The end of an era for cricket
Now the woke have come for the national game
The start of April signals the beginning of another cricket season, but the national game is not what it used to be. Call me old fashioned, but I believe it has been on a downward spiral ever since the abolition of the Gentlemen versus Players matches, which pitted amateurs against the pros and ran from 1806 before being scrapped 60 years ago. The news from the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) that “the centuries’ old tradition” that pits Eton against Harrow, and Oxford against Cambridge, at the iconic
Lord’s cricket ground each summer, will be scrapped from next year, is another nail in the coffin, says Laurence Dollimore in the Daily Mail.
The fixtures have a long history. Eton versus Harrow is the longest-running regular fixture at the MCC – it began in 1805, when Lord Byron played – and the first Oxbridge Varsity took place in 1827. The MCC apparently wants to “widen the number of people who get to play on the hallowed turf”, says Dollimore, enabling Lord’s to stage more finals of competitions at all levels, and freeing space for shortened versions of the game, such as The Hundred and Middlesex’s Twenty20 fixtures. Such arguments have gone down badly with many MCC members, who have “branded the move disappointing and saddening”.
Supporters of the change ask why people whose parents can afford to buy the privilege of an exclusive education should have an automatic right to play at Lord’s, but this misses the point, says
Simon Heffer in The Daily Telegraph. “Cricket has a culture and a history and Lord’s ground stands at the centre of both,” which is why potential MCC members are willing to wait for decades to join. Many current members are so angry at these moves, and at the fact that the numbers of days of cricket has shrunk from around 80 after World War II to just 57 today, that they are considering ending their membership.
Scrap the corporate events instead
If the MCC was genuinely making this move to increase opportunities for others, that would be one thing, says Harry Clynch in The Spectator. The reality, however, is that the MCC has “destroyed a much-loved tradition without bothering to think of something to replace it with” – no plans appear to be in place yet for new fixtures to replace the lost matches.
With signatures being collected, the issue looks far from settled, says Ivo Tennant in The Times. Opponents argue that if the MCC really wanted to increase opportunities it could eliminate the two days given to corporate sponsors, such as JPMorgan, which are “of no practical help to the standards of cricket”. Charges of being excessively woke have been dismissed by a member of the MCC committee, who adds that corporate sponsorship is part of the economic reality of the game. But it’s “hard to escape the conclusion”, says Clynch, that the change is a “vindictive move” on the part of the MCC to “bin an English cricketing tradition for no better reason than to distance” itself “from misplaced claims of elitism”. For shame.
“Cricket has a culture and a history and Lord’s ground stands at the centre of both”