Now, you can get all the USA Cricket updates via Facebook.   Also follow us on Twitter via @dreamcricket

By Peter Della Penna

An official involved with Dallas area cricket is unhappy with the decision to remove the USACA Twenty20 Nationals from the Central West, disputing the statement made on Wednesday by USACA General Manager Manaf Mohamed that it had to do with an inability to finalize a budget.

“It may have to do with the budget as far as USACA is concerned, but not from the Central West,” said the official on Thursday afternoon, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “If they had a problem with the budget, if it was too much or whatever, that wasn’t communicated to us. So I’m surprised to learn it’s a budget issue.”

“To say that this is a Central West budgetary issue is wrong. It’s a USACA budgetary issue. You’ve got to spend money regardless of where you hold it. So I’m really curious to know how much they are spending for the tournament in New Jersey now.”

The official said that the first time he learned that the tournament was moved from Dallas to New Jersey was after it was reported through this web site. No one from USACA communicated it and the last time any information was communicated by USACA to officials in Dallas was more than a week ago.

However, the biggest issue according to the official is the fact that this decision has fractured relationships at the local level in Dallas between the cricket officials and local government, businesses, potential sponsors and media.

Image (right) - A layout of Russell Creek Park in Plano, Texas. All four matches could have taken place at the same ground in Plano whereas matches in New Jersey will most likely be played at three or four separate facilities.

“I’ve burnt a lot of bridges,” said the official. “I had excellent relationships with a lot of people in Plano. Tomorrow, we still have to conduct our league’s games here and tomorrow if I need to go to the city for any infrastructure improvement, they’ll say, ‘Hey, you know what? You’re a joker. You said the national tournament was coming here. Nothing came here. This game is never ever gonna grow. I’m actually going to cut you from two grounds to one ground.’ Then what am I gonna do? That is the real problem.”

“It was such a waste of a whole lot of people’s time, including the city of Plano. We had many meetings with them to convince them on how this is really gonna take off and help this city.”

The official says that more than 70 rooms were blocked off at an area hotel for teams to use during the tournament, but the hotel management became increasingly agitated as they had not yet received a deposit from USACA and as such they would not be willing to continue to reserve the rooms.

“The hotel wanted at least the first night’s pay because they were turning away every other customer,” said the official. “We had booked this for two or three weeks while negotiations with USACA were going on. USACA said they would pay. They said they had written to Dainty and they were waiting on his approval. Then no word came… there was absolutely no response from Manaf or John Thickett or Dainty.”

“I feel bad. I burnt my bridges with some of the people, with the hotel guy because he held on for two or three weeks without giving rooms to anybody. I can’t compensate for his lack of revenue now.”

Plans had also been put in place with the city of Plano to make improvements to the cricket facilities at Russell Creek Park before the start of the tournament, but they could not start work until they received a 100% confirmation from USACA to stage the tournament.

“We had four grounds all in a single facility in Russell Creek Park. I had spoken to the city to get the [astroturf wickets] replaced and everything, get it spruced up for the national tournament. They agreed to do it,” said the official. “We talked to the contractors. We had started project managing that and we had to start pulling back everything because everybody was waiting on some advance deposit payment. The physical work to start the relaying of the pitches fortunately did not start because we would have been in a financial hole.”