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Oct. 29th, 2008 12:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
webofevilGenerally I actively avoid cricket, something that’s easier said than done if you live round the corner from a cricket ground. However, even I had been made vaguely aware of the existence of the Stanford Series, a week-long championship held in Antigua, privately sponsored by American billionaire Sir Allen Stanford, where every player in the winning team will receive $1 million. Cricket has not yet fallen prey to the warping effects of brain-crushing amounts of money being poured into the game, and concerns have been expressed that this series might herald the beginning of its slide into the kind of decadence that now characterizes football. For example, not all cricketers are yet rapists [citation needed].
It’s off to an inauspicious start. The England captain is unhappy with the state of the pitch and the health of his players: “Yes, it’s a lot of dosh,” he has said, “but the longer this week goes on the more I want to get it over with.”
Possibly the Stanford Series’s greatest liability, though, is Sir Allen Stanford. While the England team were playing a warm-up match against Middlesex, the ground’s TV screens broadcast live pictures of Sir Allen sitting in the England players’ balcony cavorting with three of their wives and girlfriends.
That’s wicketkeeper Matt Prior’s pregnant wife he’s bouncing on his knee. Prior is said to have looked “upset” when he looked up and saw the images. The other players were none too happy either. Stanford has apologised to them personally and, publicly, everyone is keen to put it behind them. But it all adds to the perception of a chaotic and unprofessional event.
Pitch for a film: As a small boy, little Allen Stanford from Texas is attacked by a cricketer (or possibly just by someone with a cricket bat). The experience scars him but drives him to succeed singlemindedly in finance so that one day he can destroy cricket, by buying the whole sport and then cuckolding all the players. Nicolas Cage to star.
It’s off to an inauspicious start. The England captain is unhappy with the state of the pitch and the health of his players: “Yes, it’s a lot of dosh,” he has said, “but the longer this week goes on the more I want to get it over with.”
Possibly the Stanford Series’s greatest liability, though, is Sir Allen Stanford. While the England team were playing a warm-up match against Middlesex, the ground’s TV screens broadcast live pictures of Sir Allen sitting in the England players’ balcony cavorting with three of their wives and girlfriends.
That’s wicketkeeper Matt Prior’s pregnant wife he’s bouncing on his knee. Prior is said to have looked “upset” when he looked up and saw the images. The other players were none too happy either. Stanford has apologised to them personally and, publicly, everyone is keen to put it behind them. But it all adds to the perception of a chaotic and unprofessional event.
Pitch for a film: As a small boy, little Allen Stanford from Texas is attacked by a cricketer (or possibly just by someone with a cricket bat). The experience scars him but drives him to succeed singlemindedly in finance so that one day he can destroy cricket, by buying the whole sport and then cuckolding all the players. Nicolas Cage to star.
