WICB, players boost incomes as results nose dive

May 02, 2010 Sports

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Cricket is definitely now big business

The West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) and its players are seeing more income now than ever before.
The spectacle of watching the Windies go to their slaughter time and time again has provided amusement to those in Asia and the rest of the world through live television broadcast, but it also appears to have fattened the coffers of the WICB.
And while the international twenty20 (T20) circuit has created an avenue for players to earn considerable sums of money, the growing popularity of the new dimension of a sport long held to define West Indians may be drawing away from development at the “grassroots” level.
The statistics paint a daunting picture.
Of 48 international matches between October 1, 2008 and September 30, 2009 — the WICB’s financial year — the Windies were only able to secure 13 wins, while eight of those victories were T20 matches.
The figures at the bottom line, on the other hand, paint a much flowery landscape.
The WICB made US$7.6 million in net income during the year that ended September 30, 2009.  This represented a reduction from US$22.5 million, primarily as a result of dividends received from participating in the ICC World Cup in 2007, but the WICB has finally returned to a positive equity position — US$6.45 million at the end of last September up from negative US$1.2 million.
Perhaps, more importantly, the WICB is profiting from its operations, principally because of media rights earnings, which were increased from US$8.2 million in 2008 to US$29.3 million in 2009. This helped push up revenues US$19.7 million to US$48 million.
WICB President Julian Hunte declared that “never in a single financial year had the board garnered as much revenue nor paid the players as significant income as it did in the year ended September 30, 2009”, in a statement attached to the financial statements.
The WICB paid out US$10 million to players, of which US$8 million was paid to international players and another US$474,572 to pay players’ retainers.
Retainers cost dropped significantly, from US$1.1 million in the previous year, but the payout to players represented a jump from US$3.3 million in the year that ended September 30, 2008.
It is not immediately clear how the US$10-million was split among the players, but based on a release last October that stated that as many as 30 players would sign retainers for the West Indies, those 30 were probably among the ones who received the lion’s share of the total, indicating that the average payment to each player is upwards of US$200,000 per year.
There are reportedly four categories under the new arrangement, based mainly on record and experience. The top is worth US$120,000, the second US$80,000 and the third US$60,000. A fourth, worth US$24,000, covers principally development players.
Undoubtedly, Chris Gayle, Ramnaresh Sarwan and Shivnarine Chanderpaul, who have secured their spots in the team consistently touring, are among the top paid.
Signing a five-year television broadcast agreement in February 2008 with Taj Television that gives the Dubai-based TV station broadcast rights to all tours to West Indies for the rest of the world, excluding the UK and the Caribbean, has brought in significant income to the WICB.
A ten per cent down payment earned the WICB US$1.8 million in 2008 and another US$385,800 last year.
And even while the WICB negotiated and received appearance fees of US$400,000 to fly to Abu Dhabi in November 2008 to receive a 3-0 drubbing from Pakistan, Taj TV and Sky paid out media rights of US$12.8 million to carry England’s tour of the West Indies in 2009.
In that series, West Indies endured five Test matches to secure the only victory in the series and retain the Wisden trophy. Even then, the Windies beat England in a twenty/20 match in Trinidad before losing 2-3 in a One-Day International (ODI) series.
The agony of giving back the Wisden Trophy in May 2009 in a 2-0 Test series blow out in England did earn the regional side US$2 million in appearance fees, which also covered a four-match One-Day International series, in which the Windies lost 1-2.
Clawing their way to the semi-finals in the ICC World Twenty/20 Cup in England where they lost to Sri Lanka, the Windies made US$141,750 in prize money along with the US$1.8 million in distributions for playing in the tournament. But that seemed a paltry sum compared to the US$15.9 million Sky and Taj TV paid for media rights to broadcast a 2-1 walloping of the Windies by India in a four-match ODI tour following the T20 tournament.
The WICB received another US$1.6 million for turning out a team last September at the ICC Champions Trophy in South Africa where the Windies lost three ODI matches in a week.
Even then, it’s not clear how much money the WICB lost due to Sky not broadcasting the Bangladesh vs West Indies series in July 2009 and thus, not paying the broadcast fees.
A boycott by the West Indies Players’ Association (WIPA) led the board to choose a second-string squad for a series of matches against Bangladesh in July 2009. As a result, Bangladesh won both Tests and the three ODIs, while the Windies were only able to secure the one win in a T20.
The players then were arguing that the WICB had not delivered on contract terms and settled fees for participation in tours.
Hunte says the focus now is on the WICB’s “cricket development programme to ensure that we have the capacity to produce players of the highest quality”.
“Whilst this mandates us to implement grassroot programmes and the higher performance centre, we are faced with the reality that these same players are increasingly driven to maximise their returns on the international 20/20 circuit”, he added in a statement.
(Camilo Thame; Jamaica Observer)

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