Google had some big plans for the ICC World Cup Cricket 2007. They launched a series of cricket gadgets that displayed the latest scores, match pictures and World Cup video clips from Youtube right on your desktop.

Google also planned a "Blogger Roadshow" in some Indian cities to promote the concept of blogging and the Blogger platform.

Unfortunately, Google's Cricket World Cup campaign may be in jeopardy now. YouTube has been ordered to remove all World Cup Cricket 2007 video clips. Fearing another lawsuit, Google has complied by deleting most of the cricket videos and replacing them with the standard message:

This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by ICC Development (International) Limited and Global Cricket Corporation Pte Limited

That leaves the Google Cricket Videos gadget of little use since it only fetches the latest videos related to cricket matches from Youtube.com. [Though at the time of writing, the widget was still showing clips from the latest match between Bermuda and Bangladesh]

Secondly, India is out of the tournament now and some people have gone to the extent of boycotting products endorsed by Indian cricket players. It is very much possible that the Blogger promotion bus may also receive a cold reception in India. Thing would have been very different if the men in blue had reached atleast the Super 8 stage.

[The Google bus was in Chandigarh last week. Anyone got pictures to share ?]