at some point, there is going to be a lawsuit. Maybe more than one. I’m not going to pretend to know anything about the legal situation, but the PCA and their international equivalents will have been getting legal advice since the ECB’s statement last week. What will be most interesting will be who ends up suing who. Well, interesting for a law student. None of it is in the interest of English cricket.
As if a whole swath of maybe-banned-maybe-nots wasn’t enough, the sheer salaries and brevity of commitment being offered by the IPL are easily more of an attraction to top class internationals than six months drudgery in some of England’s colder climes. Shaun Pollock, for a while linked with Warwickshire, was only interested in playing the Twenty20s. Of the many Antipodean retirements of the last few months, how many are headed here? This of course is leaving aside the possibility that English players wont up sticks and move to Bangalore. When players with as little international exposure as car-park call up Luke Pomersbach are being offered $50,000 for a few games graft, surely some of the international fringe must be eyeing their bank balances with jealousy.
Considering the outcry over the last few seasons at the invasion of international players, the new position seems far more worrying. With a dearth of players available to fill the overseas slots, there will be a widening in the gap between the ‘rich’ counties and those without the cash to compete for what names are available. To think that some time last year Ricky Ponting was bemoaning the grind of international cricket, and voicing concerns that too much of the shortest format was being played. Ironically, the ICL should have had little impact on English cricket in terms of timing, while the IPL runs in direct conflict with parts of the season. It is impossible to know what the long-term impacts are going to be. In the meantime, coaches around the country will be filling in team sheets in pencil.
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