Thursday evening’s storms (which may have continued into the early hours of Friday) resulted in the scheduled Global T20 Canada game between Vancouver Knights and Edmonton Royals being abandoned without a ball being bowled at the Maple Leaf Cricket Club, King City, Ontario on Friday (July 6, 2018). Work done last year on drainage was proven to be successful on the day although the tardiness of the leadership of the Toronto & District Cricket Association (TDCA) in addressing the drainage system is, in my opinion, a disgrace. One wonders if some of these leaders are really thinking about the needs for quality outfields and pitches. Back in August 2009 the southern end of the ODI ground being used for the GT20 was under a lot of water when rains poured down during the ODI series between Canada and Kenya.

The TDCA, effectively, control the purse strings of the trust under which the Maple Leaf ground operates. Probably one or two of the leaders will be telling some folks about the effort that has gone in to improving the drainage, ignoring a gap of almost 8 years in shaping up to take serious measures to deal with the problem. Some of the league standings in the Elite and SuperElite divisions reflect several games washed out in some recent seasons. Clubs have put money into playing in Canada’s largest cricket league in those seasons where little action was approved to address drainage issues.

The game start time for Friday’s game had been advanced to 11am from 4pm, as had the starts on Wednesday and Thursday. A move made to accommodate the global TV audience in the Indian sub-continent. Hopefully nobody from the likes of California drove up anticipating a 4pm start then found the start had been advanced to 11am. The world of civil law with juries awarding all kinds of damages in courts within the USA is not a setting where Canadian cricket would wish to become entangled in my opinion. It proved to be an interesting journey to the ground with the west-east subway line being slow due to some incident at Ossington. I diverted by bus to pick up some bits and pieces then joined the south-north subway at St Clair West. Things moved slowly for whatever reason on the way to Vaughan Metropolitan Centre. The VIVA Orange and 88 Bathurst helped me to the ground by about 12.15pm and I was able to copy a sizeable folder (96Gb) of still pictures and video before heading back to Toronto after the game had been abandoned.

Some might find it interesting that the printed tickets show the teams as Vancouver and Edmonton (11am start) whereas the “It’s On” and “We’re Ready” flyers include a schedule where the game is between Knights and Royals (4pm start). At least I put some money into the tournament with my ticket purchase.

Let’s hope for play in today’s two games.

Eddie Norfolk