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"One has to start asking oneself is there a future if this happens?"
Well, as I've said in other threads, one has to ask that same question even if this proposal doesn't happen.
Let's look at the facts: SA, Pak, NZ and WI have all been playing Test cricket since the 1950s at the latest, NZ and SA well before that. None of these countries is even self-sufficient in cricket, let alone profitable. They get by only because:
1) The ICC gives them a share of its profits
2) England employ their players in the county championships
3) The IPL, Big Bash and CLT20 supplement national contracts by hiring overseas players
4) They can sell the rights to home series against Ind/Eng/Aus quite profitably.
Take away these sources of support/funding and they'd all go belly-up very quickly. If they haven't become financially viable in more than fifty years of Test status, just how much 'growth' has there been? And just how much longer must the world wait?
Yes, you can't have a 'global sport' that is dominated by only three teams. But neither can you have a 'global sport' in which only three teams are financially viable and the rest are all perennial charity cases.
The draft proposal might not solve that. But the status quo sure isn't solving it either. If the status quo (Plan A) isn't working, and the draft proposal Plan B won't work, then what Plan C do we have that WILL actually work? Or is that a trick question?
Well, as I've said in other threads, one has to ask that same question even if this proposal doesn't happen.
Let's look at the facts: SA, Pak, NZ and WI have all been playing Test cricket since the 1950s at the latest, NZ and SA well before that. None of these countries is even self-sufficient in cricket, let alone profitable. They get by only because:
1) The ICC gives them a share of its profits
2) England employ their players in the county championships
3) The IPL, Big Bash and CLT20 supplement national contracts by hiring overseas players
4) They can sell the rights to home series against Ind/Eng/Aus quite profitably.
Take away these sources of support/funding and they'd all go belly-up very quickly. If they haven't become financially viable in more than fifty years of Test status, just how much 'growth' has there been? And just how much longer must the world wait?
Yes, you can't have a 'global sport' that is dominated by only three teams. But neither can you have a 'global sport' in which only three teams are financially viable and the rest are all perennial charity cases.
The draft proposal might not solve that. But the status quo sure isn't solving it either. If the status quo (Plan A) isn't working, and the draft proposal Plan B won't work, then what Plan C do we have that WILL actually work? Or is that a trick question?
