Cricket’s expansion works but there’s still a lot to be done

For fogeys like yours truly, T20 Internationals are the best kind of T20s. Which means enjoying the ICC T20 World Cup 2024 even though had ICC stuck to its original name – World T20 – it would have sounded cooler. Staging a part of it, in the United States is a hoot because where else would you get the delightful absurdity of cricket’s Bling boys, the Indian men training in a place called, guess what, Hickville?

The volume – number and decimal both – of the Nepal’s fans for their opening match against Netherlands turned the 7000-seater Grand Prairie Stadium in suburban Dallas into a standing-room-only Kathmandu rock-concert. Oman, an Indo-Pak mishmash with a Sri Lankan coach, pegged David Warner and Marcus Stoinis down for 30 balls without a boundary. Gotta love it.

This is the first time a cricket World Cup has featured 20 teams, with the Associates being part of the main event. Not tacked into ‘qualifying’ round held many moons ago, many moons away and let into the main competition in coffeespoonfulls.

For those who complain about dropping standards and lowering the quality of the competition featuring lower-ranked teams, relax. WG Grace is not rising from his grave. This is sport not an international contest to end climate change with humankind’s survival dependant on the result. Eventually the stronger teams scramble to the top – like they do in the football World Cup which went from 24 to 32 teams in 1998 and in 2026 will have 48. Which coincidentally will also be co-hosted by United States along with Canada and Mexico. Props also to the ICC for giving every country playing Twenty20 between each other T20I status and a place in the ICC rankings and List-A status. But that’s where it ends.

Grumble time begins now. That Nassau wicket is really awful, not because we need to see 57 sixes in every game but even bounce, just better timing on the bat would be nice. We get the drumroll-kaching marketing buzz of India versus Pakistan in New York. But the event is as much in New York city as much as a game in DY Patil Stadium is in downtown Mumbai. Times Square and Yankee Stadium are both around 40kms away from the Nassau County International Cricket Stadium (NCICS) as the crow flies. Approximately the same distance as Wankhede and DY Patil (with way better public transport access).

Again, it is known the ICC tried to get a pop-up stadium built on the 1145 acres of Van Cortland Park in the Bronx, HQ of New York only to have it turned down by local authorities. That story features friction between old Caribbean and new South Asian immigrants around Van Cortland but we are not going there.

The main question here is at this point in time, does the ICC still need to be indulging in group-cooking? So that India v Pakistan are always in the same World Cup group? Surely cricket has moved on from the horrors of 2007 ICC World Cup where both India and Pakistan got knocked out early? In this century, we’ve got a new format which has given cricket fresh legs, led to different origin stories around new teams that are not connected to British empire and the sport is going to the Olympic Games.

This group-cooked Ind v Pak made-for-TV ‘rivalry’ is looking tired – and trite. Eight months ago, we endured nauseous Star TV promotion for the CWC23 India v Pak match and the latest edition of ‘vande’ and ‘mauka mauka’ jokes is just as puerile. None of it looks or sounds authentic or believable. Even the players talking about the rivalry sound a bit rote.

Then there’s stories coming out of NCICS – that ticketing is a scam, it takes ages to get to the ground, parking is miles away, there’s too much security. It’s sounding too much like an Indian cricket spectator experience. The kind from the previous ICC World Cup we want to forget about. Fans have paid between $40 to US$250 for parking, and the VIP parking for India v Pakistan is naturally full.

A walk from other parking lots is between 0.6 to 1.6miles – approx. 1km to 2.5km. After which there is serious security checking, which Australian journalist Peter Lalor called “Olympic“ scale. This is not the ‘look’ that ICC needs for its grand “New York” moment meant to showcase cricket, T20, India v Pakistan to the larger American populace. Which is what we are led to believe is the entire purpose of the exercise and not-over-pricing everything for the South Asian diaspora.

Former colleague, journalist and US cricket evangelist Peter Della Penna’s social media account outlines the Nightmare of Nassau. He found Jagan Vinayagam who paid $350 for a premium ticket, was not allowed to choose seat or section on the website and given a seat on the last row at the top of NCICS with a rubbish view. Here’s the Jagan’s kicker: “I take my wife & family to 3 or 4 Mets games a year. My wife doesn’t even like baseball but she loves the fan experience at Citi Field because the amenities are great.” That slap should resound loudly in the ICC Boardroom.

Normally at ICC World Cups, we’re told ticketing is handled by the host association. Who is host of the NCICS games? USA Cricket, which was formed in 2019? Or the ICC? Or ICC’s local organising committee which is handling NCICS? I’ve mailed ICC to ask to name and shame and when they reply, will go ferreting further. At the moment, there’s no information available on the ticketing website about who’s responsible for planting guys like Jagan on the top row.

But it’s been less than five days, so let’s take a breath here. When India v Pakistan ends, maybe normal service will resume. Of the good kind.