ICC Seeking Major Share Of Cash From World Cup (10 Jul 1996)

10 July 1996

ICC seeking major share of cash from World Cup

By Christopher Martin-Jenkins, Cricket Correspondent

GLOBALISATION is the buzz-word as the full two-day meeting of the International Cricket Council gets going at Lord`s today. The session will conclude with the draw, divided into two groups of six nations, for the next World Cup, in England and Wales in 1999.

That competition is the generator of the great majority of the ICC`s income, so it is of paramount importance to the future of an organisation seeking a greater control of the game; a more significant issue in a way than which of three aspirants should succeed Sir Clyde Walcott, of Barbados, as chairman of the Council when his three-year term expires next July.

The World Cup in India, Pakistan and, briefly, Sri Lanka earlier this year is estimated to have made a clear profit of #25 million for PILCOM, the organising body, even allowing for the #5 million guarantees to ICC and the competing nations. That sort of money, made from an #8 million sponsorship, ground advertising, the endorsement of various official products associated with the tournament and, above all, television, may be beyond the power of the UK to generate next time and probably of South Africa, too, when they take on the organisation in 2003.

This is a strange paradox given the widespread poverty in many parts of the sub-continent, but it shows the complex financial background to the purely cricketing arguments which must also concern a world governing body. One of the principles which David Richards, the ICC`s able Australian chief executive, hopes to establish in the next two days is that the ICC will take the lion`s share of World Cup profits in future.

These will allow not only a tighter hold on world events, but also for the encouragement of countries where coaching and equipment is required if the game is to expand. A four-yearly Youth World Cup - one is being held in South Africa in early 1998 - has been suggested and Richards has recommended that Dr Ali Bacher should chair a new development committee to spark further expansion in non-Test countries. The more advanced of them, like Kenya and Holland, may well get the "one-day" status they have been seeking.

Dalmiya has sought to change the constitution so that a simple majority will decide the issue.

Who succeeds Sir Clyde, who is manifestly a fair and wise man for whom the well-being of cricket, not prestige, was the reason for taking the chair, is a problem indeed. Jagmohan Dalmiya, of India, commands at least a majority of the single votes of the 22 associate member countries but is not expected to get the necessary two-thirds of the nine Test countries, who all have a double vote.

He is perceived as being too mercenary and self-interested for their peace of mind. His board have presided over an orgy of televised one-day internationals around the world for the Indian team, at the expense of the Test cricket which he professes to hold as sacrosanct.

"I agree," he said at Nottingham this week, "that there is too much one-day cricket and we are addressing that problem in India." He needs to, after 51 internationals and only 10 Tests in the three-year period leading up to the tour of England.

Only when the Indian board prove by example that they recognise the need for a more balanced programme can Dalmiya be trusted, perhaps, to bring his undoubted commercial acumen to the aid of world cricket. The principle for him, as for all the delegates, ought to be that while cricket needs to be encouraged in as many countries and by as many means as possible, a sensible limit - say 10 Tests and 12 internationals per country per year - needs to be imposed on all if the game is not to be overkilled.

His rivals are Krish Mackerdhuj, of South Africa, and Malcolm Gray, of Australia. Dalmiya has sought to change the constitution so that a simple majority will decide the issue. Despite legal advice that the rule could change, the Test countries would be foolish to relinquish such control as they still exercise, quite properly, over the main issues by means of the two-thirds rule. Dalmiya admits that "there may be a stalemate and that will not be good for the game".

Whatever the outcome - it may be that Walcott will offer to continue, though this would involve a new rule allowing longer than a three-year term - the meeting is expected to sanction a new full-members executive committee to give the ICC more authority to intervene in matters like the bribery and ball-tampering allegations, especially when they are not covered by the code of conduct and the jurisdiction of the ICC referees.

It is also proposed that an experienced advisory panel should be set up to adjudicate on bowlers with suspect actions like Muttiah Muralitharan, who was called for throwing in Australia, and another Test off-spinner, Rajesh Chauhan, whom India have quietly dropped to avoid a possible repeat.

Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)