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Cricket Canada announced today that USA will join Canada, Afghanistan and Trinidad and Tobago in the 2011 Etihad Summer Cricket Festival which begins August 11th.
"Part of the mandate of the festival is to assist with the development of cricket in the region. Last year we were able to bring in Bermuda and this year we are excited to share this opportunity with USACA," Cricket Canada President Ranjit Saini said.
"The inclusion of the USA adds some more excitement to an already riveting schedule. The addition of Canada vs. USA and USA vs. Afghanistan to the slate is sure to draw interest from around the world," Mr. Saini added.
The 2011 Etihad Summer Festival also marks the resumption of the K.A. Auty Trophy, which is the oldest international sporting contest in the world. This historic 2-day match featuring USA and Canada will be played in Toronto on August 15th and August 16th.
USA vs Canada contests began in 1844. Forty three matches were played until 1912 when the series was interrupted by world events. USA won 27 and Canada won 11 matches. Six were drawn.
Through the efforts of John Marder of USA and Donald King of Canada, the event was revived in 1963 and USA presented the KA Auty Trophy in memory of Karl Andre Auty. Mr. Auty was a driving force for cricket in North America for roughly five decades beginning 1909 until his death in Chicago in 1959.
Between 1963 and 1980, USA and Canada contested for the KA Trophy. After a three year break, the series resumed again in 1983 through the efforts of Naseeruddin Khan of USACA and Jack Kyle of CCA. The last match was held in Toronto in September of 1995. It was the 69th encounter and was won handily by Canada.
In 1996, the KA Auty Trophy was shelved for a more lucrative India-Pakistan encounter. Saibal Chatterjee wrote in the October 2, 1996 edition of the Outlook magazine that "this year, cricket's oldest surviving rivalry had to make way for the contemporary game's most lucrative match-up: India vs Pakistan. To accommodate the nine-day Sahara Cup '96 in Toronto—the first edition of a series of five one-dayers scheduled to be played annually between the arch-rivals—the Canadian Cricket Association (CCA) chose to shelve the Auty Trophy tie until next year. They sacrificed a bit of the past to get a hold on the future. And gladly."
Mr. Chatterjee wrote that "Canada plans to develop infrastructural facilities so that it can co-host the 2003 World Cup."
When asked in 2003 regarding the rumors surrounding world cup fixtures in North America, Dr. Ali Bacher, the World Cup chief told the BBC: "In theory the idea of playing cricket in the USA is a good one. But you can't only go to the US for the Cricket World Cup; it has to be a strategy. It would have to be a cricketing entrée for the USA market, you can't stop there it would not make sense to have World Cup cricket in the USA and then for the sport to just disappear. It needs to be carefully worked out, and it has to be a long term strategy." In any event, the World Cup never came to North America and the KA Auty Trophy went into cold storage.
Until its present resurrection in the new millennium. For the history of the tournament, the win-loss record is USA (32) and Canada (27).
2011 Etihad Summer Festival Schedule
T20 Matches:
11th August: Afghanistan v T & T, Canada v USA
12th August: Canada v Afghanistan, T & T v USA
13th August: Afghanistan v USA, Canada v T & T
K.A. Auty Cup:
15th-16th August: Canada v USA
Postscript: USA has not yet announced a team for the tournament. Manaf Mohamed of USACA confirmed that USACA had accepted the invitation from Cricket Canada. However, some members of the USA squad expressed inability to travel due to work commitments. As of today, a team had not yet been decided, he said.