Mathematics   Mints   Millions!

Apr 26, 2025 Sports

---

Crofty’s   Cricket    Call…

BY:  Colin Croft – Former Guyana, Lancashire CCC and WI International Cricketer

Kaieteur News- Last week, three sporting events brought mathematics and much money into magnificent luminescence – West Indies Women at ICC CWC 2025 Qualifier in Pakistan, 2025 Boston Marathon and Saudi Arabian Formula 1 Grand Prix in Jedda.

I love all sports, but have affinity for soccer, cricket, athletics, cycling, tennis, swimming, boxing and Formula 1.  Very fortunately, I have been able to experience many sports at the highest levels, and met many supposedly important people along the way, around the world.

Marathon Money

For Boston’s Marathon 2025, Kenyans Sharon Lokedi and John Korir won Women’s and Men’s races, each winning US$150,000.  Almost unbelievably, Ms. Lokedi clocked 2 hours, 17 minutes, 22 seconds, the fastest time ever, by more than two minutes, for the 26.22 miles (42.10 km) Boston Marathon Women.  Setting that new record, Ms. Lokedi added another US$50,000, making her victory total US$200,000, for less than three hours of hard work.

For the mathematically challenged, Ms Lokedi made an astonishing US$87,375 per hour, for her run.  Oil company executives do not do that well.  By extrapolation, that is approximately US$3,495,000, per 40-hour week, nearly US$14 million per month, exactly why professional athletes, world over, in any sport, train so damned hard.  Financial spoils are enormous.

Fueling   Formula 1   Finances                 

In Formula 1; Jedda, Saudi Arabia, fifth 2025 race, fifty laps, total approximate distance 310 km (192 miles); McLaren’s Oscar Piastri’s total time was 1 hour, 21 minutes 6.758 seconds (approx. avg. speed 137 mph / 220 kph), beating Red Bull’s Max Verstappen by just 2.843 seconds.  Third was Ferrari’s Charles LeClerc, 8.104 seconds behind Max.  Tire choices – hard, medium, soft – and electrifying 2 to 4-second pit stops, make better results.

Placings, 1^st to 10^th, have severe consequences in Formula 1, for teams and well-paid drivers.  Points at season’s end for car construction companies and drivers net mega monies.

McLaren, 2024’s Constructors’ Champion, earned US$161m.  Most Formula 1 drivers average around US$40m per year.  With bonuses for winning races, by sheer seconds, those finances amplify.  Max Verstappen’s total 2024 income was US$75m!

The sixth 2025 Formula 1 race is next weekend in Miami, Florida, 250 miles (400 km) from my home.  I might take a quick gander, MCO (Orlando Int’l to MIA (Miami Int’l), to witness those extremely extraordinarily fast “road airplanes” careen around!

West Indies Women’s Woes in ICC Qualifier in Pakistan 2025

Now to WI Women’s inability to qualify, at ICC 2025 Pakistan Qualifier, for ICC WCWC 2025, in India (September and October 2025).  How the hell did this happen?  Why did WI Women descend so low, in four years, that they had to play in a qualifying tournament anyway?

Do not try to kill the messenger.  Colin Croft was not playing in Pakistan.  WI Women were!

Rated No. 6 by ICC but having failed to get “Top Six” for ICC WCWC 2025 (2022 to 2025) – Australia, India, South Africa, England, New Zealand, Sri Lanka – ICC Pakistan 2025 Qualifier was WI Women’s 2^nd chance to qualify for ICC WCWC 2025.  Somehow, WI Women ignominiously blew that possibility too.  There can be no excuses for that abject failure!

Unfortunately, and very disappointingly, there has been appalling dishonesty about the non-qualification of WI Women to the “big dance” in India later in 2025.

Despite the crap uttered by people intimately associated with WI cricket, written on Instagram etc., and, almost apologetically, aired by Caribbean commentators and scribes, WI Women DID NOT MISS that qualification because they DID NOT GET 167 runs in 10.0 overs, against Thailand, in that final game.  How did Thailand get 166; 30 runs too many?

WI Women MISSED that qualification because, extremely lackadaisically, WI Women LOST TO Scotland Women, a much lesser team, in their first game of ICC Qualifier Pakistan 2025.  Had WI Women beaten Scotland Women, they would have sailed through to the main event in India, even if WI Women had still lost to Pakistan Women later.  There would have been no need for CRAY, IBM or UNISYS computations, to the 3^rd decimal point, to calculate placings.

“Each game at ICC WCWC 2025 Qualifier Pakistan 2025 is an event,” said Ireland Women’s Orla Prendergast.  What a massive understatement.  Each game, in a tournament with ONLY six teams, is more like a FINAL.  There is no room for errors or comebacks; five games to make your mark and make much more money.  Everything starts at the beginning!

Few time-shortened sporting situations start badly and recover.  ICC WCWC 2025 Qualifier Pakistan 2025 was a 100 meters sprint – boom, out of the blocks, zoom!

One such exception was Atlanta’s 1996 Olympics’ 100 meters Men’s Final.  At 50 meters, T&T’s Ato Boldon led.  He finished 3^rd.  Canada’s Jamaican “Big Boy” Donovan Bailey; 9.840 seconds, world record; powered the tape, with Namibia’s Frankie Frederics 2^nd.

Dribbling diatribes suggested that WI Women desperately wanted to qualify for ICC WCWC 2025 in India.  Were they really ready for the intensity and top performances needed for that harrowing event in Pakistan?  Cricket West Indies, Team Managers, Coaches, and especially Captain Hayley Matthews MUST answer and explain THAT!

Said WI Women’s Captain Hayley Matthews: “We let ourselves down.”  Best understatement of 2025 so far!  Ms. Matthews and her squad let 8 million Caribbean people down!

Eliminated from ICC WCWC 2025, WI Women forfeited an astronomical opportunity at winning US$5m for the squad.  That thought alone must be a highly ghoulish continuing waking nightmare, ala film Director Alfred Hitchcock’s work.  I, really, certainly hope so!

CWI MUST have an extremely serious inquiry.  Personnel must be accountable; fired too; “failure to achieve the objectives for which one was hired” (a concept that does not exist in the Caribbean).  Expect us minions never to know.  Everything done is almost conclave quiet.

Realities, though, rancor.  WI Women missed ICC WCWC 2025 by 0.013 points!

So, mathematics and excellent finances go hand in glove like foo-foo and dumplings.  Ask stock market personnel around the world.  Money maketh man and woman!  Cheers!  Enjoy!

---

---