Cricket league?

The whole talk about franchise cricket is an interesting one. On one hand we have the Australian team – an unbeatable team – facing off against the rest of the world. The rest of the world is one and the same on the field – not much competition, little entertainment, and minimal flair. Australia is the opposite, but how long can Australia kick ass before not just the international audience wavers but Australians too.

Looking at domestic A.F.L. and N.R.L., and then abroad at the domestic football in England, N.F.L., the N.B.A., and baseball leagues in the United States, you find an unwaivering base of support where there are regular sellouts and massive dollars. Domestic cricket in Australia doesn’t come anywhere near this – however international cricket, in Australia, sometimes comes on par.

Look at the Ashes Tour just gone – sold out matches every time. The first three days were all gone months before the matches even were a week away. Why? Because there was hype and the prospect of competition and real matches. Let’s face it: There was a chance that the Australian team were playing someone of their calibre. Turns out they weren’t and support died off again. Just look at the turnout for the Sri Lanka matches.

So why can’t we imagine a two-tiered international ‘league’? First we divvy up the year into two seasons – an on- and an off-season. During the on-season we have cricket as normal – national teams touring other countries and playing that national team. Tests and O.D.I.’s. Don’t change it. But during the off-season we have a ‘free for all’. There are teams that can contract players from any country to make up squads of 12 – 15 cricketers that play a tournament through that off-season.

The off-season teams are privately funded. There could be rules and regulations to make things interesting – no more than x amount of players from any country (prevents nationalisation of teams and can make them appealing to all countries); can only have so many internationally contracted players (fosters domestic competitions around the world). There is no home ground for any team so that there is always going to be a match of this ‘league’ in your country soon. The format could be similar to a two-feed tournament; something like sixteen teams split into two matching up through stages to there are only two teams left. It might sound like the World Cup tournament – and that’s because the tournament isn’t that bad. It can be a fiasco, but it can be a good thing if reworked.

The off-season finishes and the players head back to their homes and you have a new situation on your hands. Now you have all your players back together after six months of separation representing your country, not just your league team. There are international matches, a chance for players to stand out and get picked come the next off-season and change the face of the tournament all over again.

Imagine a club that has Ricky Ponting, Andrew Flintoff, Chris Gale, Muttiah Muralitharan all in a team facing off against Graham Smith, Michael Hussey,Shahid Afridi, Adam Gilchrist. Not only is it a chance for Australians to play Australians, but to see anyone play anyone. That’s an exciting prospect in my opinion.

The things that stand in the way of this sort of system are many. One: National cricket organisations would be relinquishing a heck of a lot of their control over the sport in their countries. I say it’s about time, to be honest with you. Two: There will be questions about players being able to play for an entire year. In that case let both be optional, or enforce some sort of rest period through the year, or restrictions on serving consecutive seasons. There might be things standing in the way of this type of tournament, but they can be overcome if everyone came to the party.I doubt that the off-season would overtake the on-season in terms of popularity or following. Look at football around the world. Their World Cup and international matches are more popular than all domestic leagues. In fact, the domestic leagues make the international match ups even more important and exciting.

This is just an idea about cricket I’ve had for a little while, and has really formed itself with all the talk about franchise. And I, as a regular cricketing fan looking for good matches and the exciting atmosphere that is so elusive these days, would get right behind this sort of thing. And while competition between countries is lacking, maybe it needs to be between mixed-teams instead?

Thomas.

Question series

I quite enjoy those ice-breaker/team-building games that you regularly find yourself engaged in. One of my favourites is the deserted island game – name x amount of y objects you would have on the island. It’s silly when it’s a question that asks about survival items: matches, axes, tarps, etc. It gets real interesting when it’s movies, or books, or people, or things that only you can answer.

So, after trawling the Internet for a few of them, I’m going to progressively fill them out. Makes for conversation I guess, and blog posts. Here is the first one:

You’re stuck in a room with a television and a DVD player for the rest of your life. What three films would you have playing for all eternity?

My choices were as followed, and in no particular order:

• Donnie Darko – Perhaps I’d finally be able to figure out the answers to all of the questions I have about the film with all of the free time;

• Little Miss Sunshine – You have to include a comedy if for this scenario, and this was hilarious, as well as uplifting;

• The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring – Long, great, and interesting.

I didn’t think it would be smart to just pick my three favourite films because they are all pretty serious. Little Miss Sunshine brought the variety and laughs, Lord of the Rings the action and adventure, and Donnie Darko keeps you mind ticking.

Thomas.

Earliest memory meme

I shan’t be picking five bloggers to continue this thing. However, like last time, I invite anyone and everyone to comment here if they want to keep it going, or participate in this discussion (of sorts).From the big comments to the short, they are all most welcome.

The earliest clear memory I have is finding a shell in the backyard. Ok, not exactly interesting, so let me flesh it out. When I was a kid, and all the way through primary school, like most boys, I was fascinated with dinosaurs. I was confident that I would become a paleontologist and live all things prehistoric.

My mother is a keen gardener, and one day she had gone outside to do some planting in the garden – and I suspect I followed with my tools and toys to ‘help out’. It was a sunny day. I can remember digging around in the dirt of a flowerbed that ran across the back of the house, underneath a bush that has green and red leaves (pretty common, though I don’t know the name), and then hitting what I thought to be a rock. It is probably worth mentioning that I collected rocks for a good 16 years of my life. Whenever I went anywhere I took a rock away – from my grandparents house to Scotland. So finding a rock in the garden was more interesting than it would seem to any normal person.Then again, I would have been something like 3 at the time, so not really a normal person anyway.

I tried to dig around it (I treated it like a great find) and as I dug I began to realise that it wasn’t a rock, rather a shell. But not just any shell – a big shell. I’m no shell-ologist, and I don’t even know how to find a Wiki page that relates to this type of shell, so I can’t help you there. I know that I got really excited when I found it – living in south-west Sydney (or, in the way I visualised it then: a million miles away from water) I didn’t expect to find this shell. I pulled it out the ground, caked in dirt and what have you. My mother, responding to my glee, came over and suggested that we wash it up to see what it looks like. I think that some of my excitement rubbed off onto her – though maybe it was her maternal instincts and the chance to have one of ‘those moments’ with her son. You’d have to ask her.

We would have put it into an empty ice-cream container – I can’t say for sure, however, we had millions around the house back in the day. I do remember the whole process of putting it into water and swishing it around – going so far as to brushing off some of the now mud with a brush. Eventually it was clean and a beautiful shell. I felt something then that I would call a mix of pride and happiness. I had discovered a shell, treated it, and it was mine now.

Eventually, years down the track, we were building a new house, and when we were packing up our contents to move out for six months, it was suggested we throw out the shell. I immediately said no – almost protectively – and the shell stopped becoming something that was displayed around the house (as it had been all these years) to be my shell.

The story continues. When we moved into our new house, I decided that the shell deserved to be in the bathroom. It fitted with the whole design and what have you. Also, there were jars and pots of other shells – but none as big as the shell I had found. And that’s where it is now; in the bathroom, holding some plastic marine animals. Here’s a few photos of it, now, without the animals:

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One thing I used to do in the bath, which was very ‘relaxing’ was clean the shell. Years after it had all the dirt washed off, I eventually got it to look really good by using a toothbrush and ear swab. Unfortunately all the wetting and drying, and handling, took its toll and parts began to fall off. In those photos you can see that one end is rather jagged and doesn’t complete the circle. It used to be more full, but parts have crumbled and chipped off progressively. Also, some of the layers on the outside (the cover being the inside) have begun to flake off. A part came off when I picked it up for those photos even.

Anyway, that’s the whole story about my earliest memory and the shell. I suspect I’ve remembered that (and forgot 99% of the rest of my childhood) because I had a tangible item the whole time to touch and feel and help me remember finding it. I think I’ll always have that shell – I like it. It serves to remind me of a more simple time when I didn’t have to worry about things – no university or school, jobs or mundane tasks, when I could do things with my mother and when I was a good son.

Thomas.