BCCI politics kills third ODI

The Hudhud Cyclone that lashed coastal Andhra Pradesh provided Delhi an excellent opportunity to become only the second venue in India - after Gwalior in 1993 - to host successive One-Day Internationals.

The BCCI, for which pleasing its constituent units seems to be a priority, woke up too late, despite the metrological department's advance warnings of Visakhapatnam being in range of the advancing cyclone. It resulted in the third encounter of the five-ODI series against the West Indies being cancelled.

Had there been stand-by venues for home international matches, the ODI could have easily been relocated and saved the BCCI a huge embarrassment.

Initially, the BCCI didn't want to relocate the game, clearly due to vote-bank politics, as the Andhra Cricket Association (ACA) is a staunch supporter of sidelined BCCI president N. Srinivasan.

And by the time its mandarins realised that it wouldn't indeed be wise to hang on to false hope, and approached the Delhi and District Cricket Association (DDCA) on Saturday, it was too late to stage the game.

A major reason for not shifting the match was that the BCCI wouldn't have received the insurance claim had it 'prematurely' announced the cancellation of the ODI. In trying to have the best of both worlds, the BCCI ended up with egg on its face.

Finally, on Monday BCCI announced the cancellation of the ODI, due to a "natural calamity", and the two teams stayed put in Delhi. They will now travel to Dharamsala for Friday's fourth ODI.

As late as Saturday, BCCI secretary Sanjay Patel was insistent that the match would not be relocated.

"It's difficult to shift the venue at such short notice. The cricketers' itinerary may be changed but there would be logistical problems like TV crew. We're, however, alert on this," Patel had said. Only he knows what he implied by being "alert" in this context.

ACA secretary Gokaraju Gangaraju, too, was not willing to let go the chance to host the ODI, despite tell-tale warnings that the Dr YS Rajasekhara Reddy ACAVDCA Cricket Stadium was literally in the eye of the storm.

Against all odds, this is what Gangaraju said on Saturday: "The entire ground is fully covered. There's no question of water getting on to the pitch. Besides, we've excellent drainage facility. The match is on."

Had the BCCI, for a change, made cricket its top priority, the Visakhapatnam ODI could have been played in Delhi or elsewhere. DDCA president SP Bansal said he would have surely agreed to host the game had he been given a week's notice.

"We would have loved to stage a second ODI. But a three-day notice, including a Sunday, was too short to get all the required permissions - from the police, fire department, entertainment department, and the MCD - besides printing match tickets," Bansal told MAIL TODAY.

"To get MCD permission, we have to approach the Delhi High Court as a case regarding Ferozeshah Kotla's property tax is subjudice there. Without the court's permission, we couldn't have hosted a second match, and you never know how long it would have taken to get the permission," he said.

"For the first time in about eight years, we had no problem in getting the required permissions from the government departments for Saturday's ODI, for which we are thankful to them. So, had we got a week's notice we would've loved to host another match."

No BCCI official was available for comment, but a Srinivasan group loyalist admitted that this embarrassment could have been avoided had the Board put in place a policy of stand-by venues for all home matches. "And so far as rotation of venues is concerned, overlapping matches could always be adjusted in the next home series," he said.