CRICKET AUSTRALIA SHOW SOME SPIRIT
on January 2nd, 2008 at 5:09 pmAUSTRALIA’S cricket tour of Pakistan was thrown into further chaos last night after elections in the troubled country were postponed until the end of February.Australia are slated to leave for Pakistan in mid-March to play three Tests, five one-day internationals and a Twenty20 game, but that now seems out of the question.
Cricket Australia, the players union and security staff were due to complete their pre-tour inspection of safety and security measures in the first week of February. But it seems that Cricket Australia has already made their decision as in the past they have refused to play in Pakistan in less volatile conditions, they are just trying to avoid the heavy penalties imposed by ICC in the event they fail to tour.
The Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade last night continued to warn Australian travelers that “the security situation in Pakistan is very precarious and could deteriorate further”.
“We continue to receive a stream of credible reports indicating terrorists are in the advanced stages of planning attacks,” the report said.
Its true the conditions are Bad in Pakistan right now but they are quickly coming back to normal, and there has never been any threat to any player whatsoever, recently South Africa toured Pakistan, Australia A team toured Pakistan pretty much under the same conditions, the players were provided unprecedented security and all the games carried on smoothly.
Pakistan is not the only part in the world where these terrorist attacks are taking place or where the political situation is volatile, conditions have always been volatile in Srilanka, where the Tamil rebels carry out their attack on a routine basis, In India Riots, Bomb blasts, and random acts of terrorism happen quite often. In UK we had the 7/7 bombings and in the past the IRA used to carry out their attacks in UK on a routine basis, we have never heard of Cricket Australia taking security measures to this extent on those occasions.
If Australian team is not willing to come to Pakistan under the pretext of poor security conditions then Pakistan’s Government should take a strong stand on the issue and retaliate by ordering PCB to boycott all the matches with Australia in future unless they drop this policy of imposing invisible sanctions on Pakistan. In the past years other than Daniel pearl can somebody tell me how many foreigners have been attacked and killed in Pakistan. Maybe a few Chinese Engineers but their abduction and killing was targeted and was regionally motivated. Government of Pakistan should adopt a firm stance on this issue as the security conditions are bad in Pakistan because we are fighting their war in our homeland and paying the penalty. And these countries leave no chance to declare Pakistan unsafe for tourism, sports and Investment, if this is how we are going to be paid back then we might as well reconsider our policy of fighting their war.
Although the final decision has not been announced, but CA board is not expected to broach the issue until its next meeting in February. CA spokesman Peter Young last night said it was still too early to declare whether the tour would be scrapped.
“That (the elections) will go into the mix when we sit down at the end of January,” he said.
Young said CA had unsuccessfully been trying to contact Pakistan Cricket Board officials.
The series may now have to be played in a neutral venue, much to the PCB’s displeasure. The two nations played their 2002 series in the Sri Lankan capital of Colombo and Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates because of unrest in Pakistan, but the series was considered a failure because of poor crowds and a lack of general interest.The PCB is mindful of this happening again but Australian captain Ricky Ponting says staging the series outside Pakistan is better than not playing it at all.
“I’d like to be playing cricket at that stage, yeah,” Ponting said yesterday. “We haven’t played a lot of Test cricket against Pakistan in recent years so it would be nice. I would rather be playing than not.
If the tour is postponed, Australia’s top players would be free to play in the Indian Premier League and share in the Twenty20 riches which await. This is very interesting as even before the assassination of Benazir some of the Australian players were openly saying they don’t want to tour Pakistan.
Awas
Jeff lawson a week back gave a statement in an australian newspaper that the security conditions are very bad in Pakistan and he himself was debating whether to go back or not, I think PCB has pressurized him or reminded him of his job and got this statement out of him. Anyhow if the zimbabwe Tour goes on without any problem then it will become very difficult for CA to back out. ICC has chabged the rules if a country pulls out of a tour then they have to pay $ 1 mil in fines only if the govt of Australia sanctions their players from visiting Pakistan because of a adverse travel advisory in that case they might escape the penalties.
Lets wait and see what happens, I think CA will announce its decision before the Zimbabwe series completes.
Good to see at least Geoff Lawson has come out in support of Pakistan tour quite strongly. I hope his countrymen heed his advice and don’t chicken out.
I don’t know whether the violent scenes have really taken the hell out of Andrew Simons or whether he has got some other ulterior motives of playing in lucrative Indian League. Bret Lee is also happy serenading for Bollywood than playing cricket in Pakistan. With all the guarantees and assurances available, ICC needs to put its foot down and take strong action against Australia if it decides not to tour.
I knew violence would subside in a couple of days and that’s exactly what happened. Vast majority are fed up with shedding their lives for corrupt politicians, shut businesses and life at a standstill.
There should be no neutral venue, if I am not mistaken under the new rules cricket Australia will have to pay $ 1 million in fines if they fail to tour Pakistan.
I wish to add something to my earlier blog: Pakistan Government has provoked the Taleban and its allies and now the danger of retaliatory attacks on Australian Cricketers and hence the innocent spectators has not only increased but looks imminent.
Assalamualikum Brother Wasim Saqib and all the readers and bloggers. May this New Year bring peace and sanity to our beloved country Pakistan, Aamin.
My post earlier was in the interest of Pakistan’s cricket. If the PCB in their stupid way makes it a point of national pride and insist on having the tour or cancell it altogether, it will be the greatest folly and disaster in my humble view. Australia will have to assemble a second string eleven as most of the front-line players will refuse to tour or might even cancell the tour altogether citing security concern.
Lets face it. The situation is really bad and nobody can predict for sure what will prevail in two or three month’s time. By blaming Al-Qaida and Taleban for Benazir’s assasination, which everybody knows is not the case, the Government had made things difficult for the tour to go ahead. Now it has brought attention towards
the potential tourists as the Australian troops are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan and could be the obvious targets.
Furthermore, by agreeing to shift the series to Australia, both PCB and ACB will avoid financial losses which will defenitely incur in case of cancellation but above all not only the sixteen Ausssie players but sixteen thousands innocent Pakistani fans will lose their lives if God Forbid, the forces of evil succeeds in one of several matches available to them as targets.
On a purely sporting point of view, which is very dear to me is to get our budding new talents the chance to experience and excell the real test, what is called ” Baptism ” ? What other place than the hard, true and bouncy wickets of Australia where our new crop of fast bowlers, opening and middle-order batsmen and wicket -keeper would get invaluable practice and required mental toughness. As I understand, our next assignment is a tour of Australia in November/December, that means our boys will be facing the worlds top team twice within a year!!
Interesting article. I remember the Ashes tour was not cancelled because of the 7/7 bombings and amidst threats that the planes carrying the English and Australian teams would be blown up. And now they are going to cancel the tour to Pakistan, when there is no immediate threat to the players. So I think CA has decided that different standards apply to England and Pak.
The tours to India are not cancelled because the players would not want to miss the chance to appear in TV shows and act in commercials (as was seen when the Champions Trophy wasn’t cancelled after the 7/11 Mumbai train blasts). Even the SL tours (barring the SA one) aren’t cancelled. I don’t know whether it’s islamophobia or whether the players just think IPL is more important, but I don’t think the tour should get cancelled because of an assassination, esp. when tours to other countries weren’t cancelled because of similar reasons. I also agree that the PCB should boycott the Pak tours to Australia if such attitude of CA continues.
To me, it looks better to move the series to Australia rather than to scrap it. The security concerns of the Australians are genuine and well-founded. It will affect the performances of all the Aussie players who agrees to tour if the tour is forced upon.
The idea of neutral venue is impractical as was found out the last time around.
If the PCB and its incompetent Selection Commitee does its job honestly and selects only the deserving players keeping in view the future and induct enough talented youngsters and not submit to pressures, it will be a blessing in disguise.
Assamualaikum Wasim Saqib,
Australians should play and I agree with you that they have little if anything at all to fear in Pakistan. Whatever troubles Pakistan is experiencing these days, it is a political problem and it does not threaten cricket. Playing cricket is very important for our team because by playing the guys will learn. They will learn about commitment and professionalism.
Dr Haroon
Seattle