ONE reason why cricket is a game which is restricted to just nine Test playing countries and 11 full-fledged one-day teams emerged recently -- the conservativeness of the club which was once the custodian of the game. The very fact that members of the MCC did not back in sufficient numbers a move to open the club to women is proof enough of the elitist nature of the men who are members.
Or maybe we should use the term closed minds. This business of living in the past is the reason why cricket is still to emerge from the shadows and is played competitively among a pathetic number of countries. It is also the reson why charlatans can turn up and try to turn the game into a money-spinner by trotting out the excuse of popularising the game.
Britain's days as a world power are long over -- its last colony of any worth, Hong Kong, was handed back last year. As if to coincide with this changing of times, England has not put together a world-beating team for as long back as any of my generation can remember. One of the reasons is the refusal to move with the times, the MCC being a prime example.
It was not long back that England had put out advertisements to attract players who could become good fast bowlers. The home of the game, the place where you had to stand in line to get a look in, now has to try and lure people to take to cricket. And meanwhile, we have a number of people who would still like to keep to rules which were made in another day and age. These folk are in danger of becoming something that time itself forgot.
The MCC attitude is a part of the sickness that ails the game in England. There is a marked reluctance to look at new methods, what others are doing (and, incidentally, very successfully) and what is wrong with the domestic English circuit. The MCC stays with its head stuck in the sand like an ostrich and that, sadly, epitomises the English attitude too.
This is not to say that, if the MCC decides to have another vote and that goes in favour in admitting women, the whole malaise affecting the game in England would disappear. That would take time. But it would be a signal that one of the oldest institutions in the game has decided to wake up to the fact that the 20th century is ending that the times are indeed a'changing. Once the establishment changes, it will not be long before the subjects follow suit.
The MCC is supposed to be a holy cow in England so nobody would accuse the club of racism. But that is exactly what the club is indulging in by discriminating against women. In what way is it different from what South Africa did in 1969 when it refused to admit Basil D'Oliviera after he was picked for the England team, solely on the grounds that he was coloured? This incident led to South Africa ultimately being banned from the game for a little over 20 years. The MCC will, sadly, incur no such penalty. It will enter the millennium as a club for men only. The insitution which once made the laws of cricket will be remembered only as a dinosaur which refused to change.