The first question that occurred was how the England and Wales Cricket Board could allow Azeem Rafiq, a player without a full British passport, to skipper its under-15 and under-16 national sides?

It transpires that, a little like football where the likes of Ryan Giggs played for England Schoolboys before deciding to represent Wales at senior level, a player's country of origin is not an issue in schoolboy cricket.

Maybe it's time that all sports closed that particular loophole.

Nobody wants to pressure young sportsmen or women into ill-thought out decisions that they later regret or are forced to live with but a simple yes or no to an international call-up would surely suffice.

Accept the honour and you are making a binding choice. Nice and simple.

If Pakistan-born Rafiq had had a British passport the ECB was happy to simply backdate his registration and overlook Yorkshire's oversight.

The discovery that he didn't meant Yorkshire would have had to de-register Rana Naved-ul-Hasan as their overseas player and name Rafiq in his place to meet the qualification criteria.

The other irony here is that Rafiq had no major influence on the game in question, Yorkshire's nine-wicket Northern Division win over Nottinghamshire at Trent Bridge on June 27 that decided which of the two would progress to the last-eight and earn a trip to Durham.
The off-spinner took 0-18 and didn't bat.

From Yorkshire's point of view, they will rue the errors that cost them a shot at reaching finals day for the first time and with it a chance to compete for the £2.5m in prize money on offer in the inaugural end-of-season Champions League competition.

The county's chief executive, Stewart Regan, and director of cricket, Martyn Moxon, in particular have come in for some unprecedented criticism since the ECB took the unusual step of postponing the quarter-final with Durham at the Riverside just minutes before it was due to start.

Yorkshire's lesson has, literally, been a very expensive one but it is one that they are never likely to forget.

But ask yourself whether the reaction to the Headingley Carnegie club's administrative slip would have been so extreme if there was no Champions League pot of gold on the horizon?

Personally, I very much doubt it.

The fact is the huge injection of cash has, inevitably, brought with it a larger than normal greedy, green-eyed monster where cricket is concerned.

The summer game has never been blessed with great wedges of cash to play for before so it's all a little new and, frankly, vulgar – though not to the modern-day players of course.

Put money into any sporting equation and history shows us that people suddenly become very precious and, in the worst cases, downright possessive.

And that brings me to the appalling behaviour of Durham County Cricket Club's chief executive Geoff Harker.

I will concede that the postponement of the quarter-final tie, with 6,000 spectators in the Riverside ground, must have left Mr Harker with a large helping of egg on his face.

However, it was not Yorkshire's decision. And closer inspection of the facts points to Durham being more than a little culpable.

Regan was told by the ECB that it had met with its legal eagles on the morning of the July 7 game and, by lunchtime, had decided to call it off.

Durham insist the first inkling they had was at 2.45pm the same day, when they were apparently told not to admit fans.

The club challenged the decision and then chose to ignore this advice "for safety and comfort of spectators" when the ECB had not responded by 3.30pm.

But after frantic discussions – during which Durham claim they were asked to play the match as an "exhibition" – both teams finally decided to abandon any attempt to play at 5pm.

So it was the ECB and Durham that caused the fiasco.

*******

OPEN champion Padraig Harrington has been unable to hit a shot in anger in the build up to the defence of his title at Royal Birkdale this week.

The genial Irishman, who suffered from a stiff neck during the European Open two weeks ago, injured a wrist last weekend and is definitely not in the best of health for the year's third major tournament which starts tomorrow.

"I've been having treatment and I'm strongly hopeful I will be able to play," he said. "The only issue would be if I re-injured it in the rough and that's what is a little bit scary."

I should say Padraig, and with that in mind I'm sticking with Sergio Garcia to extend this summer's series of Spanish triumphs at Southport.