USA Cricket held its Annual General Meeting last Sunday. Hoo-boy. They somehow managed to be $658,000 in the red in administrative costs and lost about $400,000 on one series with Ireland in which only two T20s were played. Also in the past year, the Chairman resigned (forced out by two Board members who sued the Board), the CEO resigned (of his own volition, we think, and then they had to pay him $300,000 in previously unpaid bonuses), all the other independent Board members who were put in place when USA Cricket was certified by the ICC in 2017 are now gone, and USA Cricket is back to being run by a guy who once ran the the old de-certified national governing body USACA back in the 90’s and early 2000’s. So, basically, don’t expect Team USA in any non-USA hosted ICC events any time in the next 50 years. The 2024 T20 World Cup will be the last you ever see of them, most likely, unless the ICC manages to bribe, er, incentivize the IOC to stage cricket at the 2028 Olympics in LA.
On the field, the Men’s T20 World Cup starts tomorrow! Or whatever day it starts in Australia (Sunday, I think?). Namibia and Sri Lanka kick off the First Round, or mini-Eight, or whatever the tabs are calling it.
In an unfortunate bit of timing, the WBBL started yesterday. Opening wins were recorded by Hobart (Heather Graham, 17* off 15 and 3 wickets) over Sydney Thunder and Sydney Sixers (Ellyse Perry – no surprise – 55 off 48 and 2 wickets) over Brisbane.
New Zealand, Pakistan, and Bangladesh finished up a T20 tri-series in New Zealand today. New Zealand and Pakistan each went 3-1, losing only to each other, while Bangladesh was shut out.
England took both T20 matches from Australia that had a result in their series, which in no way was a preview for the T20 World Cup, I’m sure Australia will tell you. England opens up their official warm-up campaign against Pakistan on Tuesday local time, and Australia will have their first practice game with India on Monday local time.
Tell me about your countries’ hopeless cricket governing bodies in the comments! At least make something up to make me feel better.
