Does the ECB’s new-found enthusiasm for cricket in the Olympics stem from a genuine interest in the global game, or is it merely a means to improve its public image?
Tim Wigmore06-Nov-2015Switzerland is an unlikely setting for a critical moment in modern cricket history. Yet when the ICC, including Giles Clarke, meet the International Olympic Committee at Lausanne this month it will reveal much about who has the power, and how they intend to use it, in English and global cricket today.Under new chairman Colin Graves, the ECB has been keen to distance itself from the old regime – and above all Clarke. “I don’t want to look back at the Giles Clarke regime,” Graves told ESPNcricinfo last month.Graves’ endorsement of cricket joining the Olympics seems emblematic of the ECB’s determination to forge a new image. Many in the ECB are aware that it has become regarded as a pernicious influence on the world game following the board’s role in the International Cricket Council’s restructuring last year, its determination that the World Cup should be contracted to ten teams and its staunch opposition to Olympic participation on the grounds that it would reduce the ECB’s revenue.An ECB board meeting last Thursday endorsed Graves’ support for the ICC’s newfound interest in cricket becoming an Olympic sport. It also emphasised that Clarke should represent this position at the ICC – despite his unequivocal declaration, in the recent documentary Death of a Gentleman, that joining the Games was “impossible” and “a complete non-starter”.Clarke is not the sort to meekly accept orders from the board. The ECB president, who remains the board’s representative in the ICC, has given no indication of privately altering his stance on the Olympics.In The Guardian last week Mike Selvey, who is known to have a good working relationship with Clarke, reported that “The ICC, for its part, would see an Olympic tournament as diluting the value of its own global competitions” and that a T20 tournament would not fit within the schedule, leaving only sixes or double-wicket cricket as options. The implication was unmistakable: Clarke has yet to revise his previous opinion.Next June, Clarke is likely to become the new ICC chairman. The new BCCI president Shashank Manohar is grappling with internal politics and so, following the death of Jagmohan Dalmiya and in the aftermath of the IPL match-fixing scandal, Clarke could have a relatively free hand in the ICC executive committee.Yet while Clarke would nominally be the most influential man in world cricket, his position would appear to be contingent upon maintaining the support of the ECB board. If a full member removes their nominee to the ICC board, they cease to sit on the board and are no longer eligible to hold the position of ICC chairman, as Srinivasan might soon find out.In theory this gives the ECB board power over Clarke’s behaviour if he becomes ICC president. Clarke “will have to fall in line with the ECB stance,” says one source who has worked with him and Graves. “If Giles steps out of line he will be bombed.”And so the focus turns to Lausanne later this month, where the ICC and the IOC will meet to discuss cricket’s possible inclusion in the 2024 Games. Alongside David Richardson, Clarke has been chosen to represent the ICC, a curious decision in light of his previous public opposition to cricket joining the Games.The fact that the IOC recognise the ICC and have arranged a meeting suggests a desire to include the world’s second most popular sport (and its lucrative Indian market). However, there are issues to be overcome, with India’s non-compliance with the World Anti-Doping Agency particularly problematic. Any official bid to make cricket an Olympic sport would therefore require the full support and commitment of key ICC figures, given the diplomacy required to encourage the BCCI to modify their stance to appease the IOC. Clarke’s position remains crucial.This appears to be a moment of transformative potential for cricket. Olympic status could give the women’s game unprecedented exposure and funding, and would do the same for men’s cricket beyond the Test world. It would be expansionism with someone else footing the bill: in China, local and national government would spend $15-20 million a year on cricket if it became an Olympic sport, while government funding in most countries prioritises Olympic sports.Certainly the Olympic issue appears worthy of more debate than the current ICC stance as presented by Selvey. Indeed, rather than costing ICC events money, one expert believes it would do the exact opposite.”I don’t think that fewer people will suddenly watch the World T20 if there’s a T20 Olympics competition,” says Andrew Wildblood, the former executive vice-president of IMG, the global sports marketing firm. “In fact I’ll think it will have a positive impact because you will be distributing the game to a wider audience.”Meanwhile Graves has already said that he does not envisage difficulty fitting an Olympic event into cricket’s schedule. As far as the Olympic schedule goes, a 16-team T20 event, with four groups of four and then quarter-finals, could be completed in as few as eight days by playing up to three games a day on two different grounds.The Lausanne encounter will be instructive. Should it prove unproductive, and if Clarke is perceived as being an obstacle, it will raise questions as to how much influence Graves really holds over Clarke, with the implication that Clarke will retain considerable autonomy at the ICC while Graves focuses on English domestic cricket.Though the ECB has worked hard to restore its public image since the installation of Graves and Tom Harrison as chairman and CEO respectively, the damage that was caused by its annus horriblis in 2014-15 means that being seen to do the right thing is a vital part of the board’s new strategy. Publicly endorsing the Olympics is an obvious means of boosting the ECB’s public standing.However, fundamental questions about the ECB remain, whatever happens in Lausanne. While Clarke has remained the ECB’s representative in Dubai, Graves has yet to discuss the lack of independent governance at the ICC or the reforms to the ICC last year, even though he was deputy chairman of the ECB when they took place; nor has he shown interest in reversing the contraction of the World Cup. As part of their itineraries for next year’s Test tours of England, two full members, Sri Lanka and Pakistan, have agreed to multi-match ODI series against Ireland; England, on the other hand, still only play Ireland in a solitary ODI every two years.England also declined to make their 50-over match with Hong Kong on Sunday an official ODI. Remarkably, it is understood that the ECB claimed not to have the funds available to pay their players full match fees.The suggestion that the ECB have a renewed interest in the wellbeing of the international game is welcome indeed. Yet the perception of the board’s new enlightened stewardship remains, as yet, some way short of being a reality.