adminJOHANNESBURG. — Cricket South Africa could plunge into bankruptcy owing to a damaging row with the Board of Control for Cricket in India centred on the appointment of Haroon Lorgat as the chief executive of CSA.Media reports in South Africa yesterday warned that the projected losses of the row between CSA and BCCI, which could affect the Indian’s proposed tour of South Africa, could have far-reaching repercussions with the Sunday Times newspaper saying there was a possibility CSA could plunge into bankruptcy.
“Instead of consolidating their position as the second richest national board in would cricket, CSA are staring down the barrel of a potentially bankrupting financial crisis,” Telford Vice, writing in the Sunday Times, said.
“And all because the BCCI are refusing to fulfil the fixtures for their team’s tour to SA next season as they are listed, albeit non-binding, on the Future Tours programme.
“If the tour is shortened, as has been mooted, CSA could lose up to R200 million (about US$20 million) in revenue.
“Only half as much is estimated to have been consumed in legal fees and lost sponsorship by the bonus scandal that created the chief executive’s vacancy that Haroon Lorgat has filled in defiance of India’s threats of retribution.
“’Minimal”, was the answer reportedly given by a CSA director when the ramifications of appointing Lorgat was raised at a board meeting. Clearly, CSA knew they had a problem. Just, as clearly, they underestimated its size.
“The ICC audited accounts as at December 31 2012 put the combined net worth of the Test-playing countries at US$591 321 832,25. Of that, the BCCI owned US$294 219 865, or 49,76 percent. CSA were next on the list with US$68 436 592, followed by England’s US$58 013 070.
“But CSA’s loss for the year of US$6 027 917 was the biggest by any country. If they don’t repair their relationship with India, expect that figure to grow.”
The Sunday Times said the BCCI’s problems with Lorgat were yet to be specified, which appear to stem from his old position as the ICC chief executive.
“The BCCI are likely to push CSA out of the CLT20 (Champions League Twenty20), in which the South Africans hold a 25 percent share, and if the bad blood continues, the planning of future SA-India series will be fraught with difficulties,” write Vice.
Cricinfo reported yesterday that CSA underestimated the cost of the BCCI warnings for them not to recruit Lorgat as their chief executive.
“While uncertainty hangs over India’s tour to South Africa later this year, it has emerged that CSA might have underestimated the risk of appointing Haroon Lorgat as its chief executive despite BCCI’s strong reservations against him,” Cricinfo reported.
“While the BCCI’s antipathy towards Lorgat is well known in cricket circles, Jacques Faul, the former acting CSA chief, revealed to ESPNcricinfo that N Srinivasan, the BCCI president, had categorically warned that the tour might be at risk and CSA would stand to lose financially if they went ahead with Lorgat’s appointment.
“Faul, who is now in charge of the Titans franchise, told ESPNcricinfo that Srinivasan had communicated as much to Willie Basson, CSA’s acting president at the time.
“The conversation, according to Faul, took place during a Champions League T20 meeting in Malaysia in December 2012.
“Faul then approached Srinivasan himself and suggested that the BCCI could not tell CSA who to appoint as chief executive, but he was told that the BCCI wasn’t telling them who to appoint, but who not to appoint.
“However, over the subsequent months, CSA assumed that the financial fallout of ignoring that warning would be ‘minimal’. During this period Lorgat had secured an endorsement letter from IS Bindra, the former BCCI president and known critic of the current set-up.” — Agencies/Sunday Times/Cricinfo.
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