Ballance, Rankin Anglicised

[aydee]

Footnote - For the record, players switching nationalities is actually very common in football, particularly with Poles playing for Germany, and French-born players representing west and north African countries and vice versa.

The eligability rules in cricket are actually somewhat more stringent than they are for many other major team sports.

[foreignfield]

... to add my two cents' worth: Everything moves in circles.

15 years ago, with Australia on top of the world and English cricket in a mess, the same points were constantly raised as reasons for England's downfall: County cricket had too many foreigners (Kolpaks), hampering the blossoming of home-grown talent, international cricketers were using the Counties as an excellent finishing school ...

I think the point eugene made, before this discussion took off, was that the England cricket set-up (coaches, selection, central contracts ... everyone but KP pulling in one direction) has improved dramatically since the turn of the Millenium. It's been impressive.

[samedwards]

Footnote - For the record, players switching nationalities is actually very common in football, particularly with Poles playing for Germany, and French-born players representing west and north African countries and vice versa.

Yes, but the FIFA has stamped that out. You cannot represent two countries at the senior level in football. Going by that logic, Morgan and Rankin should not be playing for England, neither should Ronchi for NZ.

[Contra]

Players can and do represent two nations in football. If a player has represented one nation in a friendly he can then represent another; it's only if he's played a "competitive" match for one that it's difficult (but not completely outlawed) to play for another. There are several recent cases of this occurring, as well as players playing age group for one (or in one case, three) country and senior football for another. But as I said before, the way the international game works in the two sports is entirely different.

The fault here is not with English cricket but with the game on a far more global scale. The fact is that cricket is no longer an amateur sport, it's played by professionals who need to earn a living wage. The appeal of county cricket is that the facilities are good and the wages are guaranteed, so it's appealing to players from places where this isn't necessarily the case. If you consider the cases of World Series Cricket and the rebel tours, these weren't calculated attempts by players to betray their countries but about a fair day's pay for a fair day's work in an era when cricketers were paid exceptionally badly; this is the motivation of overseas-born county cricketers. There are a number of posts on here about mismanagement and pay disputes in Zimbabwe cricket, which is why players like Gary Ballance and Sean Ervine have opted for the relatively stable option of embarking on careers as county cricketers. As for Ireland, if they want to attain Full Member status from the ICC then they need to improve the domestic structure, not just because of ICC criteria but because they need to make playing in and for Ireland an attractive option for their professional players.

I know it's easy to make English cricket a scapegoat and a whipping boy for players switching countries, but they aren't at fault. If anything, situations like the one being discussed here are the fault of the countries whose players are leaving to play county cricket; partly because they might not provide their professional players with the opportunity to play the level they're capable of playing at, but mostly because they've failed to make playing professional cricket in those countries an attractive option from a financial standpoint.

[samedwards]

I know it's easy to make English cricket a scapegoat and a whipping boy for players switching countries, but they aren't at fault. If anything, situations like the one being discussed here are the fault of the countries whose players are leaving to play county cricket; partly because they might not provide their professional players with the opportunity to play the level they're capable of playing at, but mostly because they've failed to make playing professional cricket in those countries an attractive option from a financial standpoint.

And how are they supposed to make the game an attractive option from a financial standpoint when they get a pittance from the ICC and rarely get to play the big boys? If English cricket is really such a noble soul as to 'save' the players by providing better facilities and an opportunity to play Test cricket, the least they can do is have regular fixtures with their neighbours so as to help them improve and try to help in their bid to get Test status. But so far as indications go the only countries who have been trying to help Ireland in their bid to gain Test status include SA and Pak. The English cricket board is acting like the rich man from the Biblical story who owned a lot of sheep and cattle, but decided he wanted the poor man's lamb. He could have chosen any of his own sheep, but preferred the poor man's lamb, and now he is complaining that it was the poor man's fault that he could not keep it.

[Contra]

Ireland played as part of the English one-day competition on-and-off for quite some time, and withdrew of their own accord several years ago having been invited to take part again. England also play a regular ODI fixture against Ireland each summer, and teams that tour England frequently play in Ireland or Scotland also.

Nobody's saying that English cricket is a "noble soul", because that's not what it's doing. But likewise, it can't be made a pariah and accused of trying to deliberately cripple Irish cricket, because that's not what it's doing either. It is not the role of English cricket to help prop up Irish cricket, it's under no obligation to invite Ireland to play in the one-day competition or play matches against them. The role of English cricket is to first and foremost do what it sees as best for the English game, so to select a strong England international team and to provide the players contracted to counties with the means to play cricket. Selecting an Irish player isn't a conscious attempt at stealing a player from Ireland but at selecting what they believe to be the best team that's available to them.

Of course the ICC is at fault and needs to do more to promote cricket in Ireland, but the same could be said about all of the Associate nations. You can't blame the ECB or any other country's board for the actions of the ICC, and you can't throw around unsubstantiated allegations of a calculated attempt at damaging the game in another country because it's entirely unfair.

[jaybro]

No one is calling them cheats either contra Im just saying they're 1st class setup benefits from the points I out layed which for some reason you won't accept.I haven't once called them cheats or said they were cheating , I know there are plenty of players in County cricket that represent other nations but there are alot of players forced to choose between the two which I don't like the whole reason we love cricket is because it's an international sport and we love watching players represent their Country and flag but wouldn't we all rather see more competetive nations ?? Imagine how much better Ireland would be if Morgan and rankin were still there ??? And I'll ask you as a staunch English supporter wouldn't you rather see a team full of English born players ( including players born in England with foreign heritage e.g. Patel, Panesar etc. ) instead of all these blow ins ???

Australia is much like England having a diveresly Multi-cultural population and Im proud to see Khawaja and Gurindu Singh doing well for Aus but if we were to get some bloke from South Africa who has only lived here for 3 years I would not be impressed. We are having this problem in the NRL here in Australia with the games biggest stage State of Origin, all these young Kiwi's and polynesian players want to play origin even though they haven't lived here for that long it takes away from what made the game so special ...... Some of these guys won't even sing the National Anthem prior to the game.

[eugene]

A healthy England is good for cricket, we need someone who can stand in the way to the BCCI.

[Contra]

Of course we'd all rather see the Associate nations performing at a higher level, but as I said before, this is not the fault of the ECB who are under no obligation to aid Associate nations. The prevalence of European Associate cricketers and other overseas-born players is purely circumstantial; a result of waves of immigration to the country, players holding dual nationality or holding a passport from an EU member state and thus being covered by the Kolpak ruling. The reason one or two players were asked - rather than forced - to make a choice was because the counties are their employers, and they want their players to be performing to their full potential. Any other employer would be reluctant to employ someone whose ability to do their job might be compromised.

As an England supporter, I want England to field the best possible team available to them in order to win matches. The players fielded by England have all lived and played in England for significant lengths of time and are residents of the UK, so for all intents and purposes they're English. Where they were born is completely arbitrary, provided they're eligible to play for England and do what they're paid to do. Jonathan Trott, Kevin Pietersen and Matt Prior (all lifelong British passport holders) could sing "Nkosi Sikelel iAfrika" before the matches for all I care, as long as they perform when it matters. The fact is that today, with migration more common than before and sports being professional rather than amateur, players will represent countries they weren't born in and it will continue to occur. So you can be angry about something that you can't change and isn't actually all that important, or you can accept it as a facet of modern sports and just enjoy the game.

[jaybro]

So you don't care where the players come from as long as England wins ??? Fair enough that's your opinion, I don't agree and would be disappointed if Australia were to employ the same recruiting tatics.

I do realise migration is part of the world today and sport, but I think there should be no changing alligances once you represent a nation at U19's level you should be locked in, once players start playing for two different Countries it takes away some of the prestige of International sport.