US CRICKET

US Cricket and its Gordian knot

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Last year, tens of thousands of tickets were sold to watch ageing cricketers play on irregular sized outfields in baseball stadiums. © Cricbuzz

Cricket in the USA. Something that is so exciting to cricket's money men, you can imagine them day-dreaming about it while they are ordering an expenses paid dinner in a five star hotel. There is a massive cricket fan base made up of immigrants, and the children of immigrants, from cricket-loving countries that has the potential to turn cricket in America into a multi-billion dollar enterprise.

Perhaps no other place, other than India, could match what the USA could give cricket. Some would argue that the cash generating potential of cricket in the US could outstrip India and just keep going. As things stand, there is a market for the sport in the country, and that is off the back of people bringing a love of the sport with them when they made the USA their home. Imagine what could happen if Americans fell in love with cricket, like they have with "soccer".

There is a problem though. The organisation that has been in charge of running US cricket since the country was given Associate member status of the International Cricket Council (ICC) in 1965 has systematically failed to tap into this very obvious potential.

Last year, tens of thousands of tickets were sold to watch ageing cricketers play on irregular sized outfields in baseball stadiums. In 2016, the Caribbean Premier League (CPL) has had six regular season matches in Florida and the West Indies have played India in two Twenty20 Internationals. Now, that is great, but those things have happened while the USA Cricket Association (USACA) has been suspended from the ICC. It was the ICC itself that were the sanctioning authority for these matches.When USACA was given that suspension notice in June last year, it was the third time in 11 years that the ICC had taken this kind of action. The suspension wasn't a bolt out of the blue, the ICC had been concerned about the state of cricket in the USA for a long time, especially after the CEO, Darren Beazley, resigned just 13 months into a three year contract in March 2014.

Beazley's appointment was something the ICC had welcomed, an experienced sports administrator from Australia, he was considered to be the correct person to right the USACA ship. The suspension in June 2015 came after the then ICC Chairman, N Srinivasan, wrote to the USACA President, Gladstone Dainty, on 28 January 2015 to set out the ICC's concerns. The letter ran to 19 pages and gave USACA 39 different demands that needed actioning before USACA could be reinstated.

We are approaching two years since this long correspondence was sent and USACA does not appear any closer to reinstatement now than when Srinivasan wrote that letter.

And time is running out. The main demand from the ICC is that USACA implement a new constitution. This was something that Beazley was pushing for while he was still in post. He had commissioned an independent review of USACA's governance structures, details of which have been with the board since 2013. Chief amongst the recommendations was that 50% of the board are independent directors and that those that were elected into positions of power would only be able to serve for a limited period. USACA have until December 15, 2016, to ratify this new constitution. If they don't, they could face possible expulsion from the ICC at the AGM in June 2017.

USACA has struggled to hold together the cricket community in the USA. In the face of these administration failings, many of the cricket leagues that were once affiliated with USACA left the organisation and aligned themselves with the newly founded American Cricket Federation (ACF).

USACA has lost almost all the good will it once had. When any attempt to bring a semblance of professional governance has been made, it has been fiercely resisted. USACA has been losing the confidence of the leagues since at least 2005, something that brought about its first ICC suspension. Little has changed in approach or personnel since then.

In amongst all this administrative turmoil there has been, what appears to be, some good news. A company called Global Sports Ventures (GSV) has signed a licensing agreement with USACA for a professional T20 tournament based in the country in a deal that is said to be worth $70 million. Some of that money has already been used to give four US cricketers central contracts worth $48,000 a year. The issue is that with USACA currently suspended, any such tournament could be a non-sanctioned event.

Kenwyn Williams, the once Executive Secretary of USACA, and the man responsible for a 2012 Facebook meltdown which is still causing people to shake their heads, posted on his own Facebook page about the deal.

"Dainty recently signed a licensing agreement that has the potential worth of over $70 million dollars. There is just one small problem. The agreement has a 90 day due diligence clause that will terminate on December 29, 2016, if the ICC does not re-instate (sic) USACA as a member of the ICC.

"Money already spent on outlandish press events and national tournaments will mean that USACA will end up owing its kind investor 500K plus legal costs. Nothing new to USACA," Williams wrote.

A GSV Spokesperson, however, said that this isn't quite accurate. He confirmed that USACA have a year from the date of the signing of the agreement to sort out their issues with the ICC. If that deadline is not met, GSV can make a decision to extend this or not.

"Contrary to public understanding, we are not taking any sides in this nor are we interested in doing so. We will leave the politics to the politicians," the spokesperson said. "We are rather more keen on developing the sport by means of getting increased funding, awareness and professionalism into US cricket. We strongly believe US cricket should come together and like Mr. David Richardson, ICC CEO, was quoted as saying that everyone should unify under a single umbrella and we hold a similar belief."

USACA has been reluctant to give interviews or explain their thinking over the years, and where other associate boards have welcomed the chance to have any sort of coverage, those that run USA cricket have eschewed it.

Something seems to have changed in recent weeks. Their Twitter account has become active and said that it was open to answering any questions that people may have.

After a series of Twitter direct messages, a list of 13 questions were sent to USACA, and a comprehensive set of answers were provided. They run to some 11 pages and come from Shakeel Yusuf, the USACA treasurer. When asked why USACA were best placed to run cricket in the USA, Yusuf was keen to point out that in his view many of the issues were caused by the previous constitution that was imposed on USACA eight years ago.

"The various stakeholders that exist today were previously members of USACA and many of them have left as a result of the limited membership opportunities imposed on the US cricket community by the constitution under which USACA has operated for the last eight years. Consultants engaged by the ICC at USACA's cost, prepared that constitution. USACA's current, reduced and narrowed membership is a function of that ICC-generated constitution."

Yusuf went on to say that USACA's official policy is to welcome anyone into the fold if they are happy to adhere to its membership conditions and fees. He said that the 2014 constitution, that the ICC are still not happy with, was an attempt to address these administrative short-comings.

While Yusuf said that the USACA wanted to work with people to improve the state of cricket in America, they have not been fully engaged with the moves to bring together the US cricket community since their suspension. The ICC set up an advisory group to work through the issues. An ICC spokesperson confirmed that while USACA have an open invitation to attend these meetings, no one from the organisation has been at any of the three meetings that have taken place. They also said that the new constitution was not generated by the ICC, rather one that was proposed by the rest of the US cricket community in an attempt to unify the sport.

Yusuf said that USACA have worked through the 39 reinstatement conditions, and the further issues that the ICC raised after their suspension. The major sticking point for USACA is still that new constitution that the ICC are so insistent on. He said that the only condition that remains is that USACA accept what he described as the "ICC-authored constitution".

"There are ongoing discussions around it as some of the conditions set forth in them were not in complete accordance with the New York State Law for Not For Profit which USACA, as a New York registered entity, has to be in compliance with, something our lawyers pointed was illegal," Yusuf said.

When asked to comment on this, the ICC said that the constitution is not the only hurdle for USACA. "There remains still further information outstanding from USACA, which it has failed to provide since the date of suspension, and the ICC Board will need to consider whether USACA is capable of unifying the US cricket community," an ICC spokesperson said.

Furthermore, their spokesperson said that the ICC has taken independent legal advice on the matter of the constitution and it "completely rejects" the suggestion that any of what is being proposed is illegal in anyway. For them, the proposed constitution is "legally sound".

The other criticism that has been levelled at USACA is that their suspension coincided with cricket suddenly making a reappearance in the USA. After a four year absence of top level matches, once the ICC was overseeing cricket in USA, the Warne/Tendulkar games, the CPL matches and the West Indies vs India T20s all took place in quick succession. This seems to be great strides. Yusuf thought this is an unfair critique and that enough credit has been given to USACA for arranging international T20 matches featuring New Zealand in 2010 and 2012.

"You term it as great strides, please list the benefits for US cricket? Where has it taken our cricket? And how the money raised was used towards development of US Cricket? How much percentage of the money was spent towards travel of people coming from outside of the US?" Yusuf asked.

For Yusuf, not enough credit has been given to USACA for bringing the New Zealand matches to the USA. He said the USACA only changed $1 for the staging rights, which showed USACA's "true commitment to serving our community".

The way USACA has been run has been described by the ICC as "chaotic" in the past. Again, Yusuf felt this is an unfair characterisation of the organisation. He said the ICC has been described as elitist and that the "Big 3" have bullied smaller boards.

"ICC has not done anything dramatically and/or radically different than what USACA has done, except maybe have a better media outreach," he added.

The final question asked of Yusuf was why USACA should be trusted to move things forward, after all that has gone wrong why should those that care about cricket becoming a mainstay of the America sporting landscape put their faith in them.

Yusuf said that USACA is a volunteer-run organisation and it will take them time to professionalise from an administrative perspective. He felt that the deal with GSV with allow them to hire professionals to run the organisation for them."The sustained character assassination of all the people who are part of this organisation based on animosity towards certain individuals within the organisation hurts all of us in our personal and professional lives.

"Many people [accuse] USACA of being corrupt, yet ICC's CEO himself admitted of having looked deeply, and did not find any misdeeds and neither did anything show up in the IRS audit. Yet, for their own personal political ambitions individuals claim we are corrupt and engage in intellectual dishonesty."

Whatever the truth of the situation, we could be witnessing the final days of USACA being a significant force in US cricket. The ICC is not likely to back down on their insistence that the new constitution needs to be ratified.

"The new constitution has been shared with USACA and they have until 15 December to accept it," an ICC spokesperson confirmed.

USACA's third suspension in 11 years may have been the beginning of the end, if the new constitution is not adopted by 15 December 2016, it could be the end of the end.

Perhaps no other place, other than India, could match what the USA could give cricket ©Reuters

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