What would you think of a person who condemns IPL and in the same breath reveal plans to do the same in the guise of strengthening domestic cricket? For starters, I would call him a hypocrite and among other choice epithets I would also call him a rabble rouser. In an interview to Sky Sports 1 England and Wales Cricket Board Chairman Giles Clarke has done just that.
In that interview he condemns ‘rouge leagues’ in no uncertain terms and assures that such leagues have no place in England. However he lays bare his hypocrisy when he elaborates on his plans for strengthening England’s domestic Twenty20 league.
Clarke says he is keen to revamp England's own domestic Twenty20 competition in order to compete with its Indian counterpart.
He is prepared to adopt a similar policy of recruiting top overseas stars, though is determined the majority of each team must remain England-qualified.
In essence what he says is that when BCCI conducts a Twenty20 tournament with overseas players then he sees it as rape and pillage of cricket and positions IPL as evil. However, when ECB proposes to do the same, others should see it as an attempt at revamping England’s domestic cricket.
In this case signing overseas cricket stars is benign, but when BCCI signs overseas stars for their domestic tournament (IPL) then it is malignant. If this isn’t the classic double speak then what is it? Undoubtedly, Giles Clarke is a hypocrite par excellence.
No comments:
Post a Comment