Description
Friends, if you are a cricket lover then you must have seen these wonderful sights. But when Australian Captain Pat Cummins went back to his country after winning the ODI World Cup in 2023, no one welcomed him.
Success Story
While 16 teams were participating in the ODI World Cup of 2007, it reduced to only 10 in 2013. In fact, the truth is that cricket is slowly disappearing from the world and BCCI has the biggest role behind this overall downfall. How BCCI’s greed is stopping cricket from growing internationally and will this game now remain limited to India only? In today’s Blog we are going to know everything. Friends, cricket is the most watched game in the world after football and in India there is a next level craze for it. Because people here treat it not like a game but like an emotion.
This is the reason why BCCI has become the richest board of cricket today. Let us tell you that at present the net worth of BCCI is around Rs 19 thousand crores and in terms of money, even all the cricket boards of the world together cannot compete with it. Although BCCI was not always such a rich board, there was a time when BCCI did not have money to pay even to the cricketers. The Indian team playing in the 1983 World Cup was given only ₹1500 match fee and ₹200 daily allowance.
And when the team won the World Cup, the condition of BCCI was so bad that they had nothing to give as rewards to the players. That is why the then BCCI President Rajsingh Dungarpur Asked for help from Mangeshkar ji. After which Lata ji organized a free concert at Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in Delhi and ₹ 20 lakh was raised from this concert. Due to which every player was given a reward of ₹ 1 lakh. However, if compared with today’s time, when India won the T20 World Cup in 2024, then BCCI gave prize money of 100 ₹ 25 crores to the team.
And friends, from this data you must have got an idea of how much BCCI has grown from that time till today and all this has been possible only because of Indian fans. However, friends, even though the fanbase of this game is increasing very fast in India, many countries of the world are keeping distance from this game and this is a matter of great concern for the game of cricket and its fans.
For example, in the ODI World Cup of 2007, there were 16 teams, which reduced to 14 in the World Cup of 2011, and in 2013, an even greater decline was seen because this time the number of teams reduced to 10. Had arrived till now. Whereas if we talk about its exact opposite FIFA World Cup, then along with its viewership, the number of teams participating in this game is also continuously increasing. Like in the FIFA World Cup held in 2006 where 32 teams participated.
This number of the team has increased to 48 in the World Cup to be held in 2026. that means it is clear At the world level, people are more inclined towards football rather than cricket and BCCI can be considered the biggest culprit behind this changing trend. Because BCCI treats cricket not as a game but as a money making business and that is why this game has been exploited a lot.
Actually friends, ICC i.e. International Cricket Council is a governing body which controls cricket at the international level. It has a total of 12 full members which include Australia, England, South Africa, India, New Zealand, West Indies, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Zimbabwe, Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Ireland. Now all of them are full members of ICC. Then by law there should be equal distribution of ICC’s total earnings among all these, right? But this does not happen because BCCI alone takes the largest share.
For example, during the cycle of 2015 to 2023, the total earning of ICC was approximately 35 billion dollars, out of which BCCI wanted that it alone should be given 405 million dollars. But ICC refused to accept this demand and ultimately gave 23 million dollars to BCCI. Given which he was not happy at all. Now friends, here BCCI got much less than its demand. given. Yet if we see, the amount given to BCCI was more than double the amount given to other boards.
Because this. That also means the England and Wales Cricket Board had received one million dollars. That is Cricket Australia. CA$20 million. And friends, from these figures you can guess that BCCI and other cricket boards. What is the financial difference between? And friends, it is not that this difference has come only this year, rather. It has been going on like this for a long time. In such a situation, very little amount is left for the remaining members of the ICC. Due to which every member is not able to grow equally.
Apart from this, if the maximum share of total earnings is from the same country. If it is adopted then its negative impact will start falling on cricket as well and other countries will start staying away from it due to low profits. And this thing is also being seen at present that how the number of cricket teams in the World Cup is continuously decreasing and it is possible that this number may decrease further in the coming years. Now amidst all this a question also arises that is ICC not able to see all these problems?
Actually friends, ICC understands everything and has tried to correct it many times. But the biggest villain in this is BCCI which thinks more about its own benefits than saving the legacy of cricket. For example, in 2017, the ICC had proposed a new revenue sharing model under which the boards’ earnings would be equally distributed among all the members. Now all the members have agreed to this revenue sharing model, except BCCI. BCCI directly opposed this model because if it was so then its revenue would have dropped much more than before.
BCCI said that its contribution is the highest in ICC’s commercial revenue. Actually BCCI itself generates about 30 percent of global cricket revenue. That is why BCCI has made it clear that it will not accept equal distribution. Ultimately BCCI won and due to its opposition the proposal was withdrawn. Now see friends, there is 90 percent audience of cricket in India and BCCI does not show any laxity in taking advantage of it.
This is the reason why he keeps putting pressure on ICC for his own benefit. Also, he does not miss a single opportunity to earn money from cricket. Even if it is affecting the performance of the players. Now we will understand this further with examples but for now let us look at the mismanagement of BCCI. As usually the schedule of the World Cup is announced a year in advance, but the dates of the matches in the 2013 Cricket World Cup were announced by BCCI only 100 days in advance.
That means the match which was to be held in October, was announced at the end of June. Because of which the players barely got four months time to prepare and yet the players managed this problem somehow. But how does one manage frequent changes in schedule? Like in the original schedule of 2013 World Cup, BCCI had changed the dates of nine matches. Not only this, recently BCCI has announced three T20 and three ODIs to be held in Team India’s tour of Sri Lanka.
The schedule of the matches has also been changed which was earlier scheduled to start on 26th July but now it will start on 27th July and this change has also been made just 13 days before the start of the series. Now you might be wondering what difference a change of one day makes. Actually friends, this is not a street game but these are international matches on which the whole world keeps an eye. People come from every corner of the world to watch the match and book tickets and hotels in advance for this.
In this way, even a slight change in the schedule puts the audience in a lot of trouble. Apart from this, these changes also impact the broadcasting companies as they have already planned their schedules and advertisement slots and due to the last minute changes, they have to bear financial losses. But BCCI takes all these things very lightly and this shows that it has now started misusing its powers. Now friends, everyone knows that BCCI starts the richest cricket league in the world, whose name is IPL.
Cricket players from all over the world participate to play in IPL. But despite being very famous at the international level, Indian cricketers are not seen playing in any domestic league outside the country like Big Bash League etc. Have you ever wondered what is the reason behind this?
In fact, BCCI is also behind this. BCCI does not want its players to play in the domestic league of any other country because that player will take his fan base to that country or rather to that league and due to this the earnings of the cricket board of that country will increase significantly. In such a situation, that country can become a competitor of BCCI and this will start a power conflict in international cricket that I am the strongest. Or I am the richest.
You must have seen that wherever our Indian cricket team goes to play, 8 to 9 percent of the stadium is seen only by Indians. Irrespective of whether the match is taking place in England or Australia. If the match is with the Indian team then only Indian supporters will be seen in the stadium. Have you ever wondered why this happens and what is the reason that cricket has dominated the minds of us Indians so badly.
Actually, the reason for this is that BCCI has promoted cricket so massively in India in the last four decades that we do not like any other sport. Also, BCCI has made cricket a sport in India whose matches take place all the time. They never stop even if our team wins the World Cup. As recently we all saw that on June 29, India won the T20 World Cup, while on July 6, our team was playing a T-Twenty series with Zimbabwe. And not only this, after playing five matches with Zimbabwe, our team is also going to play with Sri Lanka on 27th of this month.
And friends, this sequence continues like this throughout the year. People have become so obsessed with cricket that whether the match is being held in South Africa or West Indies, Indian fans reach everywhere and this is the reason why there are more Indians inside the stadium in India’s matches than the supporters of the home country. Are visible. If we talk about football, it is very popular in Brazil, Argentina, Germany, Spain, Italy, France, Portugal, Japan, South Korea and many other countries and this game gets good viewership from everywhere.
Isn’t it just from one country like cricket? And friends, seeing all this, it seems that in the future, cricket will remain a game of Indians only because the involvement and interest of other countries in this game is continuously decreasing, which is absolutely not good for the game of cricket. Not there. Remember, this game will be able to progress only when all the nations show equal interest in it. But on the contrary, now many countries are keeping distance from it and even among the countries which are participating, there is no special craze for cricket.
We also get proof of this from this blog of Pat Cummins. When he returned to his country Australia after winning the ODI World Cup, no one gave him any special welcome at the airport nor did any crowd of fans gather at the airport. But friends, even now if BCCI wants, it can make cricket a big international sport. For this, it will have to change its policy so that all the members of ICC can grow equally.
At present, the good thing is that cricket has now been added to the Olympics, the advantage of which will be that those countries which till now had kept distance from it, will also start participating in it. And friends, as an example of this, you must have seen recently that now USA has also started playing cricket and it is possible that after joining the Olympics, countries like China will also start taking part in it, which can further accelerate the growth of cricket. By the way, what is your opinion about BCCI, please tell us by commenting.
Anyway, see you again with the powerful explanation of the Success Story.