Thursday, May 22, 2008

Germany Plays Cricket?

I thought Hitler had shot the entire team down after they had drawn a game of cricket that they had been playing for 5 days. And since then no one played cricket in Germany again.

That ain't true though as Germany begins its campaign for the 2011 ICC World Cup today.

I didn't know that the qualification process for the Cricket World Cup inolved several structured leagues.

I knew about the qualifiers for the associate nations, but there are a few tournaments held for teams to qualify for the qualifiers.

Qualifying for the Qualifiers. Interesting that.

Apparently there are 5 leagues known as the ICC World Cricket Leagues.

Let start from the bottom.

World Cricket League Division 5 kicks off this week with a tournament in Jersey. The Participating teams are:

Afghanistan, Bahamas, Botswana, Germany, Japan, Jersey, Mozambique, Nepal, Norway, Singapore, USA, and Vanuatu.

I didn't even know that there is a country called Vanuatu, let alone the fact that it played cricket. I guess USA vs Japan will be an intensely contested match.

The 2 finalists of this tournament will then qualify for the World Cricket League Divison 4, which includes Fiji, Honk Kong, Italy, and Tanzania.

Italy?

Remind me this is not soccer I'm talking about. The Italians playing cricket? Amazing. Seriously. They must be really good at sledging. I wonder why the French don't play.

The top 2 teams from the Division 4 tournament will then qualify for the World Cricket League Division 3, where they join Argentina, Cayman Islands, Papua New Guinea, and Uganda.

This is getting bigger than Soccer I tell you. Germany, Italy, and now Argentina! The French are still missing though.

The top 2 teams from Division 3 qualify for the ICC World Cup Qualifiers that will be held in 2009.

10 teams have already qualified for the 2009 ICC World Cup Qualifiers. These are the 6 teams that are part of the World Cricket League Division 1 and the 4 teams of the World Cricket League Division 2.

World Cricket League Division 1: Kenya, Scotland, Netherlands, Canada, Ireland, Bermuda
World Cricket League Division 2: UAE, Oman, Namibia, Denmark

Actually Uganda and Argentina were part of Division 2 but since they were the bottom 2 they got relegated to Division 3 and still stand a chance to play in the World Cup Qualifiers.

But where are the French? And the Chinese?

If they don't play cricket where did the term "French Cricket" come from? And the "Chinese Cut"?

(Source: Cricinfo, Wikipeda)

Make your pitch on this post...



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31 Pitched:

  1. Anonymous said...
     

    You know who else tried conquering the world..

    Oh...

  2. Amon said...
      This comment has been removed by the author.
  3. Miss Field said...
     

    Wow I never knew all those countries played, that's fantastic.

    Be good if some of them, you know, got good.

    Vanuatu is an island in the Pacific. Sounds heavenly really.

  4. Anonymous said...
     

    I guess the French decided not to play because their sledge-words are rather longish and it did not have the intended effect because others don't understand it.

  5. David Barry said...
     

    I will be tremendously disappointed if Nepal don't get up to at least Division 2 in the next couple of years. They really should be knocking on the door of Test status in a decade - they are competitive with Test nations at under-19 level and have been so for quite a number of years now. Presumably the top juniors need to get into the first-class setup in India and then they'll become quality associate-level players and be good enough for Division 1.

    The former South Australian all-rounder Joe Scuderi either played for Italy or wanted to play for Italy but didn't qualify - I think they changed the qualification rules in the late 90's. I recall a di Venuto (Michael's brother?) also playing for Italy.

    I would have played for the Oman u/17 and u/19 teams, but I missed out on the residency requirement by a few weeks. The captain of those teams was Adnan Ilyas, who is now playing for the Oman senior side, and since they're in Div 2, he now has an official List A century. I remember him as an opening bat in Muscat's D grade. :) He was easily the most talented junior batsman in Muscat when I played against him.

  6. David Barry said...
     

    Also, I love the Norwegian squad. Sample scorecard.

  7. Miss Field said...
     

    I saw a doco about a cricket club from Melbourne that went on a tour of India and Bhutan and ended up being invited to play Bhutan's national squad, they were so proud because it was a 'One Day International'.

    Som, I think all the French would have to do is go 'aww haw haw', as they do, and that would distract anyone.

  8. Q said...
     

    MF - vanuatu is an island? Amazing they play crkt there. Another place to visit in the lifetime :-)

  9. Q said...
     

    That's very interesting DB. I played for the UAE U19 in 1997-98. Went on a tour of kent in the 98 summer as well.

    Maybe I could have played for UAE but I left for college then.

    Now I play grade B crkt in Abu Dhabi..

    My youngest brother is the captain of Abu Dhabi U17 and he was in the 30 boys shortlisted for UAE U19 team for this years world cup. But the team pulled out a month or 2 before the WC cos of lack of funds. Papua New Guinea replaced them in the tournament.

  10. Q said...
     

    MF - who was proud? Bhutan or the cricket club?

  11. Miss Field said...
     

    PNG had funding but UAE didn't? That's amazing!

  12. Miss Field said...
     

    The cricket club, the doco was from their point of view.

    They won, but only just.

  13. Q said...
     

    Hahahahaha!! DB I thought UAE was the only place where the national team was made up of subcontinental players. Now I know about Norway!

  14. straight point said...
     

    thats something Q...

    is there still any hope we see you in next world cup playing for UAE?

  15. Anonymous said...
     

    Nepal would be interesting to watch so should the US whose suspension was recently lifted.

  16. Q said...
     

    Surprising isn't it MF.. The budget of the emirates cricket board isn't exactly put to the best use. Sad that cos there's quite a lot of talent here.

  17. Q said...
     

    Highly unlikely SP :-)

  18. Anonymous said...
     

    The french decided to have sex instead!

  19. Anonymous said...
     

    There are lower leagues than this that you can patronise!

    The French failed to this league qualify due to their performance at the Euro Div 2 competition.

    The likes of Finland play in Euro Div 4 which is the lowest international league in Europe

  20. Miriam said...
     

    David Barry, that Norway team list is just brilliant - thank you.

  21. Soulberry said...
     

    Informative article Q. Opens our eyes a little wider.

  22. Gaurav Sethi said...
     

    Norway's leading man: salmon khan
    What details Q, DB.

  23. John said...
     

    Good one, Q.

  24. Q said...
     

    Thank you John and SB. It definitely opens are eyes as SB pointed out.

    Its quite amazing how all these countries have proper cricket set ups and teams and boards running them.. There should be more about them in the media.. they shoudld definitely be given more coverage just to make the world more aware of cricket's existence in these parts of the world.

  25. Q said...
     

    NC, haven't heard of Salmon Khan. DB?

  26. David Barry said...
     

    NC was making a joke, Q. Norway's squad: full of Pakistani names. Salman: Pakistani name. Salmon: a type of fish. Norwegians eat lots of fish.

    So, Salmon Khan.

  27. Q said...
     

    Woops.. I was unaware of the Norwegian eating habits :-o

    Besides Pakistanis, the norway scorecard u gave the link to also had a lot of Indian names and a few Sri Lankans as well. Very much like the UAE team.

  28. Gaurav Sethi said...
     

    and that bollywood bloke Salman Khan

  29. Anonymous said...
     

    I'm from Nepal. I just wanna see Nepal play the world cup..

  30. Wes playforcountrynotforself said...
     

    Hey this is Wes from Play For Country Not For Self, I only just found this post via Google, thank you for helping promote German cricket :)

    It's been a while since this article has been published, we are playing in World Cricket League Div. 7 now (which has been won by Kuwait this year), Norway I think got relegated to Div 8. France still need to put a log on the fire haha. The best teams, below the likes of Ireland, NL and Scotland that is, are Denmark, they play a class above everyone else I think, and Guernsey, who have just won Div 6 with some mindboggling performances.

    Cheers and thanks again for promoting Associate and Affiliate cricket

    Wes

  31. Wes playforcountrynotforself said...
     

    BTW if you are interested in a blogroll exchange, my url is

    ~ Play For Country Not For Self ~

    you can find more on German cricket there...

    I had already added you to my blogroll

    Thanks again,
    Cheers.

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