No team sponsor for Indian team in WTC Final, BCCI asleep?

It is surprising that for the richest cricket board in the world, the BCCI was not able to find a team sponsor for the Indian teams.

When the Indian team takes the field on Wednesday at the Oval during the World Test Championship (WTC) final against Australia. It will be for the first time in a long time that the Indian team will take the field without a team sponsor.

India do have a kit sponsor in Adidas now. But the side does not have a team sponsor which is a surprising development. It really shows that the Board needs to get its act together or get more professional in the way they handle issues.

The Indian men’s team last played an international, against Australia, on March 15 in Chennai in an ODI. Since then, the Indian team has not played any sort of cricket as one unit. So, it should have ideally given an opportunity for the Board to find a sponsor. Ideally, before the term of the previous sponsor ended, the Board should have set the ball rolling to get a new one on board.

But unlike well-oiled professional organizations, the Indian board appears to be a one-trick pony. In this setup, the resources are earmarked for one big project at a time. The Indian Premier League (IPL) seems to have taken up all the attention and time of the Board. This is not how professional sports bodies are run worldwide. Every Board/company has specific departments taking care of specific needs/developments.

Unfortunately, that is not the case with the Board in India. All the attention for the past three months was focused just on the IPL.

This is just a shocking turn of events for a Board purported to be the richest cricket board in the world. It could also be that the Board did not get the price that they were looking for in the case of the team sponsor. But there was enough and more time to get someone on board.

The same also holds true for the host broadcaster in India for all the home international and domestic cricket matches. The term with Star Sports also ended on the same date as the team sponsor. But again no one bothered to get the ball rolling to get a new broadcaster on board. Just why this lethargy?

Should the Board not be attentive to such matters? Or this does not matter.

Answers to these questions will never be given because sources are busy.