What wrong did ECB & Giles Clarke do?

ECB and Giles Clarke have been pillored a lot in last few days due to their decision of aligning with Stanford for sponsorship and generating cash for english cricket. I do not understand why are they being treated in this way. Clarke and ECB did what they thought was an excellent way of generating cash for players and board and also help in revival of WI Cricket. Any person in their capacity would have loved this idea. A few days effort every year which would make them richer by $3.5 m and give English players a strong chance to become millionaires. They would have been fools to reject such an offer. Why do people expect them to verify Stanford's credentials? They are in no position to validate Stanford's accounts and check if he is a fraud. This is something that SEC or similar organizations need to do and none of them had raised any red flag at Stanford when this deal was made. ECB even added clauses in their contract with Stanford which gave them "get out" options in case they cannot continue to handle this type of exigency. So, In my opinion, they did no wrong and this move would have been hailed as a master stroke had English players not made a mockery of themselves on Nov 1 against Stanford XI.

I do understand that they were trying to get even with BCCI and also trying to prevent English players from participating in IPL - this motive is something that I do not agree with and this was probably only fault that Clarke's and ECB's thinking had while signing up with Stanford.

Twenty20 for 20

The last week's events in Antigua culminating in Superstars' win can be summed up as Allen Stanford's show from start to finish. He looked like the master of all he surveyed. He ensured that batsmen played with black bats, had full access to players dressing room and also had WAGs for company.


See this story in The Sun - http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/sport/cricket/article1864808.ece
He literally had English cricket in his lap :) (pun intended).


The whole event was nothing more than a publicity gimmick for him and he got better returns than he expected. Yes, he invested $20m into this but in my opinion, he got better returns than he or anyone else anticipated.


The kind of publicity that he got through this event would be worth much more than he spent. The result of the match (Superstars bt England in a one-sided encounter) would give everyone in WI a false hope of WI's cricket revival. Even sane people will forget that winning a match classified as exhibition does not make WI team a good team, leave alone great. But Stanford's spin-doctors would ensure that people in Antigua see him as a philanthropist who revived WI cricket. People will start comparing this result with drubbing that WI teams of 80s used to give England in their heydays.


It is ECB and english cricket which seem to have lost out from the drama of last week. In terms of quality of cricket, it was a pathetic display from English side who seem to be thinking more about how to spend the winner's cheque or how to behave after they have won. Giles Clarke used to call himself as champion of Test cricket, now he has no place to hide. English cricketers have emerged as money-hungry and whining sportsmen. They were seen as a side on upswing during their last series against SA but played as a club side during the match.

After watching this show, I fail to understand why does ECB has issues with its players playing in IPL? If they can play 20-20 in WI for a large amount of money, then can do the same in India as well.

I have been reading articles about BCCI becoming dominant body in ICC and trying to bully other cricket boards using their financial muscle. In this case, Stanford used his financial muscle to make ECB swallow its pride and made them and english cricketers a laughing stock. Not sure if the whole thing is worth it.