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Each year
Wisden the oldest and most venerable of cricketing periodicals produce the
Wisden Cricketers' Almanack featuring the five Cricketers of the Year. This year Dubliner Eoin Morgan is one of them.
I wonder if this is embassassing for the International Cricket Council (ICC) who are having an excruciating time at the moment after deciding this week to exclude Ireland from playing in the 2015 World Cup.
What disappoints me the most is the seeming acceptability of devaluing cricket in Ireland. It seems acceptable to afford Ireland no possibility of playing Test cricket. It seems to be acceptable for the ICC to provide them with a tiny amount of funding (a lower per centage per player than any Test nation). It seems acceptable to "develop" Irish cricketers by letting them declare for England. Well I'll tell you it's bloody well not acceptable.
The status quo of cricket must change. I say fair play to Ed Joyce and Eoin Morgan for lining out for England and facing the best players in the world - but both of them would surely prefer to represent their our colours on the world stage.
Perhaps the greatest shame of all for cricket this year is the fact that Wisden's five Cricketer's of the Year are - for the first time since 1926 - in fact only four. Mohammad Amir, Pakistan's 18 year old lightening fast bowler, had been nominated for the award but could not be selected by Wisden in the light of a five year ban he received after a spot fixing scandal last year.
What would we do if Sachin wasn't around to pick up our spirits?
