US Inter-state tournament unveiled

Following on from its Under-19 National Open Tournament in Chicago in August, Major League Cricket (MLC) has announced its plans for an inaugural Inter-State Cricket Cup for North America, to be launched in November 2005.

The plans are for a nationally organised tournament with representation from 16 US states and Canadian provinces. They will be competing on two levels - a Senior Division, and an Under-25 Division. Florida has been chosen as the location for the tournament, which is to be played from November 14 to 20, 2005.

MLC also announced that the former West Indian batsman, Desmond Haynes, has been appointed US National Coach, and will oversee the Inter-State Cricket Cup tournament as well as the future training of the select MLC US squads following the tournament.

Once the tournament is complete, MLC is planning to select two 25-member US squads, one each from the Senior and Under-25 Divisions. Coaches and managers will be selected to work with both squads to train the teams for regional and international competition. The Inter-State Cricket Cup competition will offer state-level players the opportunity to show off their abilities and potential. MLC believes that this display will provide tournament officials the criteria needed to accurately select - on two levels - future national USA cricket teams.

Bernard J Cameron, president and CEO of MLC noted that, as part of MLC's long-term initiative, the Inter-State Cricket Cup would be one of the main strategic anchoring mechanisms for the grass-roots development and growth of American cricket.

To promote and market this event, MLC Events, the programming and publicity arm of MLC, will wage a campaign for securing sponsors who would benefit by access to the estimated 6 million people belonging to the diverse cricket-loving community in the US.

MLC claims that, according to the KBS Media Guide, more than six million cricket fans reside in the United States and Canada, out of a global audience of over two billion. In addition, more than 50,000 of these enthusiasts actually play the sport in North America.

In the USA alone, there are more than 700 cricket teams. This makes the United States the ninth most-active cricket-playing country in the world, ahead of all except the top-tier Test-playing countries. Over 1.3 million Americans watched pay-per-view coverage of the 2003 Cricket World Cup, paying three times as much per viewer than their counterparts elsewhere in the world.

There has never been a sustained campaign launched in the USA to attract major sponsors for cricket in the USA. MLC has already set a good record for attracting sponsors to its National Open U-19 Championships in Chicago in August, and hopes to build on its achievements between now and November 2005.