Malcolm Gray and Speed: An Unmitigated Disaster

By Anil & Gaurang, 19 June '03
July 9 2003

Malcolm Gray, the outgoing ICC President under whom the game of cricket has suffered immeasurably, has made several shocking admissions on his way out as he makes way for the incoming President, Ehsan Mani.

While Malcolm Gray was at the helm, cricket was marketed more than ever in India, turning it into a huge money-spinner the likes of which the inventors of the game could never have imagined. Now considered the national sport of India, of the 10 or so countries in the world where cricket is very popular India contributes by far the largest portion of the game's revenue: estimated at more than 80%. This is also the approximate portion of the revenue contributed by Indian companies towards the $550 million (US) contract that the game's governing body, ICC, has negotiated with sponsors just for multi-way international tournaments such as the Cricket World Cup and Champions Trophy.

But Gray also presided over the most acrimonious and poorly managed period in cricket: one which he and his junior ICC co-executive also from Australia, Malcolm Speed, are considered largely responsible for contriving. They created rifts within cricket's member countries with their hostile, almost tyrannical old-world attitude towards many, but mostly targetted at the game's greatest money-maker, India, and its cricket board BCCI's president Jagmohan Dalmiya who was Gray's predecessor as the top executive in the ICC, as well as Indian players from captain Sourav Ganguly on down.

Gray's blackest moment was the Mike Deness affair: a huge, unforgettable blot on the history of cricket that still rankles with fans of the game. Extremely fortunate that the Indian cricketers did not press charges against incredibly biased judgments by ICC referee Deness in which he indiscriminately banned and fined more than half India's team for simply appealing enthusiastically, while ignoring their opponents, South Africa, who were appealing far more aggressively, both Malcoms were unapologetic after Deness was criticized by both Indian and South African cricket boards. Widely recognized as perhaps the most discriminatory act by an offical in cricketing history, the ICC agreed to review the penalties after Deness was prevented from entering the stadium to officiate in the 3rd Test match by South African police, but one and a half years later, have continued to stonewall, while supporting Deness's unscrupulous actions.

Another mess to which cricket almost succumbed came under Gray's watch: the specter of match-fixing. This ugly practice, of which cricketers in almost every world team were accused, was first exposed by Delhi police and then investigated by India's premiere crime investigation agency, the CBI. The ICC acted belatedly in recognizing that the problem existed, and then failed hopelessly in ensuring that the named players were properly investigated and punished. Most of the real work in this scandal was done by Indian authorities, while Paul Condon and the so-called ACU (Anti Corruption Unit) have done very little to help, mostly using data from the CBI. While India full investigated and punished multiple of its own cricketers with life bans, most other countries protected their players and the ICC did nothing to press them into similar punishments. This goes down as another giant black mark against the name of Malcom Gray.

Perhaps worst of all, the Malcoms have together been responsible for the breakup of the ICC into warring factions. When they tried to force exploitative contracts down the Indian players throats, even invoking a stern judgment against ICC by the Delhi High Court, all hell broke loose and both the Champions Trophy and World Cup were endangered -- this at a time when the vast majority of WC03 audience as well as sponsors were Indian, threatening to bring the game crashing down. Although the ICC were forced to accept the terms laid down by the Indian players for participating, they withheld all World Cup revenue from the ICC due the Indian board (an irony given that the majority of the World Cup revenue came from India), a matter that is now causing much disagreement within the ICC even as the GCC claims damages from the ICC.

Boycotting of matches is another practice that has mushroomed under the Malcoms, with two countries refusing to honor their commitments in the World Cup (with India-Pakistan match, amazingly, not one of those).

Behavior from the controversial Australian team has never been as shocking as under the watch of the Malcoms. This highly disliked team, which has been caught up in numerous public scandals and unpleasant confrontations across the world over the years, have been tolerated to the point of absurdity by umpires and referees, while the Malcoms pay lip service to the obligations of that team and the officials under whom they played. Action has been notorious by its absence, however, and those officials and players are almost always rewarded immediately thereafter. It does not help that under the Malcoms, the entire panel of the pompously-named "elite" umpires is heavily dominated by apparently biased old men from Australia, England, and South Africa.

In a series of interviews as he departs the ICC, Malcom Gray has made several shocking admissions which have rocked the cricket world with their sheer bad taste. The apparent implications from these comments seem to consist essentially of Gray owning up to several of the faults he and his co-administrator Speed are suspected of by cricket fans:

• Many other cricket boards except India's let their players off lightly, while the ACU was and is a powerless, toothless, impotent farce.
• ICC decisions were arbitrary and capricious, made mostly by Malcom & Malcom.
• ICC screwed up on the negotiations of the player contracts - they sold the rights to player images, which they never had in the first place.
• ICC Umpires and Referees are biased and inconsistent.
• Racism is rampant in the ICC, and colors many decisions.
• Politicians of countries such as England and NZ almost split the cricket community without themselves taking the heat for it. At least the Indian government acknowledges and spells out its own policy of embargo on bilateral cricket with Pakistan.
• ICC has failed to fully globalize the game, trying to keep it an old boys club. (Remember the Steve Waugh Statement about not Americanizing the game!) While in reality the game needs to be brought to USA, a huge market, and spread around the world including Hong Kong, Singapore, China, and other countries, which Dalmiya and Mani originally wanted to do.

While it is good to see him coming clean on some of his mistakes, his admissions are too little and too late. He had ample opportunity to work on these problems while he ran the ICC for four years, but cricket suffered greatly during that time. The future of the game can only look brighter with his exit from the scene.

Malcom and Malcom have been an unmitigated disaster for what used to be considered a gentleman's sport before they took over. Goodbye Malcoms, and Good Riddance!

Gray's comments shocking
Gray is also a colour
Boards tried to shield match-fixers: Gray
Umpires inconsistent: Speed
Mani matters
New ICC chief calls for international truce
Gray slams Wisden, who lash back at him
Who will pay the GCC?