Success of ICC Academy boosts UAE’s prospects for T20 World Cup in Australia

After UAE sealed qualification for the T20 World Cup last week, coach Robin Singh said he will now turn his attention to working out which players will be best suited to succeed in Australia.

Pitch conditions, for one thing, are likely to be entirely different to those which mostly prevail in the Middle East. And yet the country has been equipped for a situation like this for more than a decade, now.

While it was under construction, the ICC Academy in Dubai Sports City imported clay from Brisbane to use on the wicket block of one of its ovals.

No one knew whether the experiment would make a discernible difference. Time has shown that those pitches are, in fact, faster than the characteristics of the other wickets, which are based on clay from Pakistan.

“Having multiple surfaces [in one place] gives everyone the chance to prepare the way they should for a long duration,” Qasim Ali, the head of cricket development at the ICC Academy, said.

“If, for argument's sake, Oman doesn’t have Australian clay, or Gabba wickets to prepare on, and they just have South Asian clay, they are more likely to be behind the eight ball.

“UAE is in a position where it has seven months to get players ready on faster pitches for the World Cup in Australia. That is going to be a big challenge.”

For years, international teams have beaten a path to Sports City in the knowledge they will be able to replicate many of the conditions they will be set to face on tour.

Now the home country itself is reaping the rewards, with cohorts of young players passing through the ICC Academy equipped to deal with differing challenges.

Nine of the 15-player squad who won the plate competition at the Under 19 World Cup in the Caribbean last month are from the Academy.