Proxy War Rules BCCI-ICC Tango

Manohar wisely chose to delineate the ICC Chairman’s post from being held by a BCCI representative and thereafter elected himself...

- Sreelata S. Yellamrazu

From disquietude and uneasy bonhomie, the bones in the closet are being bared. And how! Not limited to attacks on the institutions themselves, this is turning into a virtual character assassination as the ICC and BCI war of words gets nasty.

From a seemingly innocuous voting on the future of Test cricket to threats of deliberate pull out of teams, the corridors of the International Cricket Council (ICC) resounded with thunder echoed back by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). If the cliché of uneasy lies the head that wears the crown was ever applicable, perhaps none more so than in the case of the current ICC Chairman, Shashank Manohar, who has come under direct attack from the BCCI president and his successor to that powerful position, Anurag Thakur.

Although the dismantling of the idea of the ICC’s two tier Test agenda appeared to be the primary bone of contention, it was merely one more gauntlet thrown in the line of fire in a long running, underlying feud that has put Manohar squarely in opposition with the BCCI, with neither party willing to back down.

Judging by the recent war of words, it would appear that the BCCI has been silently and secretly grudging Manohar and this was not just because of the fact that he essentially leap frogged from his pivotal encore role within the BCCI as the president to a more independent, prominent position in the ICC. Manohar is far too astute a lawyer to know swords would be drawn early when upon assuming his new role on a global level and taking on a more neutral, independent stance, Manohar metaphorically changed garb, as is the insinuation flying off the handle at the BCCI.