The Shorter Wisden 2013

by John Wisden

  Shivnarine Chanderpaul kept churning out runs, as he had for most of his 18 years as West Indies’ impenetrable wall. No longer burdened with the white-ball game, he gathered 987 runs in nine Tests, regaining his No. 1 spot in the ICC rankings, before yielding to the comet that was Michael Clarke.

  Captain Darren Sammy and wicketkeeper Denesh Ramdin, both under constant public scrutiny, produced timely hundreds down the order. Sammy’s, at Nottingham, was his first in Tests, and his role as player and leader – especially at the World Twenty20 – earned him new respect. Centuries for Ramdin at Edgbaston and Mirpur settled his tenuous position for the time being.

  Chanderpaul, 38 at year’s end, was the oldest contemporary Test player bar Sachin Tendulkar. Gayle was 33, Samuels 31, Sammy and Ramdin both in their late twenties. So the development of younger players was of more relevance to the future direction of West Indies cricket. Kieran Powell, a tall, stylish left-handed opener, finally realised the value of scores in three figures rather than two, and was carried along to his maiden Test hundred in the slipstream of Gayle’s 150 against New Zealand in Antigua; two matches later in Bangladesh, Powell joined the elite company of Headley, Weekes, Walcott, Sobers, Kanhai, Rowe, Greenidge and Lara as the only West Indians to score hundreds in each innings of a Test. The batting is likely to revolve around him and the equally elegant Darren Bravo, 23, for some time. Ramnaresh Sarwan – alienated under coach Ottis Gibson – was finally chosen again for the one-day series in Australia in February 2013, but not before he had successfully sued the WICB for $161,000 over comments they had made about his fitness.

  As it has been from the beginning, the heart of the West Indian bowling – in Tests at least – was pace, and Kemar Roach was its spearhead. He took 39 wickets in seven Tests, before a knee injury eliminated him from the Bangladesh series; among those to take 20 wickets in 2012, only Saeed Ajmal and Vernon Philander had a lower average than Roach’s 22.

  In his absence, Tino Best and Fidel Edwards were the match-winners in Bangladesh, despite the lifeless surfaces. Best, as much as Samuels, was the comeback story of the year. Aged 31, and with 28 expensive wickets in 14 erratic Tests between 2003 and 2009, he had appeared finished. Still fit and fast, however, he now applied accuracy to claim 18 more in four Tests, though his electrifying 95 at Edgbaston, a record for a Test No. 11, gave him as much satisfaction.

  The WICB’s decision to replace two home Tests against Sri Lanka in May 2013 with a later triangular tournament also involving India (to accommodate the IPL) was an indication that, like others, they had been seduced by Twenty20. Sammy was among those who regarded it as a flawed philosophy. “The T20 win doesn’t mean West Indies is back on top,” he cautioned. “We have to beat Australia, England and South Africa [in Tests]. Once we start doing that consistently, the team will be heading in the right direction.” For all Hunte’s confidence, that still seemed a long way off.

  ZIMBABWE CRICKET, 2012

  A fork in the road

  MEHLULI SIBANDA

  Zimbabwe cricket was mired in stagnation. Not only did the national team play a paltry eight international matches in all formats, they lost them all too. To demonstrate how far their stock had fallen, they hosted no international fixtures in 2012, except for an unofficial triangular series featuring South Africa and Bangladesh in July, which at least ended in a surprise victory for the home side, spurred on by the batting of Hamilton Masakadza.

  Zimbabwe were clearly stuck in limbo between the more powerful Full Members, who were reluctant to engage them in lengthy series, and the Associates, who would provide more frequent opposition – but at a price, both financially and in terms of the quality of cricket. Due to the cost required to set up the domestic franchise system in 2009, Zimbabwe Cricket were believed to have built up debts of around US$18m, which made the $1.5m awarded to them as part of the ICC’s Targeted Assistance and Performance Programme over the next three years look like a drop in the ocean.

  In January, Zimbabwe had undertaken their first tour of New Zealand for 11 years. It was a chastening experience in often cold conditions, and they were beaten in all six internationals by a team not exactly long on confidence themselves. The solitary Test at Napier was a dismemberment: Zimbabwe were underpowered with the ball, then dismissed twice in a day to lose by an innings and 301 runs – the heaviest defeat in their Test history. More bruisings followed in the one-day series, but Zimbabwe did show some fight in the two Twenty20 games, taking the second down to the last over.

  With another seven months before the World Twenty20, Zimbabwe were in desperate need of practice in the format, so their board conceived a triangular tournament in Harare, to which Bangladesh and South Africa sent young teams. Each side won two games in the group stage, but Zimbabwe sneaked past Bangladesh on net run-rate, then thumped South Africa in the final. When captain Brendan Taylor pulled the four that confirmed a rare (if unofficial) victory over their neighbours, an exuberant crowd starved of top-class cricket invaded the pitch and mobbed the players. Masakadza, who put on 118 with Taylor in the final, led the scoring charts, with 267 runs in five innings – but, sadly for him, they did not count in the Twenty20 international records.

  In June, Ozias Bvute resigned as Zimbabwe Cricket’s managing director, and was replaced by his deputy, Wilfred Mukondiwa. The debate will rage on as to whether Bvute was good for the game. Bvute, who took over in 2004, will probably always be remembered as the man whose hardline stance led to the mass exodus of senior players following the sacking that year of captain Heath Streak. That sad episode led to Zimbabwe eventually withdrawing from Test cricket in 2006, after a string of disastrous results. Bvute remained connected to the commercial arm of the board in a consultancy role.

  Zimbabwe were too often let down by short-sighted administrative decisions, and the six weeks they spent preparing in Sri Lanka for the World Twenty20 included only two warm-up matches against other nations. With such shoddy arrangements, it was no surprise when they were thrashed by both Sri Lanka and South Africa – bowing out of the tournament before five other teams had even taken the field.

  Tatenda Taibu had long been a devout Christian – banning television from his house, and holding Bible sessions with his family – and in July he quit cricket to devote his life to the church. “When I was growing up I used to think that success meant having money, a good wife and family, but that is wrong,” he said. “I was the first black captain in the country, the youngest Test captain in the history of the sport, and also the first local player to score two centuries against South Africa, but that was not enough. I have achieved everything in life, but one thing I am trying to achieve is the salvation of my soul.”

  Taibu walked away from the game at 29, usually the age when batsmen are reaching their prime. It was not the first time he had done so. In 2006, he quit Zimbabwe with the intention of qualifying for South Africa, only to return the following year. But he remained frustrated by the way cricket was being run: on the eve of Zimbabwe’s Test return in August 2011, Taibu had spoken out against the ZC leadership for their tardiness in paying players – a practice which persisted into 2012. With age on his side, there was still hope that Taibu might reconsider his decision.

  In November, head coach Alan Butcher signalled he would not be seeking a renewal of his contract beyond April 2013, as his family were not prepared to relocate from England. It meant his last assignment would be Zimbabwe’s tour of the West Indies in February and March. Butcher was at pains to point out that the Bridgetown Test would be their first for more than a year. He had turned them into a competitive unit at home, but results abroad remained worrying. And though he gave his all to the role, he was often let down by the decision-makers above him.

  CRICKET IN AFGHANISTAN, 2012

  Step by step

  SHAHID HASHMI

  Slowly but surely, Afghanistan’s cricketing infrastructure began to catch up with the success of their national team – bringing Associate membership of the ICC into vie
w. Afghanistan have won the hearts of many for their rapid rise through the World Cricket League, culminating in the grant of one-day international status in 2009, so the rubber-stamping of their application – promoted by the Asian Cricket Council – should be a formality at the ICC’s annual board meeting in June 2013.

  “The most significant decision at this year’s ACC AGM was to substantiate the claim of Afghanistan to be an Associate Member of the ICC,” said ACC chief executive Ashraful Haque in September. “Afghanistan have been the strongest side among the Affiliate Members, so we are backing them for promotion.” Vanuatu were the last country to be elevated from Affiliate to Associate membership, in 2009.

  It was a surprise to many that it had taken so long. Privately, the ICC expressed mild irritation over Afghanistan’s previous lack of interest, as they had been the second-strongest non-Test nation – certainly in Twenty20 – for a few years. They had been one win away from qualifying for the 2011 World Cup (a tortuous journey memorably documented in the film Out of the Ashes), and made it to the 2010 and 2012 World Twenty20 tournaments where, despite losing twice on both occasions, their lively approach suggested they could, in time, become a force with a little more discipline. Defeats by India and England in the 2012 competition betrayed their artlessness against quality spin.

  A major prerequisite of Associate status, however, is the active promotion of women’s cricket – and the Afghanistan Cricket Board faced accusations of being slow to support those who play and promote the women’s game, despite risks to their safety. In January 2013, the Afghan women’s team were prevented from travelling to Thailand for what would have been their first official tournament, the ACC Women’s T20 Championship, for “political reasons”.

  In 2012, Pakistan and Australia became the first Full Members to play the men’s team in one-day internationals – at Afghanistan’s surrogate home in Sharjah. Afghanistan lost both games, but beat Trinidad & Tobago and Barbados to win a quadrangular tournament (also involving a Bangladesh XI) in Port-of-Spain, which acted as practice for the World Twenty20. Afghanistan had serious ground to make up in the race for the 2015 World Cup: failure to finish in the top two of the 50-over World Cricket League Championship in 2013 would leave them having to attend a second qualifying event, in New Zealand in 2014, to try to claim one of the last two spots available.

  Although the UAE remained the logical home for Afghanistan’s international fixtures, in January 2013 the ACB announced a long-term desire to base their elite training in Pakistan – a country with which they share much more than a border. The national squad underwent a four-week conditioning camp at Lahore’s National Academy ahead of matches against Scotland in the UAE in March; the ACB and the Pakistan Cricket Board also announced they had struck a “verbal agreement” over a long-term development programme. An obvious drawback, however, was the continued reluctance of other international teams to tour Pakistan.

  “Sharjah gave us basic facilities, but unfortunately we didn’t find quality cricket to develop with,” said Kabir Khan, the Afghanistan coach and a former Pakistan player. “The cost of being in Sharjah is a lot more than here in Pakistan. We are in the process of building our infrastructure [in Afghanistan] and have two stadiums as well. But while we have academies, we don’t have specialised coaches. In Pakistan we can find the quality coaches and quality teams to play against.” Meanwhile, the best Afghan players found themselves picked up by franchises in the Bangladesh Premier League.

  The ACB made major changes to their set-up in 2012. Shahzada Masoud, previously the board president, took over as chairman from Omar Zakhilwal in October, who was busy as finance minister in Hamid Karzai’s government (two months earlier, Zakhilwal had been forced to deny corruption charges linked to Karzai’s 2009 re-election campaign). Masoud remains an advisor to the government on tribal affairs.

  The Afghan government have spent heavily to develop the two existing international-standard stadiums, in Kabul and Jalalabad, while the ACB are determined to complete three more grounds over the next two years, with plans afoot for academies too. They also hope to found a Twenty20 league, possibly in 2014.

  WOMEN’S CRICKET IN AFGHANISTAN

  Headscarved heroines

  TIM WIGMORE

  Afghanistan’s cricketers have enthralled sporting romantics for a few years now. But the country is host to more than one team: the other team play in scarves, long and baggy trousers and shirts, and yearn for the opportunities afforded to the men.

  The story of Afghan women’s cricket begins with one family. The four Barakzai sisters learned cricket when they fled Taliban rule in 1999 and became refugees in Pakistan. Returning home ten years later, the sisters – led by Diana, who is now 24 – tried to encourage others to take up the sport. In October 2011, they all completed ICC coaching courses at a camp held jointly by the charity Afghan Connection and the MCC Foundation. They have become mainstays of the fledgling Afghan women’s squad. As Diana stresses, none of this would have been possible without her father and brother, “who have always been supportive to us, always teaching us about cricket”. It was her father Mohammad Naeem Barakzai’s decision to convert a plot of land at his old house near Kabul into a cricket pitch that has provided the women’s squad with somewhere safe to play.

  “Playing cricket for a girl was not less than suicide, but my spirit, and the strong support of my family, encouraged me not to stop my activities,” says Diana, who bemoans “community negative attitudes and lack of fundraising resources”. As the Afghanistan Cricket Board’s first female development officer, she hopes to improve the situation. Raees Ahmadzai, the former Afghanistan captain and now head of the Afghan Youth Cricket Support Organisation, says there are “no proper venues for women’s cricket”, and “the girls will not feel happy to play in front of men”. As a result, women have used basketball courts and even the old National Stadium, scene of executions under the Taliban.

  So, exactly how far has women’s cricket come? Official figures show there are almost 4,000 registered female players in Afghanistan, 700 of them disabled. In October 2012, an eight-team tournament was held between school teams. But the majority of registered cricketers have the opportunity to play for only a few days a year, and some do not even tell their families. Women’s cricket is a regular occurrence in only four of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces, invariably the more westernised areas. Many Afghans who cheered the success of the men’s side feel differently about the women.

  Unsurprisingly, then, Afghanistan have yet to play an official international women’s game, despite several attempts – although they did travel to Tajikistan in July 2012 for an unofficial three-match 25-over series, and won 2–1. Most recently, in January 2013, they were on the verge of taking part in the Asian Cricket Council Women’s T20 Championship in Thailand. ACB chief executive Noor Mohammad Murad admitted “political reasons” lay behind the withdrawal, and said: “It needs long-term planning, including clear strategy to convey the message to the community that we will strictly follow up all religious rules for women cricket.”

  The circumstances of these cancellations have prompted some to question the extent of the board’s commitment to women’s cricket. One prominent figure in Afghan cricket, speaking anonymously, said the board “were arranging a day or two of cricket camps for the ladies, just to show the media they are working with Afghan girls to learn cricket”. The source also claimed the ACB “wanted a women’s department just as a symbolic thing to show to the ICC”; the ICC have declined to comment. As the ACB bid for Associate status, a women’s set-up is one requirement. As more money is invested in Afghan cricket, it must be supported by deed as well as word.

  There is no shortage of willing contributors. UNICEF hosted a camp for 140 in Jalalabad in 2010, and the Swedish Committee for Afghanistan – yes, really – have also helped Afghan Connection and MCC to build cricket pitches in schools.

  Afghan Connection have been particularly significant. Working closely with MCC and a r
ange of charities, including Cricket for Change, they have held camps and allowed girls the chance to play at school. In 2012 alone, they were responsible for building pitches for 16,000 children in ten schools although, given the difficulty of finding locations that can provide the necessary security for girls, these will primarily benefit boys. In recognition of her achievements, Afghan Connection founder and chief executive Sarah Fane was elected an honorary life member of MCC.

  Fane emphasises the “massive progress” women’s cricket has made, and the “incredible talent” of many who play it. Yet she is also realistic about the need for camps to be conducted in “a culturally sensitive way”. She says: “We do them only in the big cities. We make sure we get parental consent, and we do them in girls’ schools behind a wall so they all feel secure.” Above all she wants to guard against repercussions. “If we suddenly did a cricket camp for girls in a conservative area, there’d be such a backlash against them and against us – so we’re moving very slowly with girls.” Nevertheless, some cricketers have been labelled prostitutes for having the temerity to play the game.