Cheers and a few raised eyebrows

The decision by the International Cricket Council (ICC) to deny any parties in the USA a place at the ICC meeting at Lord's on June 24 raised quite a few eyebrows in US cricket circles - and several ragged cheers from the sidelines.

The ICC has also put the USA Cricket Association on notice that no further funds would be forthcoming after the ICC Trophy unless all disputes between it and the Council of League Presidents (CLP) were resolved to the satisfaction of all parties. The ICC did not specifically refer to the CLP by name, but since it had asked the CLP to provide information to justify its complaints against the USACA, there was no doubt who Malcolm Speed, the ICC's chief executive, was referring to.

Most CLP supporters were jubilant at ICC's decision. They had never expected the ICC to endorse the CLP as the representative body for US cricket - indeed, they would have been unprepared to take over management of all US cricket even if the opportunity had been handed to them on a silver platter. All they wanted was for ICC to deny Gladstone Dainty, the USACA president, and his baord the recognition and the status that came with representing the USA at the ICC conference, and the withholding of further funds beyond those required to finance the USA team in Ireland. This was precisely what ICC did in their letter of June 21.

The CLP is now proceeding with its plans for revising the USACA constitution, conducting free and fair elections for a new executive, and setting up a more efficient and democratic mode of governance for the USA. This is expected to take at least six months. With the ICC's letter strengthening its hand, the CLP feels it can now proceed with confidence, and it plans to move forward at its own tempo.

Opinions from the Dainty side of the aisle, on the other hand, were uncharacteristically subdued. There was a half-hearted attempt by a few Dainty supporters to call the ICC letter "no big deal", meaning that the ICC was still tiptoeing around the issues and leaving the current board in charge. As the full implications of Speed's letter began to sink in, these voices disappeared altogether.

There were some rumours that Dainty was planning to sue various bodies - some of the more far fetched ones mentioning the ICC as a target - but these stories, too, proved to be groundless. There was, of course, no reference to the ICC letter on the official USACA website.

The ICC has made it clear that it wants all disputes to be resolved before it resumes recognition and funding to the USA, and this is unlikely to be achieved in the law courts. That means that Dainty must find a more congenial way to bury all hatchets and bring all disputing parties to the same table; if he cannot or will not do that, his days of leadership of US cricket would seem to be numbered.

The biggest beneficiary of ICC's decision is Major League Cricket (MLC), which is proceeding on its own development plan and opening its program with the Chicago Under-15 Tournament in August 2005. In an earlier era, the ICC had rebuffed MLC's overtures with the comment that MLC needed to go through official channels such as the USACA. However, with no organization in the USA now enjoying official status, ICC staff are reported to have been looking at MLC in a decidedly more favorable light, and are quietly encouraging it to continue with its efforts.

By contrast, another major contender in the US cricket sweepstakes seems to have disappeared without a trace. Nothing has been heard from ProCricket in the past few months; their website hasn't been updated in ages, and messages and e-mails to Kal Patel, the organizer, go unanswered.

The reactions of US cricketers as a have been somewhat mixed, but more or less favorable to ICC. After the dramatic letter from Ehsan Mani and Speed detailing the deficiencies of USACA in terminating Project USA, many wondered why the ICC appeared to be letting the USACA off the hook. Some of these doubts, at least appeared to have been laid to rest with the ICC's latest stand. It may have been longer in coming than many had hoped, but the ICC has finally drawn the line just where most people wanted it, and that has drawn approval and even praise.

So 2005 is open season in US cricket, with no one group or organization enjoying the ICC's official stamp of approval, and all having an equal chance to prove their own worth. This may not be the best of all possible worlds, but it is better than the months of recrimination and chaos that have preceded it. If this competition proceeds in the right spirit, we may yet have a renaissance of sorts in US cricket, and the ICC should be getting the credit for bringing these circumstances about.