Next month France will play host to the women's teams of Fiji, Samoa and Vanuatu for a four team T20I tournament. But the three Pacific Island teams won't be travelling to the other side of the world, but to the French overseas collectivity of New Caledonia, over 10,000 miles from the French capital.

First, some context. One of the strangest stories in associate cricket recently was the alledged fake games scandal in French women's cricket. In order to participate in the women's T20 World Cup pathway, associate members are required to have a certain number of women's teams playing regularly.

Reporting in 2023 and 2024 by Peter O'Brien for France 24 uncovered evidence that many of the games reported had in reality never taken place and that France were in fact not eligible to participate in the pathway events. The entire French national team issued a letter calling on their board to take action.

Rather than respond to the demands of the players, Cricket France instead removed them from a planned European Cricket Network event, which the players only discovered when they saw the announcement on social media. They demanded apologies from the women's players, which were not forthcoming.

The ICC issued a statement to BBC cricket podcast Stumped, stating that "The ICC has investigated the allegations in relation to France Cricket and are satisfied that the issue is now closed. Each Member is wholly responsible for the participation data that is submitted per the census and accuracy of these records remains of utmost importance and are audited by the ICC."

Allegations of boards fiddling their census data didn't come as a surprise to anyone who has been involved in European cricket, and nor did the blunt nature of the ICC's statement.

And so to New Caledonia.

A men's team representing the territory has been involved in international cricket on and off since 1979, mostly as part of the cricket tournaments at the Pacific Games. They have had limited success, with only two wins in their entire history and having once conceded 572 against Papua New Guinea. A women's team participated in the 2015 Pacific Games, losing all their matches convincingly. With cricket not in the Pacific Games in 2023, neither a men's or women's team has played since the 2019 Pacific Games.

As in several Pacific Island nations, a local form of cricket exists in New Caledonia, where it is predominantly played by women. The regular version has previously been run completely independently from France Cricket, with the board previously having little to no interest in the game in New Caledonia.

That changed when France Cricket Chairman Prebagarane Balane visited the islands in March and signed an agreement with New Caledonia’s sports minister Mickaël Forrest and cricket committee head Jean-Marc Ihily. The agreement required all players and clubs to register with France Cricket by 31 August - reports suggest this would more than double the amount of registered players with France Cricket - and grant France Cricket the rights to call up New Caledonia players to the national team.

Officials pose at the launch event (France Cricket)

Reports at the time suggested that this was a way to replace the women's national team with players from New Caledonia and this now seems to be coming to fruition. The quad-series will begin on 10 March at the N'Du Stadium in Noumea. France have yet to name a squad, but it is thought that it will be entirely made up of players from New Caledonia.

There remains strong feelings over the board's actions around the women's team amongst French cricket clubs, with several withdrawing from the French league system last year. Cricket France are taking steps to avoid criticism - posts about it on their Facebook page have comments turned off.