Crisis threatens 2007 World Cup

AS THE four parties at the centre of the latest controversy in West Indies cricket sought a solution to their differences at a meeting in St George’s, the potential impact on the 2007 World Cup in the Caribbean was again evident. Richard Bevan, joint chief executive of the Federation of International Cricketers’ Associations (FICA), warned in an interview in the London Daily Telegraph that the row over clashing contracts between West Indies team sponsors, Digicel, and individual players’ endorsements to telecommunications rivals Cable and Wireless could jeopardise the tournament.

“Broadcasters and potential sponsors will be looking at this and thinking that ‘If the WICB can’t keep their own house in order, what chance have they got with the World Cup?’,” Bevan told writer Simon Briggs. “Over the past five or six years, the WICB have failed to understand that their players are more than just employees —  they are the product itself,” he said. “To blame them for being mercenary is a very poor position. What the WICB should have done is make sure that all their stakeholders were on board before switching their sponsors from C&W to Digicel,” he added.

Briggs said the cup would be under threat, particularly if potential commercial partners felt that a tournament run by the shambolic WICB would be a poor investment. “Concerns about venue standards and inter-island transport have already led to predictions that the competition will be a logistical nightmare,” he said. Their views followed those expressed two weeks ago by Chris Dehring, head of World Cup WI Inc, the company set up by the WICB to organise the event.

“It seems like so long ago that we won the ICC (Champions Trophy) tournament,” Dehring told a workshop in Port-of-Spain, referring to the West Indies’ triumph in England in September. “We, as the public, need to put pressure on the players and the administration to get it right because the situation (the sponsorship) dispute is turning people away.” Dehring estimated that the World Cup, the biggest single event ever staged in the cricket-playing Caribbean, had the potential to bring over US$500 million to the economies of the region.