THE GLOBAL GAME: ENGLISHMAN TO COACH ISRAEL

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It’s a contender for the trickiest job in international cricket. Danny Baker, 33, is tasked with trying to get Israel promoted from ICC Europe Division Two, staged in Sweden this month. He will have to deal with not just Israel’s on-field opponents – Germany, Gibraltar, Isle of Man, Spain and Sweden – but also political perceptions about the country’s wider role in the region.

Baker’s mission is part-coaching, part-cricket aid. “It was part of my job pitch to the Israel Cricket Association that I bring on the plane as much second-hand equipment as I can,” he told The Cricketer. “As you can imagine, it’s not that easy getting cricket kit into Israel.”

Baker is familiar with taking cricket into challenging environments. In his old job, at the Cricket for Change charity in Surrey, he ventured to Afghanistan, Serbia and, in 2010, the West Bank, where he helped introduce a town of Bedouin Arab children to the game. “We set up a game of Street20 between Arabs and Israelis,” he says. “Soon the kids were saying, ‘These Israelis, or Palestinians, they aren’t so bad, are they?’ So that was something of a triumph.”

Israeli customs officials were a little suspicious about the jingling blind cricket balls the group had flown in. “You can imagine the reception, in a country that worries about explosives,” says Baker. “Not so friendly. It wasn’t until we showed our invitation letter from the Peres Centre for Peace that they climbed down and became very apologetic.”

Baker has foundations to build on. A wave of Jewish refugees from India in the early 1950s, then a further influx from throughout the Commonwealth after the 1967 Six-Day War, gave Israeli cricket the spark it needed. A year later, Ken Barrington visited with Bournemouth CC on the first cricket tour to the independent state of Israel, scored a century, and was promptly made the ICA’s first president.

Israel currently has a player pool of around 250 to 300, mainly in southern towns with high populations of Indian Jews. T20 and 30-over games are played on Saturdays, although the most religious team play theirs on Fridays. There is also night cricket for those who find the punishing daytime heat of the Negev desert too much.

But global politics is rarely far away. Pakistan’s Abdul Hafeez Kardar flounced out of the ICC meeting which proposed Israel’s membership in 1974. And Israel’s presence at ICC tournaments has occasionally been unpopular, most notably when 500 demonstrators stormed a ground in Kuala Lumpur, smashing advertising hoardings and lighting bonfires on the outfield; they were disappointed to find the game had been moved across town. Israeli officials wishing to attend ICC meetings in Dubai have to enter the UAE on a second passport.

“We are a little concerned about the reception we’ll get in Sweden,” admits Steve Leigh, the ICA chairman. “I’ve had long conversations with my counterpart in Sweden, and the tournament organisers, and they assure us we’ll be fine. Whenever we go abroad we receive a lot of support from the Israeli government, the local embassy and the local police. The security services recommend we don’t shout about representing Israel. We don’t carry the Israeli cricket emblem when we travel, although the players do wear it on our playing shirts. It is sad, but it becomes part of our preparation.”

Baker has taken the job for cricketing reasons. “I’d like to think the Spirit of Cricket will count for something,” he says. “The political history of the region is not down to these cricket players. They deserve to play cricket. I’ve deliberately avoided addressing religious and political issues so far. I just want to judge players on their cricket, and give the 14 players we’re taking the best cricketing experience of their lives.”

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Photo credit: Israel Cricket Association