Wisden accuses England and Australia of pandering to India
The 162nd edition of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack has condemned England and Australia's acquiescence to India's 'monopoly' in 2024, the year the game 'gave up any claim to being properly administered' and the 'big three became the big one'.
The new edition of the Almanack, seen as a touchstone for the game, is published on Thursday and while it dishes out a series of high-profile awards, its editor's notes have taken aim at the game's administrators.
Lawrence Booth, the Almanack's editor, was critical of the game allowing Jay Shah, the secretary of the Board of Control of Cricket in India (BCCI) and son of Amit Shah, Narendra Modi's minister of home affairs, to slip seamlessly across to the top job at the International Cricket Council.
'The communal shrug confirmed a sorry truth: 2024 was the year cricket gave up any claim to being properly administered, with checks, balances, and governance for the many, not the few,' he writes. 'India already had the monopoly: now they had hotels on Park Lane and Mayfair.
'It is often said the ICC has become little more than an events company. The craven reorganisation of the Champions Trophy, with India's games moved at the 11th hour from Pakistan to the Gulf – three years after the schedule had been agreed by everyone, including Shah's BCCI – failed to clear even that low bar.
'England and Australia, the only other countries with a hint of clout, acquiesced with barely a squeak. Shah's coronation – uncontested, naturally – was in no small part a consequence of their refusal to hold India to account. A decade or so earlier, the talk had been of a Big Three takeover. Now, cricket has handed over the only key not already in India's possession. All hail the Big One.'
Booth describes the World Test Championship as a 'shambles masquerading as a showpiece', and an 'absurdity' because it is so difficult to follow. He described the race to this June's final at Lord's as 'a weird hybrid – like trying to choose between the winner of the 400-metre hurdles and the 100m sprint'.
'The ICC cannot allow the championship to continue as if designed on the back of a fag packet,' he writes. 'Double its length to four years, like football and rugby, and ensure the top nine in the rankings all play each other, home and away, over series of at least three Tests.
'As 2024 repeatedly reminded us, Test cricket is more competitive than proponents of a two-tier system believe. West Indies prevailed at the Gabba, Sri Lanka at the Oval. Bangladesh won in Pakistan, who came from behind to beat England, who won in New Zealand, who had just won 3-0 in India, who won the first Test in Australia, who won three of the next four. Early in 2025, West Indies squared a series in Pakistan. Unpredictability is the essence of sport.
'The response to all this must not be to insist on more, more, more – diluting the marquee series until they lose what makes them special. It must be to resist two divisions, and to invest in Test cricket everywhere, creating a more attractive proposition for the broadcasters. ICC insiders fear they will get nothing like their £2.4 billion TV deal that runs out in 2027, with potentially damaging consequences for many Test nations. It's in everyone's interests to share the love.'
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