Giles Clarke is the King Midas of English cricket, although instead of gold, everything he touches turns to a great steaming pile of crap. Sir Allen Stanford’s arrest for alleged fraud reflects badly on how quickly and wholeheartedly the English game jumped into bed with the Texan billionaire.
From the tacky start, landing in a helicopter at Lords with $20m dollars in a Perspex case, through to the underwhelming Stanford series the whole arrangement has been unseemly and slightly desperate right from the start, and serious questions need to be asked about the ECB and the position of the newly reappointed Giles Clarke.
I’ve just seen David Gower on Sky Sports saying how it’s just not good enough to go into these things with the ‘best intentions’, but outcomes and consequences have to be evaluated. After all, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
Most of all though it’s West Indies cricket, and the West Indian people that will lose the most. Stanford made a long term commitment to Windies cricket and was/is a huge employer in the region. Where that leaves plans for development, contracts and cricketing infrastructure in the Caribbean is beyond my understanding, but one thing’s for sure it’s not going to be good news.
Away from politics, really pleased to see Swanny take 5 for yesterday, I thought he bowled excellently with a nice loop, and drift. After outbowling Panesar in India and now this performance he’ll be in p1 for the forthcoming games against West Indies and forward towards the ashes.
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Apparently the accounts of his $50Billion buisness were signed off by a one-man-band accountancy firm operating from a one room office above a salon in north London -
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article5762578.ece
Clarke out!
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