Posted on 09/07/2006 6:27:56 AM PDT by AdAstraPerArdua
One of the fastest-growing games in the United States is, surprisingly, cricket.
The game flourished there for a while in the 19th century, but a combination of war and baseball sent it into decline. That is, until now.
Atlanta, Georgia is not a place you normally associate with cricket. It is famous for a fizzy drink and a baseball team called The Braves. So I was pleasantly surprised, on a recent visit, to hear the distinctive "thock" of leather on willow.
"Shot, Mouse!" shouted the tall, silver-haired West Indian standing next to me, as a batsman lofted a ball over the fence for six.
It was the semi-finals of the Atlanta regional play-offs between Tropical Sports Club and North Atlanta.
It was not a real cricket ground - just a piece of matting laid out in the middle of a schools softball field near the Atlanta airport.
Long history
But it felt like Sunday in Antigua. Under an awning, a large-hipped lady in a bandana barbecued jerk chicken in an oil drum. Men sat under the trees drinking Red Stripe and reminiscing about home. A copy of Ovid's Metamorphoses lay open on the ground.
Today, thanks to a huge influx of immigrants from India, Pakistan and the West Indies, cricket is bouncing back
Simon Worral
The silver-haired man standing next to me was not any old bystander. His name was Desmond Lewis and in his cricketing heyday he had opened the batting for the Windies with Sir Garfield Sobers.
Cricket, he told me, has grown exponentially in America. When Des arrived in 1978, he could not find 11 players to make a team.
Today, Atlanta boasts 23 teams, with 600 players competing in a well-organised league.
Though few people either side of the Atlantic know it, cricket has a long history in the United States.
It was once the national game and the annual fixture against Canada, which was first played in the 1840s. It is the oldest international sporting event in the modern world, predating today's Olympic Games by nearly 50 years.
The earliest account of a cricket match in North America comes from a plantation owner in Westover, Virginia, named William Byrd.
"I rose at six o'clock and read a chapter in Hebrew," he noted in a diary he kept between 1709 and 1712.
"About 10 o'clock Dr Blair, and Major and Captain Harrison came to see us. After I had given them a glass of sack we played cricket. I ate boiled beef for my dinner."
Baseball
The outbreak of the War of Independence in 1776 temporarily queered cricket's pitch. Like tea and taxes, it was associated with Britishness.
But by 1860 an estimated 10,000 Americans were playing the game. Presidents turned out to watch. When Chicago hosted Milwaukee in 1859, Abraham Lincoln was among the spectators.
It's way too complicated for Americans - and too slow
American student
Three years later, disaster struck. The American Civil War uprooted men from their homes, pitches fell into disrepair, and a new sport adapted from an English girls' game called rounders, took America by storm.
Baseball suited war. It was quick, easy to learn, and required little in the way of equipment or facilities - just four gunnysacks thrown on the ground, a simple bat and an equally simple ball.
Today, thanks to a huge influx of immigrants from India, Pakistan and the West Indies, cricket is bouncing back.
There are 29 leagues nationwide, with an estimated 700 clubs and 50,000 active cricketers. As well as traditional bastions like Philadelphia and New York, where Mayor Bloomberg recently announced a $1.5m investment for a purpose built pitch in Queens, cricket is now being played in such unlikely places as Dallas, Texas, and Wichita, Kansas.
In Los Angeles, a team called Compton Homies & Popz uses cricket to teach "boyz from the hood" old-fashioned virtues like discipline and manners.
'Too complicated'
So can cricket do what soccer has done, and once again become a contender in the US?
A student I met at a charity game in Atlanta was more than a little sceptical. "It's way too complicated for Americans," he said. "And too slow."
But that doesn't stop Des Lewis from dreaming.
"My dream is to get a piece of property," he told me, as the sun began to set over Georgia.
"Twenty acres or so. And build a proper cricket field. With a real pavilion."
Right. And we'll be completely metric in 2008.
Fastest growing game in America? Um, it sure hasn't reached my neck of the woods yet. Anyone else?
I have a million of them around my house, how do you kill them?
I grew to love Cricket when I lived in England, never knew it was once our national game!
Imagine a baseball game which drags on for about a week because even foul balls count as in play. Then imagine the scene where one team gets all 27 outs before the other side is allowed to bat -- with the result that you can never quite tell who's ahead. Then imagine watching the whole mess from the outfield since the playing field extends around the "stumps" for a distance in every direction.
About the only saving grace to the sport is the clubhouse -- wherein you can sit with your British friends and slowly drink yourself into a mild stupor on Pims.
If you go from one fan to two, that's a 100% increase.
I was at Greenfield Village (an awesome historical museum in Michigan) a few weeks ago. They had a cricket field set up and a guy teaching the game. It was quite enjoyable and fun. At the basic level, it's not difficult, although, like baseball, it can be quite complex.
Do not misunderestimate the fervor and stamina of the Metricofascist Jihadis. They will not stop until the entire world is under their dominance. They will, and have, do anything within their power to ensure an complete and total Metric Oriented World. You can absolutely count on it!..........You have been warned.................
Cricket would be alright, if only you didn't have to dress up like you were going to a wedding..................
As the guy in the article says - 'it's too complicated for Americans.'
I don't have to imagine it - I've been to many international cricket matches. Never had trouble working out who was ahead and never minded that the pitch was designed to suit the game, rather than the audience.
You don't have to like cricket, but don't run down a game that is loved by more people than all American sports put together. I love Baseball as well, but it's just not cricket old boy! :)
I thought lacrosse was the fastest growing game in the U.S.
I'm still using digits, cubits and reeds. They'll never take me alive.
Can't beat 'em for shellcracker.
I like the person who posted the keyword "waytoocamplicated" above. If one can't spell a simple word, it isn't likely he/she will be able to understand the rules of an entirely new sport!
~ Blue Jays ~
Whoa, hang on a sec...since when was baseball "simple"?
Basketball is simple (throw the ball in the basket)...hockey is simple (get the puck in the net)...soccer is simple (get the ball in the goal). Even NFL football, while not a simple game, has a simple objective...get the ball into the other team's endzone or through the other team's uprights.
Baseball? Move four 90 foot lengths before your team makes three outs...an out being a caught ball before it hits the ground or by tagging the runner or by making a force play at first base...oh, and try to hit a Roger Clemons split finger fastball while your at it.
Yeah, baseball isn't simple. That's my rant for the day.
Feh. Ephahs, logs, and hins for me. You kids and your newfangled cubits.
BTW, cricket is actually catching on here in Richmond. Of course, we have a MASSIVE influx of Indian tech workers, so that's why. But they do have cricket clubs here in the capital of the old Confederacy. Go figure.
}:-)4
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