C&W lash out at Digicel

Ramnaresh Sarwan: one of the players caught in the corporate clash © Getty Images

The war of words between the West Indies team sponsor, Digicel, and its rival, Cable and Wireless, gathered momentum with C&W lashing out at Digicel's statement which said accused them of "continued ambush marketing". They described Digicel's comments as `half-truths, mis-statements and blatant lies'.

Digicel had blamed C&W for declining their offer to make some concessions involving Brian Lara's and six other players' individual sponsorship deals to avoid affecting Digicel's agreement with the WICB. Responding to this, C&W said in a statement to The Trinidad Express that Digicell is "unilaterally sabotaging the work of the Caricom Prime Ministers" and that C&W could no longer "sit back and allow its integrity to be attacked, and West Indies cricket to be threatened."

C&W also questioned Digicel's ability to call themselves "proud sponsors of the game", considering the leaked memo to the press that questioned the integrity of some players who also happened to have personal endorsement deals with C&W. "Digicel have embarked on a crusade to follow the memo up with pressure on the WICB to drop these players from the team and abandon their obligation to field the best players."

The statement also mentioned that C&W had entered into personal contracts with all the players - except Lara - before April and May last year; two months prior to the agreement between the West Indies board and Digicel. C&W added that a copy of the individual contract, without the player's name and financial details, had been furnished to the board, so they were fully aware of the players' endorsement deals prior to this agreement. These contracts, C&W said, were in line with their sponsorship of the 2007 World Cup.

"Frankly, it is outrageous that Digicel can, with a straight face, claim to support West Indies cricket out of one side of its mouth, while working to destroy it out of the other."

The release also denied that C&W had refused to match Digicel's US$20million-five-year sponsorship offer, saying that they had offered US$30million.

C&W demanded "that the WICB fulfill its mandate to field the best, most capable West Indies team by reinstating the seven Cable and Wireless-sponsored players to eligibility, and that Digicel stop its capricious behaviour and its attempts to buy and bully its way into getting what it wants."