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Kenya’s ambitions to bridge the gap between themselves and the Full Member countries have been dealt a blow by the news that Roger Harper will not be renewing his contract as coach after the ICC World Twenty20.Harper took charge in January 2006 and has had considerable success in rebuilding a side that hardly played in the previous three years. In February this year Kenya won the World League Division One, a success which earned them a place in the ICC World Twenty20. The Kenyan side has also become far more disciplined in his time at the helm.Harper turned down an invitation to continue because of family commitments in the Caribbean.”Roger has been a truly marvellous ambassador for the game of cricket,” Samir Inamdar, Cricket Kenya’s chairman, told Cricinfo. “His steadying influence at a time when our cricket was in pieces has been an outstanding feature of his stay here. It has, I believe, succeeded in bringing our national team together into a cohesive and disciplined unit.”Kenya will look to fill the vacancy immediately after the tournament. Harper’s successor will be appointed for the period ending June 2009.

It may have been the `golden age of cricket’ but Edwardian professionals were treated as a lesser breed, their lives often ending in alcoholism and suicide, as Robert Palmer reveals…

“Smith EJ £1 weekly during winter if willing to work (or 10% weekly if no employment found): £2 weekly during summer and farm out at Leamington if possible, or elsewhere, failing which on ground staff.”Such was a minute in the Warwickshire CCC records for August 23, 1907, referring to the famous ‘Tiger’ Smith, who later became the club coach until his retirement at the age of 77. The minute reads as a very inhuman entry – especially ‘farm out’ – and reflects the undignified haggling which went on to obtain players as cheaply as possible.In the early years of the 1900s, these players were known as ‘professors’, the term possibly originating from their role as coaches at universities. The players may have felt that the term conferred upon them some status, but it certainly did not fill their pockets.Although the players were at liberty to work in the winter, opportunities were not abundant and many relied solely on their wage from the county. At best, this provided a hand-to-mouth existence. Even Willie Quaife, who was probably the highest paid player at Warwickshire at that time, earned only around £125 per year. This sum compared to the pay of a railwayman or a clerk but these professions carried a job for life and a pension at the end of it. A cricketer was usually finished when he was 35.In those clays, there was a huge gap between the income of a working man and those of the upper classes. As the Englishwomen’s Domestic Magazine stated, “A well bred young woman’s trousseau in the early 1900s for lingerie alone was expected to cost £100”. In other words, roughly Jim ‘Tiger’ Smith’s wage. Furthermore players were expected to buy their own kit and to pay their own hotel bills and rail fares. `Tiger’ recalled that “the return fare Birmingham- London then was 9s 7d and you could get dinner, bed and breakfast at the Adelphi in Adam Street for 7s 6d. We had nothing to grumble at”.Admittedly clubs like Warwickshire were not well off. For example, in 1902 there was a bill for the new pavilion of £1,374 to find. The profit for that year was a slender £60. Possibly this was why the players were invited to a dinner in 1902 with the touring Australians on the understanding that they paid for their own drinks. Contrast this with the conditions of today’s cosseted cricketer, with his generous salary, perhaps an England contract, lucrative sponsorship, book deal and six-figure benefit cheque. A Geoffrey Boycott speaking engagement would bring in more than a professor’s annual salary.

Of course the lucky player might expect a Benefit after 10 or 11 years as a capped player. Smith in fact had two Benefits: in 1922, he received £700; and in 1954, he had a testimonial worth £698. This, however, was a rarity. And very often much of a player’s benefit went on paying off debts. The Warwickshire player Johnnie Shilton earned £700 from his Benefit, but he was an undischarged bankrupt and most of the funds were already spoken for by various debtors. The committee was forced to have a discussion about his position, “he being in prison for debt”. Shilton died three years later, aged 37.It has been claimed that Shilton was 42 when he died but, having been unable to gain employment at Warwickshire because he was born a Yorkshireman, he used the birth certificate of his cousin John, who was born in Coventry five years before Shilton.

Cricket, generally, was not a long-lived profession in those days. A further hazard was the weather, which could destroy a player’s one chance of putting by a nest egg for his old age, or perhaps of buying a small shop. A player called Syd Santall, who had taken more than 1,000 wickets for Warwickshire, had his benefit in the match against Yorkshire spoilt by rain and he received only £400, which would be worth about £8,000 today. Scant reward indeed.It was not altogether surprising, therefore, that many players ended their days in penury. This was often due to their own failings, among which an addiction to drink ranked high. The players could not afford much to spend on drink. It was their admirers who were the danger, and clubs made appeals to the public not to treat professionals to a tipple. The impecunious Shilton, who was known as Lord Warwick because he was often seen riding around in a hansom cab, said: “Drink, sir, why I could swim in drink. I wish they wouldn’t give me drink. I wish they would give me the money.” Another said he could have drowned in drink.It was not unknown for players to take to the field the worse for drink. Another Warwickshire player, Frank Foster, who was an amateur but strongly inclined against those of his status, recalled that he had hardly tumbled into bed at seven o’clock in the morning after a night’s carousing than two team mates came into his room, stripped him, put him in the bath and for an hour “pummelled and punched” him. They then ordered him a beef steak and a pint of beer for his breakfast. He recalled that he could hardly crawl to the wicket when play began. Even so, he managed to catch Wilfred Rhodes in the first over. On another occasion he remembers leaving the card table for the breakfast table.These anecdotes are not meant to malign old cricketers as a breed. On the whole they were fine, hard-working, steady types, which made it even worse that they should be treated the way they were. We have all heard Lord Hawke’s dictum “Pray God no professional player is ever allowed to captain England”. The magical gift of leadership was felt to reside only in those who had been to a decent public school.Patsy Hendren, the old Middlesex and England player, spoke about the professionals not only having separate dressing-rooms to the amateurs, but also separate gates to the playing area at Lord’s. In one match it happened that 10 amateurs were in the side together with a solitary professional, Hendren. As a concession he was invited to use the amateur’s gate, but with his quirky sense of humour he insisted on using his own gate in solitary splendour.It was much less humorous for the professors when inferior amateurs, such as public school teachers on their summer holidays, took their places, which often led to them losing badly needed match fees. Also galling was the rule at many clubs that professors were not allowed in the pavilion except at meal times or when they were specially called for.

A particular indignity was the extraneous duties that the players were required to carry out. For example, the professors were expected to umpire club and ground games or to bowl to club members in the nets for a couple of hours. This latter chore was greatly resented, as evidenced by the experience of Shilton. After bowling his heart out at a corpulent member for an hour, he was rewarded with tuppence, the price of half a pint of ale. Legend has it that he threw the money at the member’s feet and shouted, “You must bloody need this more than me”.On another occasion Shilton told a member, a parson wearing a gaudy Free Foresters cap, to “get back to your pulpit where you’ll be more bloody use”. One can imagine the response of the great Fred Trueman to being asked to bowl to plump members wearing multi-coloured hats. ‘Dick’ Lilley and Sam Hargreave, who were both senior Warwickshire professionals, paid £15 apiece in order to secure their release from having to bowl at the members.For all the penury and the indignities, life for the old professors was largely enjoyable; glorious days, in retrospect anyway, of endless sun with springy turf beneath their feet, performing legendary feats in front of adoring crowds. The reality once they hung their boots up was grim. Many could not cope with life after cricket. Then the hangers-on quickly melted away. Presents and souvenirs went to the pawn shops. Suicide was not uncommon: even the great Arthur Shrewsbury, unable to face a summer in which he would not play cricket, shot himself.I once assumed that all cricketers found some congenial benefactor when they retired, someone who provided pleasant work somehow connected with cricket. Unfortunately there were many professors in the early 1900s who had to fend for themselves in the brutish world of the Edwardian underclass. With no marketable skills, many were forced to take ill-paid jobs: if they were lucky, a coaching appointment at a public school; if they were less lucky, working as an unskilled labourer.How surprised the old professors would be if they could come back and see the grounds of today: the ample accommodation, with no separate dressing-rooms, nor gates for amateurs: no amateurs full stop: free and plentiful equipment; a physiotherapist to minister to aches and pains; the indoor schools, the parking spaces for the sponsored cars. The old-timers only had their bicycles to ride.This article first appeared in The Cricketer in September 2002

Haroon Lorgat, the former convenor of Cricket South Africa’s (CSA) selection committee, has been appointed the ICC’s next chief executive officer. Lorgat, 47, will take over from the current CEO, Malcolm Speed, following the ICC Annual Conference, scheduled to take place between June 29 and July 4.Lorgat’s appointment, comes days after Imtiaz Patel, another South African, turned down the ICC’s offer and follows a meeting he had with David Morgan, the ICC’s president-elect, in Pretoria on Wednesday.The appointment was approved by the ICC’s recruitment board, comprising Morgan, the ICC president, Ray Mali, the vice-president, Sharad Pawar and Creagh O’Connor, the chairman of Cricket Australia.Lorgat said he look forward to an “exciting and rewarding journey in a game I have truly loved from a very young age.”He takes over at a time when the game, and the ICC, face several difficult decisions. “I am under no illusion about the challenges that await me but those challenges are also opportunities and I cannot wait to start work at the highest level in such a great game.”Mali expressed his delight at Lorgat’s appointment. “I have worked alongside him for a decade in South African cricket and I have seen first-hand what a great team player he is and that is something that will serve both him and the game extremely well in the years to come.”Lorgat previously held several posts in cricket administration. He was chairman of Western Province Professional Cricket and a board member at Western Province Cricket Association.He also served as a finance committee member for the United Cricket Board of South Africa (1999-2004), was a member of the ICC’s World Cup finance committee (2000-2003), was a board director and treasurer of CSA (2003-2004) and a selector (2001-2003). In 2004, he was appointed as chairman of selectors for CSA, a position he held until 2007.

With Shane Warne’s Test spot suddenly left vacant, New South Wales leg spinner Stuart MacGill has today produced a perfect demonstration of his suitability as a replacement in the Pura Cup clash with Victoria in Melbourne. On another stop-start day at Punt Road, MacGill sensationally claimed three wickets in the space of ten balls midway through day three to help reduce the Victorians to a score of 6/140 by stumps in reply to the Blues’ 250.Just as this game appeared to be drifting along aimlessly in mid-afternoon, the fiery spinner re-ignited proceedings with a series of spectacular dismissals. At a scoreline of 2/57 in the thirtieth over, stodgy opener Jason Arnberger and number four Bradley Hodge appeared to be laying the foundations for the Bushrangers to claim first innings points. But, in the space of ten minutes, MacGill (3/34) changed all that completely, masterminding a dramatic collapse that saw the home team lose four wickets for five runs and crash to 6/62.Arnberger (20) was the first of MacGill’s three victims, losing his off stump after advancing a pace and playing over the top of a perfectly pitched top spinner. Ian Harvey (0) was the next to fall, succumbing to a fine reflex caught and bowled as he looped back a misplayed off drive. A driving Shawn Craig (0) illustrated no clearer clue of how to conquer the former international, gloriously beaten by the best ball of the match – a sharply spinning delivery which landed in footmarks outside the line of left hander’s off stump before shooting straight through the gate and into his stumps.To an extent, the classy Hodge (60*) and captain Paul Reiffel (34*) were able to rectify matters thereafter for the Victorians with a courageous unbroken stand of seventy-eight runs for the seventh wicket. But, with the injured Warne unlikely to bat, the havoc wreaked by MacGill served as a shattering blow to the Vics’ hopes of taking any points away from this rain-marred contest. It was indeed just as well for the locals that two comfortable-looking catches – the second a particularly costly miss as Reiffel had only twelve alongside his name at the time – were grassed by Michael Slater at point.Earlier in the day, a breezy half century from all-rounder Shane Lee (53) had helped the visitors clamber their way to what proved to be a competitive first innings total. Around some fine bowling from off spinner Colin Miller (4/71) that is similarly unlikely to have escaped the attention of the national selectors, there was also some positive strokeplay at times from tailenders Brett Lee (14), MacGill (13) and Don Nash (11).

Inzamam-ul-Haq, former Pakistan captain, wants to play Test matches for some more time before retiring “in an honourable manner.”Inzamam retired from ODIs after a disastrous World Cup and resigned from the Test captaincy. The PCB is expected to leave out Inzamam from its list of centrally-contracted players, on the basis that he is no longer an ODI player. Further, sounds coming out of the board and selection committee suggest that it may be difficult for Inzamam to find a way back into the team.”I am not going to play for long but I do want to play a few more Tests as I think I can still contribute to Pakistan cricket,” Inzamam said at a function where he was feted for his contribution to the game.”I don’t understand why they (selectors) keep on saying things about my form and fitness. Obviously if I am not fit or not in form I myself will not make myself available for selection,” Inzamam said.”But the selectors should not make such a big issue of these things. I want to play Test matches but honourably and I also want to finally retire in an honourable manner,” he added.Tauqir Zia, the former board chairman, at the same function reminded Inzamam that every player had to go someday, mindful perhaps that few Pakistan players have ever left the game graciously.”What I would advise Inzamam is to accept whatever the board and selectors decide for him. What they decide, will be in the national interest and their decision must be accepted sportingly by him,” Tauqir said.Inzamam, who has played 119 Tests and 378 One-day Internationals (ODIs) for Pakistan, ruled out reversing his retirement from ODIs and said once a player retired, he should stay retired.”It is never easy for a professional cricketer, who has represented his country for 17 years, to forget the past and adopt a new lifestyle. But I have taken my decision on one-dayers,” he said.

Cynical gamesmanship or well-meaning attempt to improve the spirit in which cricket is played? The answer to that question probably depends on whether you like – or hate – England or Australia more. But if it was England’s intention to improve relations between the sides when they invited their Australia counterparts for a drink in the dressing rooms at the end of the Cardiff Test, it may well have backfired.Certainly, some in the Australian dressing room were underwhelmed by the invitation. Going in the face of modern convention – in recent times, at least, the sides would only meet for such a drink at the end of the series – it has been interpreted, coming moments after a heavy defeat, as antagonistic. Nobody likes a gloater.What is not disputed is that Alastair Cook, the England captain, invited Michael Clarke, the Australian captain, and his team into the England dressing room immediately after the game was completed. Nor is it disputed that the Australia team did not accept. Everything else is open to interpretation.

James Anderson on…

Stuart Broad: “He hardly bowled a bad ball. He hasn’t bowled badly in recent months but you just sometimes forget how dangerous he can be when he snaps into that slightly fuller length. He was always trying to find the outside edge and at pace with the bounce that he gets, he can be unplayable at times. It was great to see him in that sort of form.”
England’s balanced attack: “It probably is the best balanced attack we’ve had since Flintoff retired. It’s great to have Ben Stokes at No. 6 to bring us that four seam option and with him and Mark Wood bowling so fantastically it eases the burden on me. Moeen bowled brilliantly throughout the Cardiff Test, too, which is a big help.”
England’s positive approach: “We did exactly what we talked about: we took the positive options throughout. We were in trouble a couple of times with the bat but Joe Root did what he has been doing for a year and with the ball we kept asking questions of them.”

“It was Cooky’s idea,” James Anderson confirmed. “After the New Zealand series we had a beer after each game and we found that that was quite an enjoyable thing to do. Just to chew the fat after a hard Test. It didn’t matter if we won or lost. We still did it at Headingley after we lost. So Cooky went and asked. We were all happy to do it. I don’t know why they didn’t come in.”Clarke said he discussed the idea with the Australia coach and senior players before responding. “When Cooky approached me after the game I was a little surprised, to be honest,” he said. “It hasn’t happened too many times in my career no matter who we have played after the first Test. Normally we do it after a series.”I spoke to Darren Lehmann and a few of the senior players to get their views. They were of the opinion – like me – that at the end of the series we’ll have a drink with England. If they ask us again at the end of this match, we’ll worry about it then. For us it’s not a big deal and I’m sure for England it’s not a big deal either.”The invitation comes at the same time as England embrace a new, aggressive style of cricket and after they have spoken of playing “with a smile on their face”. While they have not specifically said they will not “sledge” they were notably quieter in Cardiff this year than they had been in the earlier matches of the summer of 2014 when the Sri Lanka players were notably unimpressed by their antics.Yet now, inspired, in part at least, by the refreshing attitude of the New Zealand side, who played a hard but good-spirited brand of cricket, England have reasoned that, to appeal to a wider fan base and to engage with a general public that seemed underwhelmed by their Ashes success in 2013, they have to do more than win. Their focus has moved away from talk of fighting and battles and more to enjoyment and the expression of skills. They appear, at first glance, to have embraced the new approach with the zeal of a recent convertBut it’s not hard to understand Australia’s cynicism towards England’s new approach. Until very recently, England gave as good as they got in terms of gamesmanship and sledging. It was, after all, only a year ago that James Anderson was accused – though subsequently cleared – of “crossing the line” in an off-field incident with Ravi Jaedja. It remains to be seen if this is a passing phase – a ploy, even, to show-up Australia’s more brusque approach – or a meaningful change.Certainly Peter Siddle, who may well come into the team for the second Investec Test at Lord’s, is unconvinced. “It’s my fifth Ashes series and it’s the first time anyone has ever gone to have a drink after one Test match,” he said. “So it’s a little bit of an interesting story.”Especially coming from Jimmy Anderson. You know what Jimmy is like. After the Oval last time we had a drink and he said ‘I don’t know why we do this, I can’t stand it’.”I’ve played four Ashes series and we’ve never had a drink after a Test match until the very last one so I don’t think anything is going to change there. It’s always a hard, aggressive match and obviously after the game it’s move on to the next one and get prepared to go again. But at the end of the series, we’ll be happy to have a drink.”Perhaps, in the grand scheme of things, such issues matter little. Perhaps it is more important to note that Moeen Ali, sore after his exertions in Cardiff, did not train at Lord’s on Tuesday, but is said not to be a risk for the second Test. Perhaps it is more important to note that Mitchell McClenaghan, New Zealand’s left-arm fast bowler currently playing for Middlesex, was among the net bowlers helping England prepare for the on-going challenge of facing Mitchell Johnson and, fitness permitting, Mitchell Starc.Or perhaps, after a few years where the image of the game has been tarnished by on-field posturing and childish sledging, it is refreshing that teams are beginning the reflect on their behaviour and the actions they can have on the next generation of cricket lovers. These are very early days in England’s conversion. It remains to be seen whether it takes root.

The inquest into the death of former Pakistan coach Bob Woolmer entered its seventh week with coroner Patrick Murphy summarising the statements of five more witnesses on Monday. Murphy had been unwell last week and unable to complete his summary.The inquest in Kingston, Jamaica, heard evidence from 57 witnesses and statements from seven other persons. The 11-member jury is expected to deliver its verdict within this week. In the event of the jury failing to agree, the court would accept a majority verdict.Woolmer died hours after he was found unconscious in his Jamaica hotel room on March 18, a day after Pakistan suffered a humiliating defeat to Ireland at the World Cup. Dr Ere Seshaiah, the government pathologist who conducted the post mortem, declared that Woolmer was murdered but three independent pathologists all concluded later that Woolmer died due to natural causes.

Hampshire have beaten off competition from Glamorgan to sign West Indies pace bowler Daren Powell. The deal is subject to approval from the West Indies board, but he is expected to be available for the County Championship match against Durham starting on July 20 and his stay would include the Friends Provident final in August.Powell was one of the key performers during West Indies one-day series win against England, taking 4 for 40 in the deciding match at Trent Bridge, and will join up with Hampshire after completing the quadrangular series in Ireland.”We are delighted to sign an international bowler who’s shown some great qualities in the West Indies tour,” said Hampshire’s team manager Paul Terry. “He’ll add depth and extra fire power to the squad. He’s keen, enthusiastic and willing to come and learn from county cricket, so hopefully it’s set for a win win situation.”Shane Warne, Hampshire’s captain, had initially hoped that Stuart Clark would return following a successful early-season spell, but he is committed to Australia ahead of the Twenty20 World Championships.