Washout nightmare
CRICKET One-day clashes’ susceptibility to falling victim to the weather mean Intercontinental Cup is a busted flush, says Kevin Ferrie
T OHAVE an interest in Scottish cricket and be a climate change denier can surely no longer be in any way compatible after the impact the rain has had on the domestic and international game in recent years.
This is our original national game, that which effectively gave birth to the less-weather-dependent ball game that has become our obsession in the past century-anda-half, but it is inconceivable that cricket could have played the role it most certainly did in generating Scotland’s passion for sport had there been as little opportunity to play in the early 19th century as we are now subjected to.
Nowhere has the impact been felt more than in what was billed as the Intercontinental Cup, but in elemental terms would have been better dubbed the “incontinent cup”, as the cricketing gods have piddled all over Scotland’s efforts to make something of what should have been one of the most important campaigns in the international team’s history.
Anyone clinging to the belief that the loss of more than 10 days of play out of a possible 16 in their four matches scheduled so far was not down to climate change would do as well trying to persuade us that Scotland head coach Grant Bradburn engaged in some sort of wild rampage around the bathrooms of New Zealand, smashing every wall-hanging he set eyes on before heading to Scotland, such would be their dependence on superstition over intellect.
Bradburn arrived two years ago as a highly respected figure who was close to being a member of Kiwi coaching aristocracy such was his contribution to the development of international stars like Corey Anderson, BJ Watling and Kane Williamson, but he is in danger of becoming some sort of latter-day sporting King Canute, who has travelled overseas to engage in the folly of seeking to confront forces that no mortal man should contemplate challenging.
This was a competition that offered the tantalising prize of allowing the “associate countries”, cricket’s second-tier nations – Scotland, Afghanistan, Hong Kong, Ireland, the Netherlands, Namibia, Papua New Guinea and the United Arab Emirates – a chance to earn the right to join the elite and get at least a taste of playing Test cricket.
If the sport is ever to grow beyond the tight geography to which the Test game has been confined it is vital the International Cricket Council finds a way of credibly involving more teams at the highest level, but this device has failed horribly. The Scottish climate, as it has been affected by meteorological change, represents a particular problem, but the loss of all four days of the match they were due to play in Hong Kong last year was a reminder that running a cricket competition that is dependent upon one-off ties, rather than being played in a series of Tests, is a true hostage to fortune.
Speaking ahead of what he knew was a match they had to win to have any chance of reviving their campaign, Bradburn expressed a determination to find every possible positive from his experiences as Scotland’s head coach, but even the most optimistic Kiwi would have to have had dark moments over the past week, during which they considered whether this pro- ject has been a waste of key years of a career.
Scotland and the UAE have now moved across the country from Ayr to Edinburgh in a bid to play two World Cricket League 50-over games, all those fixtures having been shifted from the original choice of venue in Aberdeen in a forlorn bid to beat the inevitable.
The good news is the forecast suggests we should get a full day’s play in both, but if it had been a four-day match the expectations on Wednesday would be different, and therein lies the problem.