ICC can take lessons from FIFA
In the Sydney Morning Herald , Greg Baum looks at the governing bodies of cricket and football and says the ICC and learn a few things from FIFA.
George Binoy
25-Feb-2013
In the Sydney Morning Herald, Greg Baum looks at the governing bodies of cricket and football and says the ICC and learn a few things from FIFA.
Though it has made concerted efforts in recent years to expand its horizons, essentially cricket remains a game of the old Commonwealth. As such, the ICC's members, though undoubtedly diverse, are linked by history, by culture, by language. It is a game for which people care deeply, but other than on the Indian sub-continent does not stir up fervour as soccer does. You would think that, as such, it is a relatively easy sport to run.
Yet, somehow, the ICC regularly seems to be in turmoil. Perhaps because it is smaller than soccer, cricketing power - read: money - easily becomes concentrated in one place, and the rest of the world finds itself paying obeisance there. At present, it is India. Soccer has several power bases. Far from tearing the game apart, they appear to hold it in tension.
George Binoy is an assistant editor at ESPNcricinfo