Hyderabad: The series against West Indies exposed a lot of chinks in the armour of international cricket; a lot of disproportionality, if I may. On one hand, there’s a board that’s literally minting money, on the other, there’s a board that’s not paying it’s players. On one hand, where the cricketers have every luxury at their beck and call, money pouring in like a never-ending windfall and on the other, a team, playing without any clarity of their payment.
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Logistical nightmare!
The drama that unfolded on Indian soil when a high profile match was being played out shows how much the system needs to change to ensure that this is the last of it. Imagine that kind of last minute patch-up work that would have sent the organisers in a tizzy, managing to contact the Sri Lankan board and drawing up a completely new series from scratch. There are two ways to look at this. Firstly, had Sri Lanka disagreed, the situation would have been completely different. The losses would have been difficult to handle and the tempers would have been soaring all over the place. Second, it is because this was the BCCI and the kind of control they exercise over world cricket possibly helped them come up with such a quick solution. Had it been some other board, the outcomes, again, would have been different.
Flawed system
This series against the West Indies exposed a flawed system. A bunch of extravagantly expensive players, pitted against another bunch begging for their dues. Sounds kind of unfair, isn’t it. It is, if you come to think of it. With the West Indian players protesting demanding for the dues they are fully eligible for, it’s difficult to imagine two sets of people doing the same thing and getting paid for it with such a big difference. To overcome this issue, the International Cricket Council needs to standardise payments in a way that cricketers, more or less, end of making the same kind of money for every match they feature in. Also, the match prizes and series prizes should be standardised.
Washing dirty linen in public?
The utter failure of communications between the WIPA and WICB put everyone in a spot of bother. If we consider the timelines, the WICB had always kept the BCCI on the razor’s edge, never taking responsibility or giving a clear answer. WICB president Dave Cameron had been doing flip flops way too often, much more than what the BCCI would have been comfortable with.
This whole series has been going on because of the Indian insistence and push. While Cameron had given up saying that the WICB will be left with no option if the players pulled out, the BCCI along with Virat Kohli convinced them to play along. When asked for a confirmation regarding the rest of the series, Mr Cameron didn’t respond, and when pressed, he gave the same answer. Finally, before the 4th ODI began, it was announced that the West Indies team had, in fact, pulled out, but in a few hours, it was announced that no such thing had happened. Finally, everything was clarified and the Windies team made its way back home.
This drama could have been handled in a much better, clinical way. Remember the time when Sri Lankan cricket went through the same patch? They’ve moved on and have been playing threateningly well. This issue should have either been fixed before, or after the series. And adding to it, nothing good can come if you’ve managed to irk the Big Boss of cricket!