The last 48 hours have turned into a nightmare for the England & WalesCricket Board
Martin Williamson04-Jun-2007
David Morgan: has discovered that cricket and politics do mix after all © ICC
The last 48 hours have turned into a nightmare for the England & WalesCricket Board. The one thing that the board wanted to avoid from the offwas a repeat of the near-farcical scenes which surrounded the boycottedmatch in Harare during the 2003 World Cup. But that is justwhat has happened.The sight of players wandering aimlessly around the team hotel aftertheir flight to Harare on Wednesday evening had been cancelled,as clueless as the accompanying media as to what was happening, andholding meetings to discuss their position, were almost a carbon copy ofwhat went on 19 months ago.But what was most galling was the supine approach of the ECB, and inparticular David Morgan, its chairman. After weathering flak for muchof the year over the trip, the Zimbabwean government’s decision to banjournalists gave the ECB the perfect escape route. The players didn’twant to go, the British public felt likewise (98% voted for the tour tobe scrapped in a BBC Radio poll on Wednesday) and at the 11th hourMorgan and his board were handed a get-out on a platter.Even the ICC, repeatedly cited by Morgan as the only reason England hadto tour, wavered and Ehsan Mani, its president, admitted that therewould be “a huge amount of sympathy for the ECB after the way thismatter has been handled by the Government of Zimbabwe.” It was the nearest thing to a green light for cancellation that England were likely to begiven. While the situation called for decisive leadership, what it gotwas feeble indecision. It was as if Morgan was the only person left whocontinued to believe that England would be punished if they refused totravel to Harare.Morgan blew it, and lost the respect of many of the players and, if hehad any left with them, the cricket-loving public in England. He alsomanaged to be outmanoueuvred by the Zimbabwe government, an organisationwith a track record of repeatedly scoring public-relations own goals.The concessions he won were not worth the cost.Had Morgan seized the opportunity and immediately said that the tour wasoff, the blame would have been heaped on the Zimbabwe government. Bytravelling to Harare and continuing discussions with his counterpartson the Zimbabwe board, he backed himself further into a dark and lonelycorner. If the Zimbabweans backed down, England had to tour; if theydidn’t, he was left looking foolish and the matter was still up in theair.On Thursday morning, his rhetoric grew even more feeble when he saidthat England’s tour would be cancelled unless “a significant number” ofthe journalists were admitted. What was never exactly a hardlinestrategy grew limper by the hour.And in meeting with Zimbabwe Cricket, Morgan did the one thing he alwaysmaintained was outside his remit. He played politics. The Zimbabweboard maintained all along that the decision to ban the journalists wastaken by the government and was outside its control. That didn’t stopMorgan’s venture into appeasement.Predictably, Morgan and his acolytes tried to pass off his efforts asa success during a press conference on Thursday night. The reality is that they represented little more thanshameless pandering to a corrupt and tyrannical regime.In today’s Guardian, Des Wilson, who argued against the tour fromwithin the ECB until he got fed up and resigned, said that the currentcrisis was as avoidable as it was inevitable. “[The ECB] had awell-argued and well-supported strategy for withdrawing from the tourpresented to it, and all it had to do was call the ICC’s bluff,” hewrote. “But,” he added, the problem was “a chairman whose main concernsseemed being re-elected for a second term and being acceptable at theinternational dinner table.”Events of the last day or so leave Morgan’s position highly vulnerableand his board widely discredited. When leadership was needed, he wassubmissive. His position as a credible figurehead for English cricketis in tatters. An increasingly isolated figure, and one with littlecredibility remaining, his days are surely numbered.Martin Williamson is managing editor of Wisden Cricinfo.