by The Board of Directors of England and Wales was accused of having made disabled cricket less inclusive, while several players have already resigned to protest after the director “rationalized” three teams from England in a mixed disability configuration.
The very first international series of bunability in the world – which means open to all disabilities – will take place in England against India in June and July. The format reflects the first intimate invalid league of England by bringing together the physical disability teams (PD), the learning handicap (LD) and the deaf teams to play as a group.
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But players are concerned about the fact that the decision will reduce the opportunities of disabled cricket players at the elite level and promote the most capable of them. Two deaf players have already withdrawn from the selection, after the announcement of the change to all the players in December, they say, no consultation.
Liam Thomas, who was a goalkeeper from the England PD team until his retirement in January, said he was concerned about changes. Although he added that there was an excitement among some players on the chance to play an international match at Lord’s this summer as part of the Pan-Mamage series as well as a double-head with the England women’s team which will be projected live on Sky Sports.
“This is an excellent opportunity. And in theory, it works,” said Thomas. “The ECB will have a cost, a tour fee, a set of expenses, a set of coach staff – it checks all the right boxes. But when you start to break it down and discover the concerns of people, you go to Nitty-Gritty.
“How will they communicate? How will each deficiency be assigned? If you only have five PD points in the England team, how can you develop a physical disability cricket and develop our basin of players? It is limiting opportunities.”
Communication between deaf people and hearing players is a big problem. While the ECB presents sign language training during the squad weekends, a deaf cricket player in England said it would have little impact. “This reduces BSL [British Sign Language]A rich language, in a tick box exercise. You would not say: ‘A French player joined us but it’s ok because we have all learned to say anomaly“He said.
“Deaf cricket allows everyone to play our best cricket because it removes all the deafness.
“We have hammered so many different accessibility problems with the DPL, and the ECB has done nothing on this subject.”
The player in question withdrew from the India series.
Although there are rules in place to prevent the DPL teams from being fully selected from a group of disabled people, a figure close to the national configuration told the Guardian that there were concerns among coaches that the players of the deaf groups and apprenticeship disorders would be sidelined in the India series.
“In the last three DPL finals, the 12th man of each team has always been an apprenticeship disability player,” they said. “You must have four letters bordered by each group – the LD and the deaf players have always biss four, then you have 12 overshots bordered by the guys from the PD.” The four captains of 2024 Disability Premier League came from the PD group, while the PD player Callum Flynn will be captain of England against India.
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Dr. Ben Powis, lecturer in sport at the University of Bournemouth and the main author of the report, criticized the BCE plans. “The rationalization of these squads means that there will be players with certain disabilities which will now be frozen in international cricket,” he said. “The ECB has created a system in which people can fail.” The ECB says that its objective is to encourage more countries to align the sides of the handicaps, paving the way for a world cup for disabled people, but the players have questioned it, especially since no other nation is currently playing in panoramic cricket.
“It’s colonial, in a way,” said a deaf player in England. “The framing of messages around him is:” We are ahead of the world, we are the first, we are those who decide where it goes “.
A spokesperson for the ECB said: “We are saddened to learn this player’s experiences in the Premier League for Disabilities. We talked to the player in question after last summer to try to understand how the invalidity program could ensure that deaf players felt included in mixed disability cricket groups, and this summer, we introduced 17 hours of inclusion training in all disorder groups, compulsory for all players.
“Gathering the cricket players from different deficiency groups is extremely exciting, but it is not without challenges and we always seek to make sure that each individual in the configuration feels included, supported and capable of prospering. This summer, we will test the international cricket of mixed handicaps because we think that this creates a product that will bring more players and more fans.”
