It's always been my view that you should only be allowed to play international cricket, or any other top-level sport for that matter, for the country of your birth. No exceptions!
So many England cricketers of recent years (and coaching staff) seem to speak with the inevitable twang of someone from the southern half of the African continent. Or there's a hint of Irish - so there is.
Andrew Symonds played for Gloucestershire against Lincolnshire at Sleaford in the NatWest competition while regarded as being English. He appeared internationally for Australia. Quite legally, under the rules. But surely it's time they were changed and simplified.
Football is just as confusing. You all know the stories about Grannie being born in the Emerald Isle or north of the border and some player with a cockney accent posting off her birth certificate to the powers-that-be.
At county level, I always admired Yorkshire, as did many others, for engaging only those born within the boundaries of our biggest county.
Except, a century ago, of course, in the era of great captain Lord Hawke, who was a Lincolnshire Yellow Belly, like most of us!
Eventually, even the reactionary committee folk at Yorkshire CCC were forced to bow to the enevitable and drop the requirement, just to stay on a level playing field with the competition.
Just in case anyone mistakenly thinks there's an underlying trend of racialism here, I'm going to point out that England started it all in the first place.
In the days of British Empire, and the Raj, when the sun never set on the red-painted areas of your household globe, we had to ensure that those cricketing stars born in the colonies were able to represent us at cricket (eg future captain Sir Colin Cowdrey - born Bangalore, India). And many others.
Just to prove my point about the rules, The Nawab of Pataudi (Snr) played Test cricket for England and India!
It's certainly not a matter of ethnic origin, as far as I can see. Any cricketer, whatever his ethnicity in passport terms, should be free to play for the country of his birth.
Somehow the rules don't seem right in allowing a person born in another cricket-playing country to spend a few years living elsewhere and then qualify to play internationally for the country they've chosen to join.
I'll be taking a look at the country of birth of all players in Test series from now on. Starting with the forthcoming Ashes, Down-Under. If those not born in England, or Australia, play key roles, to me it must be regarded as a hollow victory.
Domestically, I still feel upset about what happened in the Minor Counties Championship. The overseas professionals were banned in the late 1980s - many of us thinking that precluded something similar in the first class game. But a quarter-of-century later, nothing has happened further up the pyramid.
I liked to watch the overseas stars in the Minor Counties - pitting Test stars against local club cricketers. The stars from afar added to attendances, helped with sponsorship and created interest among newspaper readers (my own paper included).
But if they want to encourage English-qualified players in the Minor Counties by excluding overseas stars, how come the same doesn't apply in first class county cricket, with its profusion of 'Kolpak' registrations AND Test stars from abroad?
It wasn't so bad when overseas players signed for the entire county season, but these days they seem to arrive for a month or two, only to disappear to be replaced by another.
True greats like the game's No. 1 all-rounder, left-hander Sir Garfield Sobers, made lasting contributions. Just consider what the legendary West Indian - top-notch batsman, superb close fielder, fast bowler, finger spinner, Chinaman devotee and hitter of six sixes in an over - did to raise the profile and fortunes of Nottinghamshire. Or what Wasim Akram did for so long up at Lancashire.
However, for every great player like Sir Garry and Wasim, there have been dozens of others who have come and gone without really making a mark and played in an XI in which a local player, therefore, did not get the Chance to Shine, to use a current ECB term.
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Rules like the one you suggest are difficult to justify. If country of birth were the over-riding factor, what would that mean to the kids of servicemen and women, or business people posted overseas?
ReplyDeleteMy wife was born in Tanzania to parents from Cornwall and Greater London. If she had been an international class sportswoman, should she have been banned from playing for her true country, just because her father was doing service for his country in a forign land when she was born?
Where you are born is an undisputed fact. Friends have been known to take the mickey out of "yours truly" when they discover the so-called Mr Brigg was born in Scunthorpe. For medical reasons, mother had to go to Scunthorpe General, which had facilities unavailable at Brigg Maternity Hospital. The fact mother was born in Brigg (using the current sports qualification system) seems to suggest I can claim to be a paid-up Briggensian, just like all the worthy folk actually born in the town. On my birth certificate it says Scunthorpe. Now consider what some of our Ashes series cricketers have on theirs as place of birth. It's exactly the same argument. Oh, by the way, I only spent the first three days of my life in Scunthorpe and have been in Brigg for 54 years since, but there's no disputing the fact I was born in the steel town.
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