Jack Bannister severs ties with the Bears over the Stanford fiasco

Jack Bannister, ex-player and committee member is now an ex-member. He has severed ties with the club over the Stanford fiasco. The full text of his farewell letter to the club is on Brian's blog but in brief he says he has become disillusioned with the ECB over their handling of the Stanford affair and the recent turmoil in the England camp and as the ECB leadership is supported by Warwickshire then he cannot be associated with the club anymore.

Jack has made a grand guesture here obviously intending to gain some publicity. The ECB needs to be totally shook up and heads need to roll. Not necessarily actual beheading taking place though i am not that choosy.

The Stanford soap continues

What with yesterday's exciting events Sir Allen Stanford's involvement with the game has switched suddenly from "Who wants to be a T20 millionaire?" to "CSI : Antigua". The FBI are investigating his links to a Mexican drugs cartel. Sir Allen is still missing after trying to fly to Antigua but being foiled by a cancelled credit card. Meanwhile there has been a run on the banks he owned in Antigua, Venezuela and elsewhere.

As for more interesting matters, on the pitch England have the West Indies at 142-3 in their second innings. To win on day 5 England need 7 wickets, the Windies need 360 runs.

Allen Stanford

Well you can read about the Allen Stanford mess here, here, here and here.

I'm not going to comment on it. I'm sure a lot of the media pack will be crowing. Personally i have nothing against rich Americans. My best friend from college migrated there and is now a rich American, for some reason he didn't want to remain here a slightly less rich Brummie. He does own a Jag though, living the dream!

Update : i must admit though i do find it rather amusing that he tried to flee the US but his credit card didn't work!

Bell watch : England vs Stanford Superstars

Well i'm glad i couldn't see this after all! I had to go to London at the weekend and was cursing the fact i couldn't see the $20 million match, but in the end it seems to have been a blessing. Belly only made 7 but then again out of 99ao it wasn't that bad after all. So what went wrong? Couldn't they handle the pressure? Were their minds elsewhere? England had better get it sorted out fast, can you imagine Australia getting into such a muddle?

Get on with the game!

KP wants the week to end, Freddie is sick, the ECB are to review the series, seems everyone is lining up to give the Stanford Super Series a good kicking. The media are loving it of course as they have been vindicated, or in other words they haven't had to change their opinion of the series from before it actually happened. Finally Steve Harmison says he would find the prize money very useful. He bowled very well under pressure, who could imagine him as a T20 death bowler a couple of years ago. How this can't be considered good for his career and for England i don't know.

We've had the ridiculously overblown incident where the WAGs sat on Stanford's lap of course, one considers if Stanford was not a rich American the incident would not have merited a mention. The series is described as tawdry and crass in the media, of course T20 cricket in England is a refined and classy experience. Yes the whole thing leaves a bad taste in the mouth but its not the series or Stanford doing that but the British media doing that.

People complain about the tawdry money aspect but let us remember why England are there in the first place, they went there to try and stop players being lured by the big bucks of the ICL and IPL. Stanford didn't hold a gun to anyone's head to come and play there and the ECB will welcome their cut of the millions. This is the ECB of course who cut off live cricket from a generation of non-Sky Sports subscribers because they could get more money. Well Stanford will give them plenty of what they love and what keeps the county game afloat. Integrity can go out of the window when you have a mortgage to pay, a view shared by millions in jobs they don't like too much but would like sleeping under a canal bridge even less. Such is life.

And as for the players... you are being paid to play cricket in Antigua while England freezes, stop moaning! Rant over.

Bell watch : England vs Trinidad & Tobago

In their last warm-up match England played Trinidad & Tobago, fresh from beating Middlesex to become the T20 Champions of the Universe (or something), and won by 1 run. Bell did well again scoring 37 off 41 balls including 2 sixes. Actually Bell has been the lynch pin of the T20 side for some time but of course doesn't get the plaudits.

Bell run out (Carter) 23

I love cricket!

England vs Middlesex was interesting if not that exciting. The pitch in Antigua is pretty poor. Bell made a creditable 23 off 25 balls and Carter's bowling was pretty decent 1-24. I am in two minds about Carter's performances for Middlesex. I hope he does well but that he doesn't do so well that Middlesex try and poach him!

The Stanford T20

It has trouble in the courts and Brian Halford writing for the Birmingham Post is against it but personally i have no trouble with the upcoming Stanford T20 taking place, i do worry though that the winner takes all and high stakes could cause ruptions in the England team and if they win this could cause a divide between the winners and other England players who don't play ODIs/T20s.

However professional sportsmen are always just 1 tackle/slip/ball away from a career ending injury so if some American tycoon wishes to throw millions at them for a few hours work then good luck to them! I am more interested in some of the warm-up games, especially England vs Middlesex. Neil Carter will be playing for Middlesex so we could have the sight of Carter bowling at Ian Bell. I don't know about you but that sounds rather cool to me.