WEST INDIAN GREAT MICHAEL Holding has taken taken aim at the International Cricket Council, slamming the ICC for operating more as an “event management company” rather than the game’s world governing body.
“The ICC right now are a production company,” Holding stated. “They manage their events, make a lot of money from their events, but they do not manage the game. This game is not being managed by the people responsible for managing the game.
“What they are trying to do is manage the money that the game can bring in, not the game – and that is very disappointing. I said this to my boss at Sky this summer. I said ‘this great game that made me what I am, I am very disappointed in it, I am disappointed in the people running it, and I won’t miss it when I go.'”
Holding, who is calling time on 31 years in the commentary box, which followed a 15-year playing career, made his comments in an acceptance interview after winning the the Cricket Writers’ Club (CWC) Peter Smith Award.
The CWC judging panel praised Holding’s fight for equality in their citation, stating: “In the last 18 months, his searing words on racism and the Black Lives Matter movement have opened eyes and ears around the world.”
However the cricket legend, who served the game with distinction for nearly half a century, reserved his heaviest criticism for the The England and Wales Cricket Board, noting that their decision to pull their planned tour of Pakistan with less than a month’s notice was poor.
“They were going for four days,” he stated. “Pakistan went to England before vaccines were available, for six or seven weeks. They stayed, they played their cricket, they were in this bubble, which I was in, and yes it wasn’t fantastic, but it was better than going out into society where we knew Covid was and without any vaccinations for anyone.
“And yet they stayed, they played, they honoured what England wanted them to honour, to save England’s butt, to put it mildly. So did the West Indies. And you have an opportunity now to try to repay to a small degree what Pakistan did.”
Holding underscored the treatment of Pakistan and the explanation for the withdrawal as another example of the governing bodies’ ineptitude.
“[The statement is] rubbish. I wouldn’t even pay attention to that statement, it doesn’t wash with me. I cannot even with those Mickey Mouse statements – no substance. Nobody wants to come forward and face up to anything because they know what they did was wrong, so they put out a statement and hide behind a statement.
“It just reminds me of the rubbish they did with Black Lives Matter. I won’t go back into that because I’ve said enough about that. But what that signal sends to me, is the same western arrogance. I will treat you how I feel like treating you, it doesn’t matter what you think, I’ll just do what I want.”
The 67-year-old didn’t mince any words in saying that England wouldn’t have dared to call off a tour if India were the hosts because the BCC is “rich and powerful”.
“Four days in Pakistan? I’m absolutely sure they wouldn’t have done that to India, because India is rich and powerful,” Holding added.
Cricket’s governing bodies have clearly “failed the test” as far as Holding is concerned.
“I am very disappointed in the people who are running [the game] and the people managing it, and I won’t miss it when I go,” the Jamaican said.
“I’ll miss the friendships that I’ve made, I’ll miss the great people I work with, but I won’t miss the game, because this game is not the game that I started playing and the game that I knew. It’s different.”
