Portrait of a player as an entertainer

UMPIRE's POST

Last Monday, at the press conference in Mumbai that paraded Indian Cricket League's battalion of recruits, Kapil Dev made a remark whose poignancy may well have escaped him. The question from the floor was whether there was going to be an oversupply of cricket that would further dilute whatever novelty was left to it.

Will the public, in choosing between whether to watch Sachin Tendulkar or Dinesh Mongia, end up being disillusioned?

The question sounded far-fetched, but nevertheless galvanised Kapil into one of his trademark shots from the lip. "There are so many films made in the country. I cannot tell you to watch only Amitabh Bachchan's and not any of Shah Rukh Khan's. It is up to you to choose."

In making the comparison with movies, he succinctly captured what lies at the root of the turbulence that Indian cricket is going through. Like it or not, the sport has become entertainment.

What else did you expect? The national pride is a bit overplayed. Many players privately admit to living in a haze, not quite remembering the games as distinct from one another. It is like travelling in a bubble equipped with canned applause, lament, injury and vagaries of selection.

Many sports already are entertainment, without any national pride, though local loyalties do hold sway. Basketball and baseball are played along these lines in the US. So are soccer leagues in England and Italy.

Instead of ruing it, it is best to wake up and learn to treat cricket like any other industry. The ruling elite at the cricket board, ever since it came to power, has been quite unabashed in focusing on maximising revenue. So, why does it grudge the players' desire to do the same?

An ICL player, amid the noise of rehearsed responses detailing the love of the game, let it slip that the league had given him "security". Why should he feel compelled to use the euphemism?

Baichung Bhutia tried very hard to play in England and ended up on the bench of a second division club. That did not invite a ban on him from the Indian football administration. Beckham is playing in the US purely for money. But he remains eligible to represent England.

All anti-trust and anti-competitive practices ought to be thrown out of the system. Monopolistic moves aimed at snuffing out competition must be stopped. We also have to stop embracing, selectively of course, Nehrivian abhorrence of profit.

As cricket becomes entertainment, the time to establish order is now. Otherwise, it will end up being as chaotic as the industry Kapil likened it to.