just down the road from Pakistan, bring your own whites.
Yes that’s what the England team are being asked to do after all, stump up at Mohali just down the road from a certain country which has been pretty much linked with everything that went on in Bombay which is just a little farther away from the attackers bases and training camps.
And to the surprise of some out there a number of players aren’t too chuffed at the idea.
Ah but they’ll be getting “SAS style” security, which of course would be a step up from those two blokes at the Bombay railway station who were sharing a rifle to fend off the AK-47 wielding terrorists. Up to the level of security that various high profile members of the Gandhi family can’t currently attest to.
Imran Khan said terrorists wouldn’t dare harm cricketers as the public would turn on them, I’m thinking the “team of Tony Blair” wouldn’t illicit great sympathy with many in the region. The Indian authorities were apparently warned about the attacks some months back, was this when it was thought certain members of the England squad would be in the Taj Mahal hotel? And not just their kit.
Yes some England players are lazy buggers who are bad tourists, some who showed their passion for a possible $1 million over representing their country recently and they have just come off a real stuffing in the games played in the one day series but even someone as cynical as me can see things have changed a bit with all this. Though saying that if any of those that refuse to go sign up with the IPL they should have their central contracts withdrawn.
Yes the Australian’s toured here in ’05 after the London bombings but then what were the chances that team were going to be taking the tube or the number 45 bus to Fulham Broadway? If their hotel had been attacked then I doubt that years Ashes would have been remembered as it has.
They shouldn’t pressurised into returning to India an time soon if they don’t want to go, the senior players should take the lead and call it all off because you know the spineless ECB or ICCC won’t. It can’t be much fun for the younger and fringe players who may feel that thinking of themselves and their families could put a black mark against their name for future recognition.
But it’s not just the England team or their families that would have to worry, how many fans would the two test matches attract? Well the stadiums wouldn’t probably be packed out as test matches don’t get the same crowds one dayers do but who would want to watch a game on a flat track with the chance a bomb loaded truck might just get driven into view. Yes the England team might have all the security in the world but who would be protecting the locals that the lot in Bombay had no qualms in massacring?
Maybe ECB chairman Giles Clarke could set up the tests in a neutral venue such as for example Bogota in Columbia, which is where he was when this all went off.