Stanford 20/20 For 20: Money, The Root of All Good

The richest single sporting match in history is only days away and while many find the whole affair philosophically and economically repugnant, our man in Fabian infatuated London, The Tooting Trumpet, chooses, in the following article, to view the match and the tournament that precedes it with a rebellious coherent optimism that cheerfully challenges the prevailing intellectual condescension of  capitalist philanthropy.

Ayn Rand liked money – not just in the way that you and I (and Homer Simpson) like money – but philosophically, even viscerally. She expressed this veneration of money most explicitly in Francisco’s speech from her novel, Atlas Shrugged.

Ayn Rand writes this warning to finish the speech –

“Until and unless you discover that money is the root of all good, you ask for your own destruction. When money ceases to be the tool by which men deal with one another, then men become the tools of men. Blood, whips and guns – or dollars. Take your choice – there is no other – and your time is running out.”

It’s likely that Sir Allen Stanford, a man whose business is described as wealth management, subscribes to Ayn Rand’s robust defence of money as the best means for people to deal with each other. His instigation of the Stanford 20/20 for 20 series of matches on his own ground in Antigua has placed money at the heart of cricket in much the same way as the first round of IPL auctions did less than twelve months ago.

Inevitably, this foregrounding of money (and its extent – $20,000,000 to the winners of next Saturday’s match between the Stanford Superstars and England) has produced any amount of hand-wringing in the Press and in the comments sections of many blogs.

But why is Stanford, who is ploughing unheard of sums into West Indian cricket which faced a very real prospect of being marginalised at world level and regional level before this sugar daddy turned up, so vilified by so many? The Trumpet boils down the objections into three main areas.

(i) He is American, looks American and acts American and therefore cannot be trusted.

Where is the evidence for this view? He has lived in the West Indies for years and has put his money where his mouth is. He appears to be genuinely liked and respected in the Caribbean and, unlike some wealthy Americans elsewhere in the world, has embraced the local culture rather than imposed his own. He built a cricket ground when he could have built a baseball or basketball stadium.

(ii) It’s distasteful, this gaudy display of money, the helicopter landing at Lord’s, the quick surrender of the ECB to his dubious charms.

But isn’t this pure hypocrisy? If we’re fortunate enough to have a job, we sell our skills for money – few of us would turn down the opportunity to sell those skills for hugely more money, especially if we had our employer’s backing.

(iii) It will imbalance both the game, through promoting T20 at the expense of Tests and through making very wealthy men of some players, but not all.

Not so long ago, the talk was of player burnout through too many Tests. (And how many T20 games does it take to equal the physical and mental effort of a Test? Five? Ten? Probably twenty). Perhaps we need fewer Tests to make them the marquee events they should be and not the treadmill they have become.

If the Game’s leadership (a bigger constituency than just the ICC) can sort out a proper calendar for world cricket, T20, ODIs and Tests can cohabit comfortably. Some players might specialise in T20, but it won’t be many and any young player would have to be mad to turn down Test cricket as the rewards are substantial and the glory great.

Dressing rooms might divide between Ferraris and BMWs but cricket has always accommodated Maharajahs and paupers. It happens in other employment situations, indeed in life, and leadership is what deals with it.

So let’s go back to my quote above, specifically, “Blood, whips and guns – or dollars. Take your choice – there is no other – and your time is running out.”

The Stanford players have taken the dollars: their detractors have not threatened physical violence, but a more subtle violence by calling into question their integrity, their sense of the game’s history and their willingness to make a quick buck over the long term health of the game. The players haven’t snapped back yet, and that is to their credit.

Come the showdown on Saturday, The Trumpet is looking forward to seeing professional cricketers giving their all for their team, playing hard but playing fair and, yes, playing for money. The Trumpet might not like the winner takes all format, but other than that, he wouldn’t have it any other way.