THE SOUND of willow on leather – as a traditional cricket bat connects with a traditional cricket ball – is usually the soundtrack to a traditional English summer. But Trumps war has put this summer’s sport in danger.
The problem is that the England and Wales Cricket Board buys 4,000-5,000 cricket balls each summer for use at all Test matches and first class games in England. It buys the balls from a company called Dukes. Dukes does have a factory in the London Borough of Walthamstow, but that only distributes the balls – which are stitched in south Asia. The balls travel to the UK by plane via the Gulf – and plane routes through the Gulf are in rather short supply at the moment, given the US/Israeli attack on Iran.
Dukes’s owner, Dilip Jajodia, is quite cross about the situation. He has explained that there is a logjam in the freight business, so airlines are not taking new consignments through the Middle East. Worse, airlines which used to charge under £4 to carry a box of 120 cricket balls are now looking at charging three times as much.
Jajodia is planning to supply 50% of the order soon and hoping to complete the order in the future. He is also looking for other routes. With pre-season warm-up matches already underway and the County Championship due to begin on 3rd April, cricket fans across the country will be hoping that a solution is found very quickly.
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