Bertus de Jong sits down with journalist Tim Brooks, Associate cricket commentator, sometime CricketEurope correspondent, and author of a new book on European cricket; Cricket on the Continent.

TB: Well as you know I contributed a chapter on Nepalese cricket to Tim Wigmore and Peter Miller's book on Associate cricket, Second XI, and that demonstrated that cricket fans are interested in cricket beyond test nations.

European cricket is at quite an interesting juncture at the moment, with the virtual withdrawal of the ICC from the region as part of the fall-out from the "Big Three" reforms, and also given the effect of migratory trends and the influx of refugees issue creating a more multicultural region with greater links to cricket. There's a lot of topical issues in the region, and whilst there's been quite a lot written on Ireland and Scotland other countries have received much less coverage. The situation in Continental Europe is really rather different to the UK and Ireland and there's only ever been one book on the topic - written in the late Sixties.

TB: Yes, it was written by three guys, players, mainly with a Danish-Dutch perspective, but it's not really investigative in style. It's a treasure trove of anecdote but doesn’t deal with the how and why - so I thought there was something of a gap there.

TB: Basically all of them, except I've not included Israel or Turkey, even though they compete in European tournaments. The Channel Islands were also out of scope as until recent decades they were incorporated within the ECB.

TB: Yes, ahead of the book I'd been doing a bit of work with a few boards on building the profile of the game in their countries - Germany, Norway, Greece, and of course as you know I've watched a fair bit of cricket in Holland and have some good contacts there. On top of that I've been to eight or nine countries to interview people, finding out what the common and particular issues are. There is nothing like seeing cricket first hand to understand how it is played and what challenges the sport faces.

TB: The book's actually split into three section - past, present and future - in the past section I've looked at different development models, looking especially at different forms of English influence and the desire to reflect English virtues through cricket. So you have places like Gibraltar and Corfu where there was direct involvement, or the case of Germany where there it was more a military presence, and then in other instances it's more through trading and commercial links.

So in looking at the roots of the game in the region the question I started with was to what extent was it English influence and to what extent it sprang from indigenous interest, and then why in the game took off to a greater extent in Denmark and Holland than in, say, France or Italy. What I've also tried to do is explore certain related themes such as exclusivity and the appeal of corinthianism and how that was a factor across different countries. I then sketch out the specific history of the game in each country in turn as to the level of cricket played, how it happened reflecting on those cross cutting themes. It's something of mix between an analysis of development themes and a charting the story of cricket in each country, partly because I wanted the book to serve as an overarching narrative as well as a reference book.

TB: Well that's actually a very interesting question. I think it's fair to say now that most people who follow the implementation of development programmes just assume that everyone in cricket wants as many people as possible to play. This is seen in the focus on participation levels. Historically though, that's not been the case. A lot of clubs would only have players from certain schools and made no attempt to reach out to local populations. If you look at cricket in Portugal for example the English that played thought it was too sophisticated a game for the locals. I actually go into this in some depth in the history section, I argue cricket had something of a window of opportunity between about 1890 and 1905 when football wasn't really established. People were playing cricket in Denmark before they were playing football. People were playing cricket in Italy before they were playing football, but it wasn't capitalised on. In the case of Italy actually you had cricket clubs established by Englishmen that didn't allow locals to play.

Whilst now there are a lot of people in Europe putting their heart and soul into growing the game, dedicating a huge amount of effort and time to try to boost cricket in the region, but still there's this idea of exclusivity, and you see something of a "big fish in a small pond" syndrome. There's still an inherent tension between the old culture of cricket and the new. A part of that of course is the fact that if you look at who's playing cricket in Europe now it's those of South Asian origin that are in the majority in many places, who come from a different cricketing background, and the degree of assimilation varies from country to country. In some cases you see very ethnically diverse clubs that function well, in others you see something of a splintering, with clubs that are almost exclusively Pakistani or exclusively South Asian, which have a very different culture and feel to the more established clubs or the multi-sport clubs that you see in Holland or Denmark. So I've talked a bit in the book about this issue of "two cultures" of cricket - which isn't necessarily strictly delineated along race lines, but that certainly is an element.

TB: Yes it's actually a big problem for boards across the continent. If you look for example at Germany, they've gone from a situation where there were about 800 regular players to probably closer to 4,500 - 5,000 and going up all the time - largely due to refugees and immigration trends obviously. Now they're coping with that on a shoestring budget and there's some heroic work going on, but have they got the resources to keep that many players playing to a coherent vision in a coordinated league? - Arguably not. So then what you find is that certain communities want to set up IPL-style tournaments with franchises and branding and the like - which might be seen as more exciting than, say, the Dutch Division 2 or whatever - and boards end up struggling to keep players in any kind of structured development pathway.

TB: Exactly, now some countries have looked to cope with that by an increase in regional delegation - as in Germany for example - in the hope of expanding their staff base and attracting volunteers, but it's really just a short-term fix. There is this prospect, and I think in places you're starting to see it happening, of there being a lot more cricket played in Europe in the future but it being a lot more fragmented, and maybe even reverting entirely to recreational rather than structured, performance and development-driven forms.

TB: Well there have actually been examples of board take-overs in the last three or four years, more so than previously. The ICC haven't been keen to get involved in these governance issues despite there being some quite significant risks to return on investment from ICC funding.If you look at what happened in France for example, in the late 2000's they tried to take it down a more systematic development path, they had quite a good ethnic and regional mix in the team in around 2010/11, but now it's much more focused on elite ethnic clubs in the Paris region and that's where the money's going too, which has obviously caused some tension within the wider French cricket community.

TB: Yes, essentially the main difference I see is that in terms of club culture - which I talk about quite a bit in the book - is that the older Western European club model tends to be more about preparing for the future, the Asian sentiment tends to be "I want to play now, I want to play as often as possible, I want to win as often as possible" - so more of an immediacy - and if you channel money into that then there's a risk that the sort of long-term development pathways that the ICC hopes to encourage members to go through can wither on the vine.

TB: Well that's why I think this migration-related growth is both a huge opportunity and the biggest challenge for European cricket. I go into this a fair bit in the "Future" section, that on the one hand because of migratory trends it's inevitable that cricket will always exist on the continent, that's guaranteed, but the real challenge is whether it can be coordinated into coherent national plans. For example, the way that development pathway rhetoric was rolled out under the "Bigger Better Global Game" strategy was very much that you'd attract more players, you'd build a participation base and then have a pathway going through schools to clubs and then on to national age-group and national teams into the global tournament framework and there was a sense that everyone had to be funneled through that process. But I think there's quite a lot of evidence that many people just don't want to. They prefer just to play recreational cricket because it's more fun. As I'm sure you know for a lot of recreational players in these communities their biggest concern is actually removing match fees. If an alternative league comes in and says "you don't have to pay 15 euros a match" then many will go with that over an official league.

TB: Well yes, as you know the profits of the 1996 World Cup and the Champions Trophy allowed some money for a development programme and the ICC Europe office was set up.. In the period 2009-12 there were 13 to 15 tournaments a year for under 13 through to under 23 level, a lot of direct ICC involvement in national strategies, 5-year plans, annual reports, and all very closely overseen by ICC development officers. It was all very hands-on and while there was quite a bit of money, much of it was ring-fenced. That's obviously changed quite a bit, and if you look at the strategy under Nick Pink's tenure, particularly towards the end - not necessarily his strategy but reflecting a change in overall development programme philosophy - there was a feeling that this was perhaps inhibiting creativity and local solutions, so they looked to pull back from that, and of course in parallel to that funding was cut from all but the ODI Associates or the HPP, and a lot of boards were left with only about $10,000 to $15,000 a year to run cricket in their countries. Now the ICC obviously argue that boards should be getting a greater proportion of their funding from national governments, sponsors etc, but of course that's very difficult to do with one man and his dog on the payroll.

TB: In a sense, yes. It's basically that the BCCI philosophy of not telling members what to do is now leaching down into ICC development policy, though obviously if you don't give a country much money you can't really tell them to do a lot anyway. Regional development grants have gone now as well, that's supposedly going to be done centrally from Dubai, and I'm told there's a list of countries – of which not many are in Continental Europe – where the ICC sees potential and will look to provide with targeted funding. Unfortunately it's difficult to escape the conclusion that a line has been drawn in the sand, and there are quite a few European countries underneath it.

TB: I think there's an interesting dynamic where there is more money coming into the game in northern Europe and especially Scandinavia, partly through governments allotting quite significant funding, recognising the role cricket can play in integration and social cohesion issues. Norway, for example, recently built an indoor high performance centre at the cost of some 400,000 euros, and that money came from the government. If you look at Norway’s funding the ICC contribution is less than a fifth - likewise Sweden recently recognised the game as an official sport and the board are seeing a good deal more funding - the grounds that hosted Europe Division 2 for example cost a fair bit but were good. Germany we've spoken about and if they are able to harness the growth in player numbers I can see them becoming the region's strongest team on the field in 10 to 15 years.

Conversely in southern Europe there's not the same degree of development, Spain really ought to have a lot of potential given the climate and the facilities in La Manga but they've not really pushed on, Italy are rather masking a weaker domestic scene with passport players - these aren't the sides getting promoted in the lower European divisions. So there seems to be something of a North-South split developing and in large part that's down to politics and funding.

TB: In the "future" section of the book I set out something of a manifesto on how to develop cricket in the region. Some of the points are fairly well-rehearsed - say the ICC to challenge some of its ideas of status, to introduce a more equitable funding model, a more equitable governance model - the sort of thing that you and I and others have been writing about for years, but I also talk a bit about the potential role of the ECB and initiatives where boards are twinned with English clubs and even counties, developing partnerships like the Netherlands and Spain with Essex, Guernsey with Sussex etc. For smaller countries that maybe fall outside the system now I've looked at the potential of cricket tourism, there's a few examples where this is working well, ice cricket in Estonia for example, but the real key remains getting into mainstream schools. Now that's obviously nothing new and it's something that boards do target, but there's different ways of going about it. All too often you'll see development officers or coaches visiting a school, having a clinic for a hundred or so kids, plugging those numbers into their participation figures and then there being no follow up. And the enthusiasm just evaportates.

TB: Right, but on the other hand you do see it done right. In Denmark for example you have Freddie Klokker - obviously one of the key players for the national side - who has three or four schools around Copenhagen and he's there all the time, teaching the PE teachers as much as the kids, and you really do see the results. If you look at Denmark's performance at youth level this year you see the results of a concerted five year strategy.

BdJ: Is there really much of a tradition of inter-school sports in Denmark though? I know that in many continental European countries that the English tradition of schools competing against each other is entirely alien.

TB: That's also pretty true of Denmark, the Danish approach isn't purely schools-based though. There's a very interesting pilot scheme they've recently introduced called the "master club programme" where certain clubs serve as local hubs, with board support, looking to forge links with local schools, local youth associations, religious institutions and municipal authorities. The goal at the end of the day is to embed cricket clubs in their local community in such a way as to ensure long-term sustainable roots, and to get to the point that cricket's visible enough to become a viable option for young kids. The risk of fragmentation is that cricket's profile is spread so thinly that it's got no real footprint at all.

TB: It is something of a rarity now, I've talked a bit about the loss of cricket on the BBC from a Dutch perspective, whereas now you'll only find it on subscription channels.

TB: Exactly, but also when you do it's presented in a very different way. This ties back a bit to this idea of the changing perception of cricket from an English sport to an Asian sport. So if you look at the example of Germany there was a fair bit written about the sudden growth of cricket but if you look at the way the media presents it, it's not a local story, it's a socio-cultural story. It's presented as a foreign sport - this isn't only true in Germany - and often with a sort of attitude of fascination at this "mad sport that goes on for five days" and the like. It's accentuating the difference.

TB: So the question is then can, and how can cricket become a universal sport on the continent rather than becoming a Minority sport.

TB: You actually see, as a reaction to this, in places like Hungary and Poland, the development of so-called "native teams" outside of the national team, as an attempt to prevent it becoming entirely an Asian game. Now there's obviously different views on whether that's likely to help or is just another example of fragmentation, but it does illustrate one of the themes of the book, which is how that perception plays into reality.

TB: Yeah well first off I'd have loved to have written a little more about women's cricket, though it is there, and it's interesting to see how some of these issues - especially the ethnicity question - actually affect the women's game rather differently. Also in terms of the history, locating sources was a huge challenge, and I've an idea there's a lot more really interesting stuff that will eventually emerge somewhere. Something I came across which I found fascinating was the role of cricket as a sort of passive resistance during the war in both Holland and Denmark, just a really interesting bit of social history. Or this story of a teacher introducing cricket in single Swiss college, and that the old boys actually ended up spreading it throughout the country, which really ties into the broader theme of the book, of how cricket enters and how it develops, and what factors allow it to consolidate or wither. It would have been lovely to have a little more evidence about these early days, but there's certainly plenty more interesting trails to follow.

Cricket on the Continent is out on October 11th, available in most UK bookshops, Amazon and Bol.com.