New ICC Associate and Affiliate Participation Figures
The ICC have released their annual development research participation figures for 2007.
Overall Figures (Top 20)
1. Uganda 32,923
2. Scotland 25,476
3. USA 20,054
4. Canada 19,202
5. Malaysia 13,659
6. Suriname 12,750
7. Ireland 12,322
8. Germany 12,081
9. Afghanistan 12,000 (*Approx)
10. Nepal 11,944
11. Namibia 10,473
12. Denmark 10,276
13. Vanuatu 10,025
14. UAE 8,675
15. Japan 6,913
16. Kenya 6,806
17. Indonesia 6,161
18. Guernsey 5,165
19. Holland 4,835
20. Italy 4,734
Senior/Junior Players
1. USA 15,540
2. Afghanistan 12,000 * (approx)
3. Nepal 9,750
4. Canada 9,585
5. Scotland 9,135
6. Malaysia 8,805
7. Ireland 8,055
8. UAE 5,225
9. Holland 3,585
10. Saudi Arabia 3,455
11. Vanuatu 2,505
12. Guernsey 2,225
13. Singapore 2,160
14. Indonesia 2,010
15. Denmark 1,900
16. Hong Kong 1,860
17. Nigeria 1,815
18. Japan 1,755
19. Namibia 1,720
20. Bermuda 1,590
Junior Involvement/Kanga/Kwik etc
1. Uganda 31,193
2. Scotland 16,341
3. Suriname 12,300
4. Germany 10,966
5. Canada 9,617
6. Namibia 8,753
7. Denamrk 8,376
8. Vanuatu 7,520
9. Kenya 5,891
10. Japan 5,158
11. Malaysia 4,854
12. USA 4,514
13. Ireland 4,267
14. Indonesia 4,151
15. Italy 3,849
16. UAE 3,450
17. Argentina 3,275
18. Guernsey 2,940
19. Hong Kong 2,684
20. Thailand 2,573
Largest Increases
1. Suriname + 12,120
2. Germany + 6,894
3. Scotland + 4,226
4. USA + 3,912
5. Canada + 3,696
6. Vanuatu + 3,056
7. Japan + 2,912
8. Malaysia + 2,337
9. Nepal + 2,124
10. Denmark + 2,043
11. Indonesia + 1,551
12. Bhutan + 1,435
13. Samoa + 1,158
14. Bermuda + 1,134
15. Italy + 1,034
16. Singapore + 1,010
17. Kenya + 976
18. Ghana + 965
19. Austria + 866
20. Finland + 760
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Global Cricket
I thought it was about time I started my own blog. I have followed associate and affiliate cricket since 1998. Tony Munro’s BTTW column was a great inspiration. Global Cricket will specifically focus on the non-test playing cricket nations of the world. At present there are 91 countries that have associate or affiliate membership of The International Cricket Council. Most of these nations aspire to play at the highest level. How are they bridging the gap in standards? Do they have good facilities, strong development programs and sound administrative practices in place? There is a need for cricket to embrace a more diverse cultural outlook if it is to prosper in the future. The ICC’s global development program was first initiated in 1997 and began to really take shape after the 2001 ICC Trophy in Toronto, Canada. Although a new cricketing powerhouse is yet to emerge, it is clear that standards are improving dramatically and in time more nations will be able to compete with the 10 full members. I will be featuring newspaper articles of interest, opinion pieces and articles written by myself and some ideas about expanding the game. Please feel free to comment.-Ben Stinga
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Recent Comments
Uganda’s not mucking about, are they? The gap in the overall numbers between them and Scotland is bigger than Kenya’s entire player base! Most in the Kanga/Kwik scene, but that’ll change over time.
The German board needn’t be too shy either, having managed to double their player pool, another year like this and they’ll be within the top 5, even half that gain would put them close to that area.
Nepal aren’t doing too shabby, what I like is that a vast majority of their players are playing at a level beyond Kanga/Kwik cricket.
It’ll be interesting to see next year if Ireland’s WC sucess can encourage some growth, they had
a poor increase, failing to make it into the top 20, but things like the WC results take time to translate into numbers.
Overall it looks ile Kanga and Kwik are proving to be big introductions into the sport, there’ll still be a lot of work needed to help kids progress to proper cricket, but it’s still encouraging.
That said, some serious questions need to be asked…
Firstly the USA, they’ve got great numbers, but can’t seem to make anything of it, plus, the big question is how much of their numbers came from NON cricketing circles. It would also be interesting to know just how much of it’s numbers increase is due to the hard work of individuals (as opposed to the USACA). Also per capita of the U.S. population, the numbers are tiny.
The Netherlands are 19th out of the top 20 overall, don’t even feature on the growth top 20, that’s some serious alarm bell material, the KNCB needs to start acting. If Japan managed to get more players overall than they did, that’s a serious warning sign. For a country that wants test status, there’s a lot to be done.
These numbers would seem to indicate that cricket’s associates and affiliates are deserving of some development assistance.
Maybe a large proportion of the USA numbers are players yet to qualify?
Good figures this year. Around 340,000 players outside the test nations now.
Yeah kanga, kwik (or programs like), schools clinics and television really raise the numbers or better still all four at once in some countries!
Those numbers look pathetic for some countries. But I guess it is a good beginning.
It would be interesting if the figures were compared to populations and also if we could find out no. of players in England for comparison purposes
More than 800,000 eastern Europeans have registered to work in Britain in the last 4 years, half a million from Poland. If a number of them do return home, perhaps they would take a love of cricket with them and boost the sport in their homelands.
What is the cricket situation in the former Eastern Bloc countries, I’ve not heard much about it?
One concern is that for countries like Canada is that the Kanga cricket numbers are being used to pad the overall total. A large number of children may be exposed to cricket through a Kanga cricket session at their schools. However, more detail is required to find the number of students participating regularly. Also, how many Kanga cricket kids go on to join their local clubs? Not many, I would wager. So the numbers, while encouraging, only tell half the story.
It will be interesting to follow Uganda’s progress over the next decade in terms of senior participation and international success. Namibia and Bermuda’s numbers are surprisingly low given their success.
Ray
Yep, true! I suppose in some countries without the kwik/kanka/etc programs, very few would ever learn about the game but converting these novices into hardball cricketers is a key.
Tom
That’s a really interesting observation. That could really have an interesting spin-off for cricket in Eastern Europe much like it did for Afghanistan when the Afghan people sheltered in Pakistan for a period.
Ben,
what would really be interesting is to divide these figures by a country’s population and find the percentage of the population that these numbers constitute (remember however that for places like Ireland it would be for the population of the whole island and for Scotland it would be the residents in Scotland). I’m sure if this was done there would be a whole different set of countries for “Overall Participation”, “Senior/Junior Participation”, Junior Involvement/Kanga/Kwik Participation” and “Largest Increases in Participation”. If any country managed to feature in the top 20 for the straight figures and in the participation rate then that would be a country that might really be worth watching.
Divide the number by population and it’s great for small country like Nepal.