ECB can afford to play the waiting game
Officials from the England & Wales Cricket Board will meet with their Zimbabwean counterparts at Lord's on Tuesday to discuss the prospects of this November's tour of Zimbabwe by England going ahead
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As recently as last week it appeared that all the pressure was on England. The International Cricket Council had come out firmly on the side of the trip going ahead, and the swingeing financial penalties hanging over the ECB had persuaded it of the need to reassess its moral stance. Peter Chingoka, the ZCU's chairman, probably expected to arrive at Lord's holding all the aces. Instead, he will sit down with what is increasingly looking like a busted flush.
The chaos which followed Heath Streak's sacking, and the subsequent thinly-disguised purge of the vast majority of white players, has led to widespread international condemnation of the ZCU. Only those with financial or political agendas maintain the increasingly far-fetched claim that all is well with cricket in Zimbabwe. And the position of the discredited ZCU, clearly controlled by political factions, is only likely to get worse.
Remarkably, the ECB is now in the driving seat and can afford to sit back and play the waiting game. Although the ICC and some of its more politicised members are keen for a decision, there is no obligation on the ECB to make one in the near future. The penalties were it to announce the tour was off would be draconian, and so it can argue that it is monitoring the situation, consulting with its players ... and do absolutely nothing. It has said that no decision is likely before June, and even then it is under no obligation to come out one way or the other.
Were Zimbabwe's forthcoming series against Sri Lanka and Australia to prove farcically one-sided, as they might well do given the side named last week, then the ICC might be forced to act to preserve the credibility of the international game. Allowing a politically-cleansed side to play is one thing, but when they are no better than a poor club XI it's another altogether.
David Morgan, the ECB's chairman, will sit down with Chingoka and his hardline sidekick Ozias Bvute tomorrow for what will undoubtedly be a cordial but utterly pointless meeting. Morgan knows that the tide is turning, and that in another two months the actions of the ZCU might have delivered England from a potential disaster.
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