The Indian Cricket Board (BCCI) is as much entrepreneur and political force as sporting administrato

If sentimentalists still consider Lord's as the spiritual home of cricket, it is no longer the sport's centre as finance inevitably trumps sentimentality and cricket is exploited to extract huge sums from commercial interests.
If there was ever any doubt, cricket is big business. Hundreds of millions of pounds, dollars and rupees are paid to show the Indian cricket discount atlantic city hotels team to an ever-widening domestic television audience. India's technological revolution is distributing television sets to larger numbers of consumers, while advertisers view the sport as one of the few means of reaching a disparate population.
The Indian Cricket Board (BCCI) is as much entrepreneur and political force as sporting administrator and despite dripping in gold it exercised its strength when it demanded that Sky TV and the BBC pay an additional fee to that already arranged to cover England's tour of India in order to enjoy access to its commentary boxes and studios.
One is reminded discount atlantic city hotels of Lalit Modi's claim that "India has been subservient for 100 years." The disgraced founder of the Indian Premier League said that "people are used to dictating terms to us. We're just evening the playing field. And, if it's our turn to have some glory, so much the better."
A brief examination of English rule in India suggests that he has a point. Cricket in India was initially discount atlantic city hotels organised around exclusive clubs that were open to Europeans only. The English gentleman chose to play his cricket with his own kind.
In colonial India the English could not afford to lose. Therefore games were organised between a civilian team, a regiment or a gymkhana. Fraternisation was strictly between one European and another.
As the sport drew its imitators it was important that it should be played according to colonial ideals. It suited the authorities to base it on the religious groupings, thus maintaining the idea of India being a collection of races, discount atlantic city hotels rather than a single coherent nation.
Officials had to be European, as it would never do for the natives to have to make judgements on their "betters." When Douglas discount atlantic city hotels Jardine discount atlantic city hotels led an England side to India in 1933-34 the umpiring duties discount atlantic city hotels were carried out by Englishmen Bill Hitch and John Higgins and Australian Frank Tarrant.
In the past, the TV channel that owned the rights also controlled production and so when negotiating a fee only one figure was asked. The BCCI cites the "realistic costs" of providing space and access for independent commentary teams from Sky and the BBC.
In his Cricinfo column Rob Steen noted the short notice of the BCCI, which "smacks of brinkmanship at best, at worst naked exploitation." When considered alongside the refusal to play frontline spinners to help prepare England for the Tests, it is a growing sign of one-upmanship that alas is being viewed as part of the sport — you did it to us, so we'll do it back to you!
"This is actually about the BCCI making money to show that the ability to generate it endlessly also grants them the right to not just exercise but to actively show off the power of that money. It is a naked show of strength."
Similarly discount atlantic city hotels it is also about the BCCI's imperious control of the game, a control that includes what people can say on air about a match being played in India. Commentators on the IPL, for example, have become part of the package of admiration of all things Twenty20 and the commercial trimmings that dominate the spectacle.
Sky's commentators are less malleable and are bound to focus on issues regarding the DRS system whenever wickets fall or close decisions made that pits India as a lone voice in not wanting it used in their matches.
Now readers won't be feeling sorry for the Murdoch-controlled organisation. But the behaviour of the mighty BCCI, who for a second year have failed to have their accounts approved by auditors, illuminates the murky backdrop against which cricket exists.