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Black cricketers (English Cricket)

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
There was an article somewhere else along these lines a little while ago, can't remember where. Don't know if it was discussed in CW, though.
 

BoyBrumby

Englishman
Think the article covers it pretty well. More & more of the talented black kids who would've played cricket a generation ago are playing football. Conversely there are next to no British Asian professional footballers (Michael Chopra is the only one I can think of off the top of my head) but we have a healthy sprinkling in our cricket team.
 

Spitfires_Fan

State Vice-Captain
Yeah, was a good article I thought. It'll be interesting to see how Robbie Joseph develops for Kent. He had made a good start to the season before his horror match against Durham a couple of weeks ago.
 

Goughy

Hall of Fame Member
There are a number of reasons why as alluded to in the article.

Firstly, the changing demographics of the black population in the UK.
Between 1980 and 1997 10 black players debuted for England and only 2 of them (Syd and Neil Williams) were born in England. Lewis, Benjamin, Malcolm, DeFreitas, Small, Slack, Cowans and Roland Butcher (no relation to Mark Butcher) were all born in the West Indies.

England has never had a track record of producing British-born black cricketers.

In 1997 Mark Butcher and Dean Headley debuted. I wouldnt include them in this discussion for 2 reasons. Firstly they are not a typical product of a system as they come from cricketing dynasties with both their fathers being Test cricketers (Headley, father and Grandfather for WI and Butcher, father for England) and they grew up around the County scene. Secondly, they are mixed race.

In the 10 years since 1997 only Alex Tudor has played Test cricket for England.

THere are a number of reasons why, as the article touch on some.

1) Less first generation West Indians brought up on cricket in the Islands.

2) The change in the education system where school sport in the state system was reduced since 1985 and beyond.

3) The explosion of the Premier League and the domination of soccer. Football is easier to get into, pays better, is more glamerous etc. No suprises that more people play it and want to play it. For example in my year group at school out of 130 boys only 2 played cricket and football was the only sport the school offered.

4) Small black population to start with so no real suprise that there are not that many playing. According to the CIA Factbook the UK (as the cricket team doesnt purely draw from England) the population is 2% black.

5) Fashion. West Indian/Black players were very fashionable in the 1980s and going into the 1990s due to the incredible WI team of the time. This led to a number being selected. In fact a Wisden from the 1980s suggests limiting the number of West Indians a team could have. We have seen similar with Australians being fashionable in the 1990s (Mullally, White, McCague, Gallian, Adam Hollioake, Ben Hollioake). All part of England consciencely or subconsciencely attempting to mimic what superior teams were doing at the time with inferior players.

The numbers may be down at the moment but I would suggest that the 1980s had an unrealistic participation level that was always unlikely to be maintained. The current levels are probably closer to the natural 'norms' even if they may be on the low side of that.
 
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BoyBrumby

Englishman
There are a number of reasons why as alluded to in the article.

Firstly, the changing demographics of the black population in the UK.
Between 1980 and 1997 10 black players debuted for England and only 2 of them (Syd and Neil Williams) were born in England. Lewis, Benjamin, Malcolm, DeFreitas, Small, Slack, Cowans and Roland Butcher (no relation to Mark Butcher) were all born in the West Indies.

England has never had a track record of producing British-born black cricketers.

In 1997 Mark Butcher and Dean Headley debuted. I wouldnt include them in this discussion for 2 reasons. Firstly they are not a typical product of a system as they come from cricketing dynasties with both their fathers being Test cricketers (Headley, father and Grandfather for WI and Butcher, father for England) and they grew up around the County scene. Secondly, they are mixed race.

In the 10 years since 1997 only Alex Tudor has played Test cricket for England.

THere are a number of reasons why, as the article touch on some.

1) Less first generation West Indians brought up on cricket in the Islands.

2) The change in the education system where school sport in the state system was reduced since 1985 and beyond.

3) The explosion of the Premier League and the domination of soccer. Football is easier to get into, pays better, is more glamerous etc. No suprises that more people play it and want to play it. For example in my year group at school out of 130 boys only 2 played cricket and football was the only sport the school offered.

4) Small black population to start with so no real suprise that there are not that many playing. According to the CIA Factbook the UK (as the cricket team doesnt purely draw from England) the population is 2% black.

5) Fashion. West Indian/Black players were very fashionable in the 1980s and going into the 1990s due to the incredible WI team of the time. This led to a number being selected. In fact a Wisden from the 1980s suggests limiting the number of West Indians a team could have. We have seen similar with Australians being fashionable in the 1990s (Mullally, White, McCague, Gallian, Adam Hollioake, Ben Hollioake). All part of England consciencely or subconsciencely attempting to mimic what superior teams were doing at the time with inferior players.

The numbers may be down at the moment but I would suggest that the 1980s had an unrealistic participation level that was always unlikely to be maintained. The current levels are probably closer to the natural 'norms' even if they may be on the low side of that.
Yeah, that pretty much covers it. Other possible factors are our black population still being primarily urban based (mainly in London & Birmingham) where there's limited first-hand exposure to cricket &, as integration continues over the generations, the influence of cricketing loving parents, grandparents & great-grandparents wanes; & the fact that West Indian cricket itself is in a bit of a fallow period, so young black kids don't have the heroes to look up to & emulate anymore.

What's possibly more interesting is why there are so few Asian footballers. The fact that we have so many young Asian cricketers does suggest they perhaps have a stronger cultural bond to the sport, but it also possibly denotes a lesser level of integration into mainstream British culture. Sad to say but in England in sporting terms football pretty much is mainstream culture.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
Love the way there's this assumption that black British kids would have Caribbean heroes, anyway...
 

Goughy

Hall of Fame Member
Love the way there's this assumption that black British kids would have Caribbean heroes, anyway...
Yeah agreed. Hashim Amla had Steve Waugh as his hero and rolemodel. There is no reason why a persons hero has to be of the same nationality or ethnicity.

One would guess that the some of the best selling football tops with white kids in the UK include guys like Drogba, Henry etc
 
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BoyBrumby

Englishman
There's no guarantee that they will or should, but I'd say a lot of black kids probably do have black heroes & role models and, as a minority, it's only healthy they do. I bet a heck of a lot more black kids look up to (say) Muhammad Ali or Michael Jordan than they do any current English cricketer.
 

BoyBrumby

Englishman
But there are famous black guys everywhere, too - not just in the Caribbean.
Not in the current England team tho, which is sort of the article's point. If there aren't black role models in cricket black talent is more likely to be lost to other sports where there is significant black representation.

Mihir Bose's article touches on my point:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/mihirbose/2007/04/where_have_englands_black_cric.html

"They (the EBC) want a strong West Indies team, or at least a stronger one than at present, as this would help create the sort of role models so essential if Afro-Carribean cricketers are once again to take centre stage in the English game."
 

HeathDavisSpeed

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
There's a few cricketers of West Indian descent around in England, they just aren't good enough or old enough to be playing for the England team.

There's Westfield and Chambers at Essex.
Carberry at Hampshire...

Okay, now I'm out of ideas...

But there are some around. Certain teams just need to look at the Essex model of having training camps in the inner cities. Ravi Bopara, Graham Gooch and Nasser Hussain were all schooled at the Ilford version, so maybe those counties which serve big cities need to take advantage of this more.
 

HeathDavisSpeed

Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
Mali Richards? I think so, but I don't think he plays much first class. Not good enough apparently.

Gordon Greenidge's son also played, but suffered from a similar problem (as in not as good as the dad)
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
Carl Greenidge is totally different to Dad, TBH. Seam-bowler. And no, not a very good one. But has still managed, like so many, to move around and remain on the fringe of several sides.
 

Nishant

International 12th Man
There are a number of reasons why as alluded to in the article.

Firstly, the changing demographics of the black population in the UK.
Between 1980 and 1997 10 black players debuted for England and only 2 of them (Syd and Neil Williams) were born in England. Lewis, Benjamin, Malcolm, DeFreitas, Small, Slack, Cowans and Roland Butcher (no relation to Mark Butcher) were all born in the West Indies.

England has never had a track record of producing British-born black cricketers.

In 1997 Mark Butcher and Dean Headley debuted. I wouldnt include them in this discussion for 2 reasons. Firstly they are not a typical product of a system as they come from cricketing dynasties with both their fathers being Test cricketers (Headley, father and Grandfather for WI and Butcher, father for England) and they grew up around the County scene. Secondly, they are mixed race.

In the 10 years since 1997 only Alex Tudor has played Test cricket for England.

THere are a number of reasons why, as the article touch on some.

1) Less first generation West Indians brought up on cricket in the Islands.

2) The change in the education system where school sport in the state system was reduced since 1985 and beyond.

3) The explosion of the Premier League and the domination of soccer. Football is easier to get into, pays better, is more glamerous etc. No suprises that more people play it and want to play it. For example in my year group at school out of 130 boys only 2 played cricket and football was the only sport the school offered.

4) Small black population to start with so no real suprise that there are not that many playing. According to the CIA Factbook the UK (as the cricket team doesnt purely draw from England) the population is 2% black.

5) Fashion. West Indian/Black players were very fashionable in the 1980s and going into the 1990s due to the incredible WI team of the time. This led to a number being selected. In fact a Wisden from the 1980s suggests limiting the number of West Indians a team could have. We have seen similar with Australians being fashionable in the 1990s (Mullally, White, McCague, Gallian, Adam Hollioake, Ben Hollioake). All part of England consciencely or subconsciencely attempting to mimic what superior teams were doing at the time with inferior players.

The numbers may be down at the moment but I would suggest that the 1980s had an unrealistic participation level that was always unlikely to be maintained. The current levels are probably closer to the natural 'norms' even if they may be on the low side of that.
good points there TBH...covers the reasons quite well.
 

wpdavid

Hall of Fame Member
Linked to the decline of WI as a force in international cricket, there's been a sharp reduction in the number of overseas players from the WI in the CC. Going back 20-30 years, loads of them played here, and most were highly successful. In fact, there weren't many WI players from the early 70's to early 90's who didn't play in the CC at some stage of their careers. Nowadays, there's very few, and that alone will account for some of the decrease in numbers. That's before you consider the knock-on effect in terms of their being role models and encouraging black kids in this country to play the game.
 

Kweek

Cricketer Of The Year
Linked to the decline of WI as a force in international cricket, there's been a sharp reduction in the number of overseas players from the WI in the CC. Going back 20-30 years, loads of them played here, and most were highly successful. In fact, there weren't many WI players from the early 70's to early 90's who didn't play in the CC at some stage of their careers. Nowadays, there's very few, and that alone will account for some of the decrease in numbers. That's before you consider the knock-on effect in terms of their being role models and encouraging black kids in this country to play the game.
I seriously read Norwayese
:ph34r:
 

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