cricket with balls

When a cricketer walks down the wicket slogging in a crucial game there is a chance that if he misses it he will be out of this game, and perhaps out of the next one.

Cricket, and all sport, is tough like that.

You can be selected on performance, and de-selected on performance.

Cricket Administracrats do not have to worry about this.

They can fuck up for years without fear of demotion.

Even if their error has something to do with their side losing.

Look at the latest fuck up, Imran Tahir, the luscious leggie who is so cool we refuse to bag his alice band.  Mostly.

South Africa lucked into this world-class leg spinner because the dude loves to travel and found himself a wife in their country.

In April 09 he said he was qualified to play for South Africa.

No one questioned it.

Before that he had played in a Presidents XI match against Australia, so he was clearly a chance of international honours.

Then almost a year later he is supposedly qualified and gets picked for a squad when South Africa really need an attacking bowler to help them win, but instead they can’t pick him because he is not yet a permanent resident.  Surely something some official should have known before calling him into the squad.

If South Africa trusted that he was qualified in April 09, why did no one check then on the off chance he might be required?

At best it makes CSA look like a bunch of idiots who have shown that they don’t believe in their spinner but have no other player to replace him. At worst this could cost South Africa the series against England.

There is more though, because it seems that Tahir just doesn’t understand the rules, he thinks that he qualifies because it is four years since he played for Pakistan A, and now is only missing out because of paperwork.

That is not how the system works, as the Times points out (and I have read up on this boring shit before), you need to have lived in the country you wish to represent for at least 180 nights a year for four years.  The times doesn’t think Tahir has, and I have my doubts too.

While these errors were also Tahir’s, someone at CSA should have checked all this out at least two years ago when he was obviously trying to qualify.

And this isn’t some one off. Azeem Rafiq cost Yorkshire points when the played him when he didn’t have a UK passport. Darren “Eyelids” Pattinson played a couple of seasons for Victoria before playing for England, but technically he should have played all his games for Victoria as an overseas player before that, just no one noticed.  Surrey also did a great one when for the 08 season they tried to get Shoaib in for the last four games so they wouldn’t get relegated, by no one checked Shoaib’s visa so he only ended up arriving for the last two games.

Not that it mattered.  He looked shit anyway.

All of these, and there are probably heaps more, have either cost teams or could have cost teams on the field.

I wonder how many people were demoted or fired over it?

Ofcourse the ICC are experts at this kind of fuck up.  How often does an umpire or match referee get refused entry in a country due to visa problems?

But we know that no one gets fired from the ICC, how else would you explain Daryl Harper.

Has anyone even checked if Brendan Nash is Jamaican?  Or did he just rock up with a Marley T-shirt and say I’m one of you, gimme a game?

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