Lamb at Tuesday's press conference

By Frank Malley, PA Chief Sports Writer

So the farce is over. Or is it?

After weeks of prevarication, a rainforest of statements and a cloud of cynicism England will not be going to play cricket in the blood-soaked land of President Robert Mugabe.

Hallelujah for that, but let's not be in any doubt why a match which should never have been countenanced in the first place will not now go ahead in Harare.

Not because English cricket was overcome by compassion and concern for the starving millions in Zimbabwe amid a World Cup reeling from the suspension of Shane Warne after a positive drugs test.

Nor because Nasser Hussain and his players were determined not to hand Mugabe a propaganda coup, even if late in the day they had voiced their distaste for Zimbabwe's murderous government regime.

No, principle has been lower than a snake's belly on the agenda of English cricket this past month.

The players effectively pulled out of Thursday's match because they were frightened - scared witless by the letter from some little-known, self-styled Sons and Daughters of Zimbabwe which threatened: 'Come to Zimbabwe and you will go back to Britain in wooden coffins.'

No shame in that, even if security forces ridiculed the threat. Too many fanatics and nutcases have carried out their threats in this terrorist-strewn world to be dismissed lightly, especially when the message claimed that even if the cricketers returned home safe foreign groups would hunt down their families and they would live in fear forever.

Concentrating on sport in such circumstances would have been impossible.

Still, regardless of whether the match is eventually played elsewhere after more exhaustive appeals and counter-appeals to the ICC technical committee, the chronicles will record the whole shameful saga of England's scheduled World Cup trip to Harare as perhaps the lowest point in English cricket history.

To say Prime Minister Tony Blair was slow to give a lead is like saying Iraq have been a mite dilatory in disposing of chemical weapons. The England and Wales Cricket Board, however, have been worse than slow - they have blundered through endless press briefings, peddling their position which put money above morality with an earnestness which has been as sickening as it has been undignified.

"It has not been a sordid squabble about money," chairman David Morgan said. No?

Well, why won't so many questions go away?

Such as why did ECB chief executive Tim Lamb wait three weeks to reveal the death threats after receiving the letter on January 20?

Why were the players kept in the dark while the ECB tried to bully them into fulfilling their contractual obligations?

Why did Lamb shift his position from "We don't make moral judgements" to one in which he criticised Mugabe's tyranny, to one in which the security arrangements were suddenly overridingly paramount, especially as he had been a member of the ICC delegation which gave Zimbabwe safety approval last November?

But, above all, why did he not make public that letter until the beginning of this week when the players were amid emotional turmoil as they teetered on the brink of boycotting Zimbabwe? Why did he change his opinion that it was the product of a "crank" to one which demanded serious consideration?

The inevitable conclusion is that, faced with the financial loss which English cricket would have incurred for a unilateral withdrawal, it was the last throw of Lamb's dice. A switch on security grounds would avoid financial penalty. It was the perfect compromise.

As it happened it might have worked, though it seems Zimbabwe are still likely to refuse to play the match outside the country and then the points allocation is by no means certain. But let's not pretend that the farce has not damaged English cricket.

The behaviour of England's administrators this past month has been little short of shameful. At a time which demanded clear thought, strong principle and inspired leadership the ECB for too long peddled the old cliche that sport and politics should not mix.

They asserted that it was first and foremost a "business" as if somehow that gave it a right to be wrong.

And finally they bowed to the fears of their own players while Morgan hid behind the spurious claim that "We were concerned for the Zimbabwe community and the spectators at the match."

Even then Morgan saved his most farcical observation for last. "We have not dithered or been guilty of procrastination," he said.

And all that was missing was Brian Rix with his trousers around his ankles.