{"id":4734,"date":"2016-04-28T05:10:18","date_gmt":"2016-04-27T23:40:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=4734"},"modified":"2016-04-28T05:10:18","modified_gmt":"2016-04-27T23:40:18","slug":"worldcup-cricket-rigged-indias-fan-care","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=4734","title":{"rendered":"Cricket is Rigged in India\u2019s Favour. But Does the Desi Fan Really Care?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I<\/span>n the documentary <\/p>Death of a <\/span><\/i>Gentleman<\/span><\/i><\/a> (2015),<\/span><\/i> journalist Gideon Haigh explains the biggest problem ailing modern cricket. \u201cI\u2019d condense it into a question that I don\u2019t think administrators have answered. Does cricket make money in order to exist, or does it exist in order to make money?\u201d Haigh rhetorically asks the filmmakers Sam Collins and Jarrod Kimber. Haigh\u2019s bluntness might cut some as too sharp, but it wasn\u2019t without reason. The <\/span>hour-and-a-half long documentary<\/span><\/a> painstakingly outlines the dubious graft that was behind the clean white outfits of the gentleman\u2019s game. Predictably, the film went unnoticed, more so in the one place it should have been watched \u2013 cricket-worshiping India. Last week, however, on the Netflix show Patriot Act comedian Hasan Minhaj exposed India\u2019s cynical commercialisation of cricket on a stage that, ideally, warrants attention. One question Minhaj, however, did not ask is whether the Indian <\/span>cricket fan<\/span><\/a> even cares.<\/span>\n\nLet\u2019s just start by saying that cricket isn\u2019t what it used to be two decades ago. It certainly isn\u2019t as competitive. Of the teams participating in this year\u2019s World Cup, there are really just three squads \u2013 Australia, <\/span>England<\/span><\/a> and India \u2013 worth writing home about. Of them, only India has veritable world-class match winners, with the exception of a handful in the others. Australia\u2019s famed pace attacks have dwindled over the years, as have England\u2019s fabled all-rounders. The other teams are there, it seems to make up the numbers, and maybe cause an eye-rolling upset or two. Pakistan, South Africa, New Zealand, Sri Lanka, and West Indies have seen better days and definitively better squads. But the story isn\u2019t as much on the ground as it is off the field. As <\/span>Minhaj<\/span><\/a> explains, India is slated to pocket 33 per cent of the profits from this year\u2019s tournament. That is a third of the total earnings, for what is already the richest cricketing board in the world.<\/span>\n\nIt could be argued, as Minhaj does, that India brings in the bulk of the sponsorship, and of course, a billion eyeballs, but that would be like saying that the one with the biggest appetite deserves the biggest cut. By the same logic, the US should get a head-start in the <\/span>Olympics<\/span><\/a>, Brazil should directly enter the knockout rounds at football\u2019s World Cup, and Rafael Nadal should be given the French Open just for turning up. Though BCCI is the administration behind a national team, it is easily the biggest corporate juggernaut in the sport; something that automatically translates to more money, more salaries, bigger dreams, deeper purses, and about enough glitter and superficiality to seduce youngsters. In a way, that kind of also answers why former <\/span>World Cup<\/span><\/a> semi-finalists like Kenya and perennial underdogs Zimbabwe have vanished from the cricketing landscape altogether. <\/span>\n\nBCCI now commands a slice of the cake so big that it has become obsessed with preservation, to the extent of having become, over the last decade or so, <\/span>anti-cricket<\/span><\/a>. As Minhaj explains, BCCI has often expressed its disinterest in Test cricket. What was once supposed to be the vanguard of cricketing philosophy and culture has now become the hotspot of pithy entertainment and cricketing greed. The <\/span>IPL<\/span><\/a>, as Minhaj explains, has done wonders for corporate giants but it has dented the democratic structure of the sport. Things could get as bad as India not bothering with World Cup tournaments in the future, just as it hasn\u2019t bothered to elevate the sport on a global scale. To counter this narrative, the fallacy that most administrators hide behind is the billion-strong fans of cricket, disregarding the fact that possibly 95 per cent of that base is Indian in nationality or origin.<\/span>\n

The IPL, as Minhaj explains, has done wonders for corporate giants but it has dented the democratic structure of the sport.<\/blockquote>\nMinhaj also explains how most \u201cWorld\u201d tournaments are now planned to suit India\u2019s participation, its exposure primarily, since those <\/span>matches<\/span><\/a> draw the most revenue. It explains the needlessly boring and extended roster of the upcoming edition. It\u2019s as if the other teams are there to open for the main event that comes later. What is most disturbing about all of this is that the Indian fan doesn\u2019t and probably won\u2019t care. They are more than happy about the fact that there is little or no competition to beat. They are more than okay with the fact that the IPL has become so big, so lucrative, and perhaps so flattering in its dividends, it almost compensates for the absence of <\/span>international<\/span><\/a> competition and by extension a future in which cricket is \u201cactually\u201d a global sport. What is the point to winning a contest you dictate the rules and imagination of, anyway?<\/span>\n\nAny change, if possible, can be brought about by the people who make this sport the business it is. Unfortunately, Indian fans tend to forget and forgive too easily. <\/span>Corruption<\/span><\/a>, nepotism, fraud and cheating have always surfaced in Indian cricket\u2019s history only for its fans to forgive their demigods and pretend they are beyond reproach. To them, the survival of the spectacle, the illusion is far more important than the sanctity of fair play, sportsmanship and accountability, things cricket once swore by. <\/span>\n\nElsewhere, cricket looks ominously weak, on the brink even. Gone are the days when an Andy Flower traumatised India or a Steve Tikolo batted like a <\/span>survivor<\/span><\/a>. Cricket is broken, monopolised, and rigged in India\u2019s favour to the extent that it would be more significant if India do not lift the cup than if they do.<\/span>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last week, comedian Hasan Minhaj exposed our cynical commercialisation of cricket on his Netflix show Patriot Act. He explains how most \u201cworld\u201d tournaments are now planned to suit India\u2019s participation. The one question Minhaj, however, did not ask is whether the Indian cricket fan even cares.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":137,"featured_media":4735,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[107],"tags":[2263,449,6793,2965,19,5059,397,7794,8373,1274],"class_list":["post-4734","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pov","tag-bcci","tag-cricket","tag-fan","tag-hasan-minhaj","tag-india","tag-indian-fan","tag-ipl","tag-patriot-act","tag-tournament","tag-world-cup"],"yoast_head":"\nCricket is Rigged in India\u2019s Favour. 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