Call off the comp

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(Getty Images)

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SHADES OF THE BLAST: Terrorist incidents in Karachi and elsewhere in Pakistan have taken their toll on the country’s hosting of the Champions League. (Getty Images)

Scorned by crowds, loathed by players but loved by the money men, cricket’s ‘other’ tournament has run into troubled times. Richard Whitehead looks at the events that have led to the cancellation of this year’s Champions Trophy.

Commercial greed brought about its very existence, and now the wake formed by scampering boards, teams and players eager to cash in on everything lucrative but avoid any headaches, has seen this year’s Champions League postponed at the eleventh hour.

They cited the security situation in Pakistan, or apparent lack of it. Players from around the world had for months been voicing their own opposition to the tour on account of the various bombings in Karachi and around Pakistan.

Should we expect cricketers to ply their profession in an area of danger? They are after all entertainers and playing the sport is their job. How would you feel if you were called on to put your safety in peril at the behest of your boss? Would you do it? Or would you say it was more than your job was worth?

On the other side of the coin, the Pakistan board had admitted their country was experiencing safety concerns and promised the level of protection on offer during the tournament would be on par with presidential security.

And the bold question was asked: why would dangerous fanatics target cricketers when they were often intense fans of the sport?

Cricketers, so goes the argument, might be high profile but are generally politically apathetic and highly unlikely to be at the centre of a bombing campaign.

The issue has split the cricket world into two very distinct blocs.

For years, it has been clear the Champions Trophy is an unloved tournament, a white elephant in an overcrowded cricket schedule.

It is unpopular with players and cricket-goers alike, and whose importance is based on the bottom line.

Only the inaugural tournament in 1998 has ever attracted crowds, when it was held in Bangladesh under the premise of being designed to raise the profile of the lesser cricketing nations by giving them exposure to the top teams.

That idea has since flown out of the window and these days it is billed as a low-fat World Cup, taking place to fill the period of lull between the biggest events in the sport.

It is, however, made for television and this year’s non-event would have been expected to make in the region of $83 million, a not insignificant amount of money, and a mouth-watering sum for many boards.

The individual members of the ICC have never really agreed on its presence on the calendar, and this was apparent from the last-ditch decision on what would happen to the tournament this year on account of the security threat perceived by a number of boards.

Reached through a telephone conference, the stalemate between the boards was averted thereby reducing the potential for a serious split among the cricket world.

On the one side, Australia, South Africa, England and New Zealand were ostensibly against holding it in Pakistan, where they deemed the danger to be too great.

On the other were Pakistan, India, Bangladesh and South Africa, who concluded that the show must go on. With Zimbabwe’s vote not worth the paper its discredited account statements were printed on, the West Indies vote became pivotal, and swung to the non-Asian bloc.

The options were either to go ahead regardless, to hastily transfer the tournament to another country or to postpone it altogether.

While most of the Asian countries declared “crisis, what crisis?” Sri Lanka threw its hat in the ring, stating it could put on the tournament “at a week’s notice.”

Considering Pakistan had a staff of several-hundred people employed in the planning of the Champions Trophy, it always sounded optimistic.

England and South Africa also volunteered to step in, but given the jealously guarded power split between members of the ICC, this move was always going to be unlikely.

Regardless of the where, the fact that a major sporting event might be switched to another country three weeks before its start was never going to happen.

In the end, sense prevailed: Pakistan would retain the tournament, pencilled in for following October, although the ICC have reserved the right to relocate it if it is seen the security situation hasn’t improved.

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