Zimbabwe has withdrawn from the competition, clearing the way for it to take place as planned in England.

Cricinfo report here.

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Spike Milligan

Hi, I am new posting here but been reading for a year or so.

The cynic in me cant help thinking that ZCU have done this to take the focus away from them being removed from Full member status.

Hi, Flints - welcome to the cricket cynics' forum!

More seriously, welcome to WAT - we hope you enjoy your time here.

Like you, I don't suppose for one minute that ZC did this to save any blushes for the running dogs of British imperialism, but it does at least allow the game to move on a bit. The issue of whether Zimbabwe should be heaved out of the ICC, or at least have its full member status revoked, remains the elephant in the room. I would not now expect any action this week, but this issue will not go away until Mugabe does, so I'm afraid we will still be talking about it for a while.

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Money won't buy you friends. But it gets you a better class of enemy.
Spike Milligan

I dont even know how to respond to this.does chingoka intend to prove his integrity by this move? the zimbabwe issue has been so severely sabotaged in the last few days with talks of that ridiculous compromise formula and now this news.

Shame on the BCCI battling to protect its interests and its vote bank. the ecb has also sold itself out putting its monetary interests(read hosting the T20 WC) ahead of the actual issue. also the ECB resorted to illegitimate means to garner support( read luring srilanka with an out of turn series) something people would accuse the BCCI of doing in the recent past.

The ECB is as greedy as the BCCI, specially after the Allen Stanford deal and also the following excerpt I got from Cricinfo would also substantiate my feelings.

The source revealed that Giles Clarke, the ECB chairman, who is well-connected in the Middle East, has received an "offer" with prize money that is "clearly more than what is being offered for the Champions League" from an UAE businessman to take part in a similar tournament "with other teams".

i think the ZCU also was in a position to take whatever it got from the ICC. there was strong possibility of a pull out by australia,new zealand and a few more countries if zimbabwe played the T20 WC. Zimbabwe got their test status suspended, no team thinks its a viable option to tour zimbabwe, nor will the zimbabwe matches attract a lot of attention in other places as pakistan found out earlier this year. ZCU pulling out but retaining its full member status means that its ready to take the full member 'perks' from ICC and be content.

its a win-win situation for all the boards, zimbabwe managing to avert a complete stoppage of funds trickling in from ICC, the BCCI managing to save its vote bank and england getting to host its T20 WC. The only losers are cricket and the people suffering in Zimbabwe. I feel disgusted by this turn of events and the appalling 'resolution' of this deadlock after that weird compromise formula wasn't agreed upon whereas a unanimous decision should have been taken by the ICC to throw out zimbabwe. I for one will need to rethink if I should watch the ICC T20 WC 2009 at all.

Thanks

Indeed. I expect it was more a case of certain quarters retaining s "friendly" vote.


Again agreed. But that will by no means be an overnight thing. To my knowledge the whole point of the qualification to being a full member of the ICC was that the country concerned was proven to compete at a sufficient standard at TEST cricket and have the structure in place to maintain that standard. Something that by their own admission ZC is unable to do and likely will be unable to do for some time after Mugabe "leaves".

Is there anyone that comes on her that can give a balanced opinion from within Zimbabwe?

Paoli is our most regular contributor with inside knowledge, I think - but I've not seen him around here for several months.

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Money won't buy you friends. But it gets you a better class of enemy.
Spike Milligan

I am not too sure what to make of this decision, but my gut tells me it is wrong

1. ZCU still maintain an influence within the ICC that they do that at the expense of the people of Zimbabwe
2. The ECB can keep the Twenty20 but it comes at a heavy price to their reputation
3. The BCCI get to keep their "vote bank" intact at the expense of their already low reputation
4. The ICC, with it's standing already looking weak, sink to a new lower level

Sport and Politics don't mix, well I am not so sure, because this smacks of a political decision not a sporting one.

There will be more on this in tomorrow's papers, but I'm not so sure this was a decision as such. To me, it reads like a unilateral action by ZC which makes any immediate decision by the ICC unnecessary. ZC certainly knows its politics and they will doubtless claim the high ground by arguing that they rule their own cricket, and no-one else does. I'm not too happy that the ICC has got away (again) with being allowed to sit on its hands, and of course this is entirely political - sport has nothing to do with it.

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Money won't buy you friends. But it gets you a better class of enemy.
Spike Milligan

Well OF so what if the ZCU have volunteered not to turn up in England for the World Cup?.

What difference will that make?, surely after the 20/20 World Cup - everything will be back to square one.

LINK: BBC SPORT | Cricket | Zimbabwe to miss World Twenty20
Well I would not be so smug if I were the ECB, they have not come out of this well.
So what - They knew they could never take part in England. Zimbabwe has lost this minuscule battle, but I bet they have won the war - with what influence they still have.
LINK: BBC SPORT | Cricket | Zimbabwe decision pleases ECB boss

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Ern

Well not quite in all senses. The message coming out of the ICC, fromJames Fitzgerald an ICC spokesman (and from Chingoka separately) is that countries will need to decide whether they wish to play Zimbabwe or not. This only applies of course to countries whose governments have instructed the National boards not to play Zimbabwe either at home or away.

It's also perfectly true that this existed before the ICC conference, so in that sense nothing has changed.

What amused me the most (if anyone could posibly derive any amusement from this rediculous nonsense) was Chingoka stating at the end of his statement "...more tours with our Asian friendss, specially India." Considering the BCCI consider Zimbabwe as an 'un-profitable' side to play, I'm very interested to see just how many games Zimbabwe play against their new 'Asian' friends'.

They've very much won the war.

It's common knowledge in negotiation, that you define beforehand precisely what positive outcomes you want to win and what you're willing to concede to win those outcomes. It's bartering, you give up concessions to win concessions.

However, there is nearly always some concessions you're not willing to barter and for Chingoka and Zimbabwe those two were the income they recieve as a full member and the vote they recieve as a full member.

Considering all they've conceeded to retain those two 'un-barterables' was to withdraw from next years T20 World Cup, I'd say they've hardly given up any concessions at all to retain their full membership.