Sweeping changes underway in USA

The newly elected USA Cricket Association board has covered more ground within its first two weeks of operation than any previous administration has achieved in a year. If it is able to keep up this blistering place, it is likely to set an admin record, and give US cricketers a great deal to think about.

The primary reason for the change of pace is that the board is now being driven by its stakeholders. Most previous bodies have functioned as secretive cabals, staying out of public view and communicating with the public only when forced to do so by external events.

The new board has the Council of League Presidents (CLP) to deal with. The CLP is an organization that has so far existed only on paper but is reconstituting itself as an active body with its own agenda, policy goals and demands to make of the executive. They are, in effect, the field generals of US cricket, who have now convinced themselves that their active participation in USACA affairs. It's involvement is now the only thing that will save US cricket from stagnating in the doldrums. The good thing is that the new board is working closely with the CLP, and is fully responsive to its concerns.

In the last fortnight, the USACA board has achieved the following:-

Co-signed and approved the CLP resolution of "no-confidence" in Gladstone Dainty [USACA president] and his associates, and set a fast-track process in motion to appoint a new executive team in four weeks

Took over the operations of the USACA website and exempted the webmaster from direct control over all content and formats

Formally requested the ICC to cease funding USACA until the new executive team was in place

Proceeded to appoint a new selection committee for the USACA, stipulating that no board members should be on it or on USA teams in order to avoid conflicts of interest (the old board had allowed two of its members to play or staff previous USA teams)

Formally requested the treasurer to submit detailed accounts for the past year, and make the records available for scrutiny, setting a short deadline for compliance

Called for an Extraordinary General Meeting of the USACA on June 4, the earliest feasible time that such a meeting could be held within the USACA constitution, to amend its articles and by-laws and provide greater accountability of the USACA executive and board to the US cricketing public

So far, beyond a veiled threat to take legal action against the new executive, very little has been heard from Dainty. It is known that his alternative board met on April 9, but there have been no announcements or press releases, only rumours about what was discussed or decided.

It seems that the procedures and practices executed by the old executive are becoming a serious hindrance to Dainty's efforts to retain control of US cricket. The super-secret proceedings, a refusal to acknowledge, let alone respond to, any criticism; and the cloak-and-dagger methods of operation stand in marked contrast to the openness and transparency with which the CLP and the new Board is conducting itself.

At some point in the near future, people will simply stop caring what Dainty really stands for, and is up to. And that could be the end of the ancien regime in US cricket, though few US cricketers will mourn its passing.