SPIRO: Has Cricket Australia sold out Test cricket to Indian money?

Old Spiro has been around sports long enough to be able to enunciate the somewhat ribald Zavos Sports Axiom No. 1: “If you jump into bed with your enemies, sooner or later you are going to be screwed.”

If there is a profound truth in this axiom, and I believe there is, then the onus is on Cricket Australia (in keeping with the ribald tone of the axiom) to ensure the experience is an enjoyable one for those cricket nations and their supporters who love the variety and ebb-and-flow of Test cricket.

The determination of India’s Board of Cricket Control (the BCCI) to scuttle the ICC format had three main targets.

First, to increase by a significant margin the BCCI’s revenues coming from the game of international cricket.

Second, to lock in India’s economic and political control of world cricket.

Third, to protect the IPL tournament against any challenges in terms of other countries or the availability of star players from around the world.

It is reasonably clear (I say ‘reasonably’ because many details are still murky) the BCCI has hit all of these targets in the bullseye.

I am taking most of the next lot of information/analysis from Mike Atherton’s article that was published on Thursday in The Australian.

Atherton is a former captain of England. He is now a cricket commentators and pundit for The Times. He is extremely well-informed and has access through his connections to a range of cricket administrators around the world.

He was critical of the draft proposals when they were put forward. He is still critical of the sligthtly amended principles that have been agreed to (or will be agreed to next month) that have emerged from the negotiations.

These principles appear to be:

1. There will be an opportunity for all members to play all formats of cricket on merit, with participation based on meritocracy: no immunity to any country, and no change to membership status.

Atherton’s gloss on this is that the countries with most to gain from this principle – the current associates like Afghanistan and Ireland – will not be barred from playing Test cricket ‘but it will not come for a long time.’

2. The Test cricket fund will be available to South Africa now, as well as Bangladesh, Zimbabwe, New Zealand, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and the West Indies.

Atherton suggests that those countries playing ‘unviable Tests’, Tests that have no interest outside of the two countries playing them and no financial dividends to these countries, will ‘one by one be bought off with a promise here and a promise there.’

In other words, there will be a fall in the number of Tests played and countries like, say, the West Indies – which once had the most formidable Test team in the world – will slowly give away playing Tests and try and evolve into a cricket power in the shorter forms of the game.

The boss of the Federation of International Cricketers’ Association, Paul Marsh, believes that local T20 leagues like the IPL will take over from international cricket.

My gloss on this is that T20 is a game that lends itself to gambling where it is estimated in India alone that up to $400 million can be wagered on an individual game, even if India is not competing.

3. The establishment of ExCo, an executive that effectively replaces the ICC, with five members that must include representatives of the BCCI, Cricket Australia and the England Cricket Board.

Atherton makes the point the Big Three will dominate ExCo. The biggest job of ExCo, he points out, will be to conclude and distribute the television rights for the next eight-year cycle.

India will chair the main ExCo committee handling these negotiations; Australia will chair ExCo; and England will chair the Finance and Commercial Affairs Committee.

4. All this means, according to Atherton, ‘extra money’ for India, Australia and England.

Chloe Saltau, in the SMH, reports that India will receive up to eight times more than the weakest full member. Cricket Australia will receive twice as much as the weakest full member, and England three times as much.

Saltau also reports that India is understood to have offered “better protection and compensation to countries that give up players to the IPL if the changes are adopted”.

And this gets to the heart of the matter, in my opinion.

The BCCI wanted more money and it also wanted to protect its money-machine (and gambling machine), the IPL. Both these requirements have been met when the plan is finally agreed to.

As an aside, it may be that leaving South Africa out of a Big Four may well have had something to do with the fact that a successful IPL was held in the Republic when India was out of bounds because of a terrorist attack in Mumbai.

Atherton’s article was given the headline: ‘It’s the end of the world as we know it.’

And here we come to Cricket Australia. I don’t think CA had much choice but to go along with the BCCI power play. Solidarity is a great thing. But looking after your own interests when they could be gravely threatened trumps solidarity, I would argue.

I can excuse the tough tactics, too, to force through what India wanted.

But now that the new order has been established, we have to expect some leadership from CA to ensure that the cricket countries outside the Big Three get their fair amount of Test cricket and tours to and from the Big Three countries.

This means, essentially, reining in the BCCI’s clear determination to turn world cricket, now that the great Sachin Tendulkar no longer dominates the Test arena, into an endless series of short form cricket tournaments.

We want and we expect leadership from CA on this. After all, CA and ECB can out-vote the BCCI under the new arrangements if this needs to be done in the best interests of the game throughout the world.

So the answer to the question at the top of this article can be answered in the negative (and I feel sure this will happen) if CA keeps the traditions of the cricket game in mind when the big decisions are being made by ExCo.