Cricket and the Commonwealth continue to march together. The intricacies of both are difficult to explain, but both continue to thrive.

“Cricket and the Commonwealth continue to march together. The intricacies of both are difficult to explain, but both continue to thrive.”

The Rt Hon Sir John Major, KG, CH, on the game that provides “the cement that keeps together 53 diverse nations”

London, 16 October 2009. Cricket and the Commonwealth are ‘two institutions that inter-link and endure’, said former United Kingdom Prime Minister Sir John Major at a dinner to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Modern Commonwealth at Lord’s Cricket Ground, London, on 14 October 2009.

“The well-being of Nations often hangs on the affection between populations, and even on relations between individuals in Government”, said Sir John.

“In the Commonwealth, the King of Sports is cricket. I rarely had a meeting with a Caribbean leader – or an Indian or a Pakistani – without it featuring. With Australians, cricket was almost a formal agenda item.”

Sir John spoke of the bonds of shared Commonwealth values, many of which find expression in cricket. He also spoke of nations defining and advancing themselves though the “magic [of cricket] that was a guiding light for the dispossessed and the disenfranchised”.

“Over many decades, cricket has, for some, been an escape from obscurity to fame, poverty to comfort, exclusion to inclusion.”

Sir John was joined by Test Match cricketers from around the Commonwealth, chaired in discussion by BBC cricket correspondent Jonathan Agnew. The cast included Mike Brearley (England), Steve Elworthy (South Africa), Farokh Engineer (India), Geoff Howarth (New Zealand), Clive Lloyd (West Indies), Derek Underwood (England) and Sidath Wettimuny (Sri Lanka). Bob Cowper (Australia) and Asif Iqbal (Pakistan) were to have joined the panel, but were, at the last minute, unable to attend.

The panel discussed Sir John’s assertion that “because cricket is a game of the mind, the way it is played reflects the very marrow of the nation from which the players come”. Each discussed the way that their country had, in Agnew’s words, “taken the game in its own direction”, giving it individuality within its communality.

“In the Commonwealth,” said Sir John, “cricket is an invisible bond, a shared love that brings people together. Cricket is cohesive.”

Cricket and the Commonwealth, he concluded, “are linked by history, and have evolved over time to reflect our shared interests, common goals, sense of fair play – and sense of fun”.

Commonwealth Secretary-General Kamalesh Sharma said: “Sir John has spoken with great insight about the quality of the Commonwealth as an association of nations, and the defining values, the history, the common systems, and the shared concerns that bind it together. Cricket is an extraordinarily powerful bond between the nations of the Commonwealth”.

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