Adam Gilchrist plugs cricket as an Olympic sport

Adam Gilchrist, the retired Australian cricket international, has used his Colin Cowdrey Spirit of Cricket address to call for the sport to make a concerted effort to be included in the Olympics. "The single best way to spread the game globally," said Gilchrist, "is for the ICC to actively seek its inclusion as an Olympic sport."
He observed: "Without doubt the Olympic movement provides one of the most efficient and cost effective distribution networks for individual sports to spread their wings globally. It would be difficult to see a better, quicker or cheaper way of spreading the game throughout the world."
Several moves have been made by the game's administrators in recent years to begin a campaign to get cricket back in the Olympic programme for the first time since 1900, when a Devon and Somerset Wanderers side representing Britain beat France in a one-off match. In 2007 the IOC recognised cricket as a member sport and the ICC has repeatedly said it intends to push for full inclusion.
The earliest point at which cricket could be included would be 2020, with seven sports already competing for two spare spaces on the roster for 2016. Gilchrist believes cricket has one key advantage over rugby sevens, golf and squash, all of which are among the seven currently pushing for inclusion.
"The Olympic movement's only remaining dead pocket in the world happens to coincide with cricket's strongest – the subcontinent," said Gilchrist. "This region, which includes India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, represents just over one fifth of the world's population. But with the exception of their great hockey teams of the past, these cricket powerhouses have received barely a handful of Olympic medals in nearly 100 years of competition.
"What better way for the IOC to spread the Olympic brand and ideals into this region than on the back of T20 cricket? The rewards for both the ICC and IOC getting this right would be enormous."

source: http://guardian.co

Time to make cricket the only religion on the subcontinent

Just down the corridor from me at the Hotel Plaza in Havana is the suite where George Herman Ruth – Babe or the Bambino to baseball fans – stayed 90 years ago. It's a shrine of sorts to the first of baseball's marquee names, a supreme slugger who captivated fans and divided opinion wherever he went. In so many ways, Ruth was an iconic symbol of pre-Depression America, just as Sachin Tendulkar became the face of post-liberalisation India. But while the Babe was a larger-than-life character in every sense, Tendulkar's time in the spotlight has been notable mainly for the near-complete absence of controversy and an almost painful shyness.
Baseball runs through the veins of people on this island. While a small number of top players have defected to the major leagues across the water, the vast majority of those who have played for a wonderfully talented amateur side have lived by the Teófilo Stevenson adage that a few million dollars is nothing compared to the love of eight million compañeros.
Having just covered the climactic stages of the ICC World Twenty20, it is enough to make you wonder why Cuba is nowhere in the picture when it comes to cricket. Certainly, there is an awareness that such a sport exists. At immigration I was grilled on account of being a journalist, until the young man asking the questions inquired which topics I covered. When I said sport, and cricket in particular, he took a step back and imitated a big hit that would have gone a fair distance over cow corner.
Given how the Chappell brothers played baseball as a winter sport, and how naturally athletic Cubans are, they'd have a crack Twenty20 outfit in no time with the requisite guidance. That, in turn, leads to the ICC and promotion of the game worldwide. The sooner they reduce the farce of a 50-over World Cup to a manageable four weeks or less with fewer teams the better. For spreading the gospel, the only format that works is Twenty20. Rugby realised that nearly two decades ago with Sevens and cricket has to follow suit if it harbours serious ambitions of being an Olympic sport.
Test cricket may be the pinnacle when it comes to skill and even drama but it's never going to rival the slam-bang version for popularity. To expect that would be to expect Vivaldi to outsell the Beatles. There's a place for the purist but snobbery is something the game can ill afford if it wants to be globally relevant.
Ideally, the World Cup would be restricted to just the top eight or 10 teams (once the anomaly of a tournament called the Champions Trophy disappears from the calendar) and the World Twenty20 could then be thrown open to more teams. Had Afghanistan or Kenya been able to play this time, we might have seen even more upsets. In a 50-over game, a team like Kenya wouldn't have a prayer against Australia or South Africa but in the abbreviated form anything's possible. You only have to look at Fiji's magnificent Sevens side and the emerging Kenyans to see how much deeper the talent pool becomes when an additional element of chance is introduced.
Perhaps in the future, teams touring the Caribbean could play a one-off Twenty20 game at a non-traditional venue such as Cuba or the Dominican Republic. Plant the seed and see how it germinates. Unlike many of the world's big banks, the ICC and some of the individual boards certainly have enough cash to spare.
Fortunately, though, money isn't everything. The sweetest aspect of the World T20 was the early exit of Australia, India and England, the three countries that seem to regard the Future Tours Programme as some kind of personal fiefdom. While it could be said that the security situations in Pakistan and Sri Lanka have prevented more matches being scheduled there, it still doesn't explain the reluctance to invite them. The Pakistanis were once Asia's biggest drawcard, while the Lankans have reached the final in two of the past three global events.
A recent study revealed that the Indian Premier League has already become one of the world's most lucrative sporting properties but it was probably their exclusion from it that provided one of the spurs for Pakistan's players on the world stage. The players who had their contracts torn up, including a certain Shahid Khan Afridi (Deccan Chargers), had a point to prove and they did so to thrilling effect. Like the Cubans, the Pathans have a natural aptitude for ball sports – the squash Khans, Jahangir and Jansher, both hail from Nawankali, Umar Gul's home town – and it would be foolish to underestimate the role cricket could play in keeping restless youth away from guns and other malignant influences.
The Taliban may have succeeded in shutting down girls' schools and hairdressing salons but if the reaction to the World Twenty20 triumph is any indicator they will need to fight a thousand years or longer to eradicate cricket's grip on the nation. "It means everything to us and our nation," said Younus Khan, another Pathan, and that's not hyperbole. Given the game's power to unite and the tendency of religious leaders to divide, maybe it's time to abolish all other faiths and make cricket the only religion on the subcontinent. Once that happens, maybe we can send a few missionaries over to Cuba.

source: http://guardian.co.

Andy Murray accused of using gamesmanship to upset opponent

takes his second step towards what he hopes will be the Wimbledon final today after defending himself from accusations by his Latvian opponent, Ernests Gulbis, that he feigned injury during their match at Queen's last year. Gulbis felt Murray used a medical time-out to change the course of the tie before going on to win in three sets.
The British No1 injured his right thumb during a fall and also had problems with his neck, pulling out of his quarter-final against Andy Roddick the next day. However, Gulbis claimed yesterday that Murray did not have anything wrong with him. "He just broke my rhythm and I was not an experienced enough player to deal with that at the time," he said.
Responding to the 20-year-old's claim, Murray said: "That's very disappointing to hear. I never once used any of the rules that certain players have used to try to gain an upper hand in a match or to slow my opponent down. Definitely when I played him at Queen's that was not the case. I didn't know there was a problem but I couldn't grip the racket the following day. There are so many things in matches where guys take toilet breaks, injury time-outs, delay you sometimes when you are trying to serve and take a little bit longer between the points than they are meant to. It happens all the time. It's just part of sport."
Murray added he had never resorted to gamesmanship. "It's a form of cheating. It's bending the rules to gain an advantage. It's a bit like diving in football. It does go on and certain players do it and certain players don't. I'm one of the guys who doesn't do it."
Murray, third on Centre Cout today, said he would have preferred to have won his opening match against Robert Kendrick in straight sets and was hoping for a more straightforward victory today. "It is sometimes good to have tight matches early in tournaments but, if I had won in three sets, I would have been just as happy as I am just now. At the US Open when I got to the final I had some tough matches right at the start and when I managed to come through them it gave me confidence. But the easier you win the better, normally."
Murray revealed that he and his brother, Jamie, had agreed to buy a share in Stirling Albion for whom their grandfather played. "I went to watch them a few times when I was younger and we used to play five-a-side at their training facility. It would be nice if they could stay alive but it's so tough nowadays. And it's not like they are doing a whole lot of winning either." Unlike him.

source: http:/guardian.co.

Euro: the way to frcovery

Are the indications of development in the Euro Zone by now so intense that the government is not able to begin excluding is monetary spur and the ECB start talking about rate hikes or not. Although they are keeping their sense of concern, apparently the region’s finance ministers are to be leaning this way, and even a small bend from official can be interpreted into firmness by speculators. Examining the eminent week, there is abundance of economic fodder on the docket – and most of it is powerful enough to ignite instability and change timing on the ultimate economic upturn. But the actual fundamental theme is going to be in formative whether policy officials’ fortitude to ease a recovery is creditable or setting the economy up for another catastrophe should the rebound collapse.

source: forexcult.com

Euro: the way to frcovery

us dollar consolidation keeps on going

The US dollar finished week up against almost all of the majors, except the British pound and Japanese yen, but the currency actually did little but combine. Looking to the DXY index, one can indicate that the US dollar dropped on Friday was eventually advocated by an increasing trend-line around 80 linking the June 3 and June 11 lows. With struggle threatening just up at 81.35, this period of tense range-bound trade gives the currency at risk to breakouts this coming week, particularly since there is going to be quite a bit of event risk on hand from the US. On Tuesday, the National Association of Realtors (NAR) is expected to give details on that existing home sales went up for the 2nd straight month at a rate of 2.6 % in May to a yearly speed of 4.80 million from 4.68 million.

source: http://forexcult.com

Gov. Sanford Admits Affair and Explains Disappearance

But his confession and apology, in a rambling, nationally televised news conference, left other mysteries unsolved, like whether he had lied to his staff members as late as Monday about his whereabouts, whether the affair had definitively ended, whether he would resign from the governorship and whether he would even have acknowledged the affair had he not been met at the airport in Atlanta by a reporter upon his return.
Mr. Sanford, 49, admitted that he had been in Buenos Aires since Thursday, not hiking on the Appalachian Trail, as his staff members had said.
Standing in the rotunda of the South Carolina Statehouse, the governor, a Republican who had been considered a possible presidential candidate in 2012, teared up as he spoke, taking more than seven minutes to apologize before getting to the crux of the matter.
“The bottom line is this,” he said. “I have been unfaithful to my wife.”
The governor’s wife, Jenny, 46, who did not attend the news conference, issued a statement later in the day saying that while she loves her husband, she asked him to leave the family two weeks ago in a trial separation, though she still believes the marriage can be repaired. The couple have four sons, the youngest 10.
“We reached a point where I felt it was important to look my sons in the eyes and maintain my dignity, self-respect, and my basic sense of right and wrong,” she said. Because of the separation, she said, she did not know where he was in the last week.
The governor, who raised his national profile by opposing the Obama administration’s economic stimulus plan, said he would resign from his position as chairman of the Republican Governors Association. He will be succeeded by Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi. A reporter tried to ask Mr. Sanford if he would resign from the governor’s office, but he did not answer.
Coming a week after the admission of an extramarital affair by Senator John Ensign, a Nevada Republican who had also begun exploring a presidential run in 2012, the governor’s acknowledgment was yet another blow to Republican hopes for a strong field of challengers to President Obama.
“Personal circumstances over the course of the last week have managed to shrink the front line of the 2012 possible contender list by 30 percent,” said Phil Musser, a former executive director of the Republican Governors Association.
Mr. Sanford is regarded as a political lone wolf and has made numerous enemies even within his own party, which controls both houses of the state legislature. Scott H. Huffmon, a political science professor at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, S.C., said it was unclear whether there would be pressure on the governor to resign. “His opponents,” Dr. Huffmon said, “are sitting back trying to figure out if they’d be better off with a completely emasculated governor to deal with or if they’d be better off with André Bauer,” the lieutenant governor, who would take office if Mr. Sanford resigned.
Mr. Sanford made at least one state-sponsored trip to Argentina during the period of his relationship. In an interview late Wednesday, Daniel Scioli, the governor of Buenos Aires Province, said he met with Mr. Sanford on June 26, 2008, in La Plata, a town outside Buenos Aires. Mr. Scioli said the request for the meeting had come from Mr. Sanford’s office via the United States Embassy.
The governor was not known as a moralist but has frowned on infidelity and as a congressman voted to impeach President Bill Clinton after the Monica Lewinsky affair. “He lied under a different oath, and that’s the oath to his wife,” Mr. Sanford said at the time on CNN. “So it’s got to be taken very, very seriously.”
Mr. Sanford and his wife had joined an intensive Bible study group for couples in the last few months, according to William H. Jones, president of Columbia International University, a conservative evangelical college. Dr. Jones said the governor and his wife had been encouraged to join the Bible study by a longtime friend, Cubby Culbertson, a businessman in Columbia who teaches the Bible and who was thanked by the governor in his news conference.
At the news conference, Mr. Sanford said his friendship with the unnamed woman began eight years ago and became a romance about a year ago. He said he had seen her three times since then. The relationship was “discovered” five months ago, he said, and he had been trying to reconcile with his wife.
Mr. Sanford strongly implied that he had ended the affair. “The one thing that you really find is that you absolutely want resolution,” he said. “And so oddly enough, I spent the last five days of my life crying in Argentina.”
On Wednesday afternoon, The State, the leading newspaper in Columbia, published on its Web site several e-mail messages it said it obtained in December between Mr. Sanford and a Buenos Aires woman the newspaper identified only as Maria.

source: http://nytimes.com