West Indies’ Chris Gayle poses at the launch with 100 days to go until the start of the ICC Men’s T20 … [+]
On June 1, the United States and Canada will continue their 180-year-old cricket rivalry to open the T20 World Cup at the Grand Prairie Stadium in Texas. Just days after the IPL left the building with its six, counts of over 200 and soaring revenues, the internationalists gather again in their own countries to do it all again under their national flag. T20 is the abbreviated version of the game, but it has the brand value of a global cash cow.
What better place to bring this carnival than to the biggest sports market in the world. The USA co-hosts the event along with the West Indies and therefore did not have to go through any formal qualification process. This is quite useful as the country is currently ranked 19th in the T20 rankings, between Papua New Guinea and Oman, both among the 20 participating countries. The USA is just an associate member of the International Cricket Council and aims to change that by 2030. Winning games against high-level opposition is the only way to gain full member status and a more competitive team.
It’s a historic moment for a country that had cricket as its national pastime before the Civil War. By the early 20th century, the game was in decline in most states as baseball became “our game,” as Walt Whitman described it. However, the Gentlemen of Philadelphia continued to tour England, where Sir Plum Warner, a respected English cricketer, described America’s John Barton King as ‘one of the best bowlers of all time’. Even Sir Donald Bradman described ‘Bart’ as “America’s greatest cricket son”. Where are you, next generation hero?
With Major League Cricket still in its infancy, the T20 World Cup is yet another stepping stone to bring the sport back into the mainstream. The 15-player squad was announced late last week. It’s a fairly experienced group of thirty-something players who have either emigrated to the field of dreams or left the highly competitive world of South Asian domestic cricket. India and Pakistan are world-class opponents in Group A, so there will be plenty of memories and conversations to catch up on once the stumps are drawn. Or broken. Despite the recent 4-0 draw against Canada, the improvement in quality will be enormous.
There is one name that stands out from the 2015 ODI World Cup, when New Zealand lost to Australia in front of 100,000 spectators in Melbourne. Corey Anderson, who scored a duck in that match, has played 49 ODIs and 31 T20Is under the Kiwi flag and was a regular for the San Francisco Unicorns in the first edition of the MLC last summer. The 33-year-old made his debut for his new country in the T20 series against the Canadians in April and scored 28 and 55. His experience will be invaluable.
Captain Monank Patel is one of those rare breed of bowlers who leads the team and keeps wicket. The 31-year-old was born in Gujarat and was a former teammate of Axar Patel and Jasprit Bumrah, the leading wicket-taker in the current IPL. There is a strong Gujarati population in the United States, especially in New Jersey, where the captain emigrated permanently in 2016. “I never thought I didn’t belong here,” Patel commented in an interview with Crizbuzz. He is a man ready to stand his ground.
In 2018, Patel was largely on the sidelines but caught the eye with an 80-ball century at a selection camp held in Texas in 2018 to begin his international career. USA Cricket’s selection criteria were certainly controversial and a bit introspective. This prevented players like fast bowler Cameron Gannon, who is second only to Trent Boult in the 2023 MLC wickets column, from being considered.
The squad is full of players with history in the Caribbean Premier League, IPL or other franchises. Left-arm pacer Saurabh Netravalkar once captained India Under-19s in a team that included KL Rahul, while Milind Kumar played for Delhi Daredevils and Royal Challengers Bangalore.
The New York boy in the team is vice-captain Aaron Jones, who was born in Queens but grew up and played much of his early cricket in Barbados at youth and senior levels. Perhaps the most talented of the group, Steven Taylor, was born in Florida but made his Stars and Stripes debut at the age of 16 against his parents’ home country of Jamaica. Taylor scored the first T20 century by an American in 2013 and averages 40 with a strike rate of 147.
HARARE, ZIMBABWE – JULY 6: Aaron Jones of the USA takes a shot while Aryansh Sharma of the UAE continues during … [+]
Newly appointed coach Stuart Law is the kind of hard-nosed ex-Australian the team will need when the going gets tough. He has also led a nomadic existence, leaving his home country and becoming a British citizen just under two decades ago. He will be expected to serve this multi-generational, mixed-generation team, especially as Law has coached Sri Lanka, the West Indies and Bangladesh. The Americans will play the latter in the final friendlies before the real business begins.
In a recent poll, more than half of American cricket fans thought their team could lift the prize in Barbados on June 29. This is highly unlikely, but the path to becoming a force in the game has already begun.
