Indian players sign ICC contract

AUCKLAND: The simmering conflict between the Indian cricketers and the International Cricket Council (ICC) over the Players’ Terms for the World Cup seems to be on the boil down with the players signing the contracts here on Friday. The controversy is, however, still far from being settled with the players insisting that their acceptance was only "conditional".
All the cricketers in the Indian World Cup squad signed the Players’ Terms on Friday but have clearly stated that a few clauses were unacceptable to them.`` We have not accepted the Players’ Terms wholly,’’ clarified a senior Indian cricketer. ``Certain clauses are still unacceptable to us and now it is up to the ICC to sort things out,’’ he added.
The reservations of the players are reportedly over the ambush marketing and image clauses. However, by signing the Players’ Terms, the Indians have met the ICC deadline of January 14.
The signing of the contracts may have been an outcome of a nearly 45-minute talk between BCCI president, Jagmohan Dalmiya and Indian skipper Sourav Ganguly on Thursday night. Dalmiya, according to sources, had once again reiterated his support to the players’ stand.
Meanwhile Ganguly, talking about the contract controversy, said the Indian cricketers’ stand had already been explained to the ICC. ``We are in contact with the BCCI. We have told the ICC what our problems are __ we have set our terms and conditions. There are certain areas that need to be looked into,’’ he said.
The skipper also expressed his disappointment at the way the issue has dragged on. ``We decided to co-operate fully when we were touring England last summer, thinking there will be time after this for them to sort it out. But the situation is the same and there are certain restrictions on us. We have our existing contracts and it is illegal to break and we’ve told them about it.’’
The Indian skipper was referring to the controversy over the signing of the Players’ Terms for the ICC Champions Trophy last September. The Indians had agreed to sign the contract then on the condition that the ICC would look into their grievances. The ICC, in turn, constituted a six-member contract committee, with Dalmiya as one of the members, to settle the issue before the World Cup.
The world cricket governing body came up with a ``final offer’’ for the Indian players in December, which reduced the ``blackout period’’ by 25 days __ that is just five days after the tournament, instead of 30.
Under the original clause, the players were barred from endorsing products, which were in a conflict of interest to the official sponsors of the tournament for a period of 30 days before the event, during the event and 30 days after it.
But, according to sources, this concession is still not acceptable to the players. They want the restrictions to apply only for the duration of the World Cup (February 8-March 23) as they can persuade their sponsors just for that period.
The ICC had also reduced to three months the validity period of the image clause, under which the official sponsors were allowed to use player images till six months after an ICC event. Some more unspecified restrictions had been imposed on the use of player images by the ICC sponsors in order ``to avoid any suggestion of a personal endorsement by the players’’.
But the image clause is unacceptable to the Indian cricketers as it clashes with their pre-existing contracts. ``How can Virender Sehwag, who is endorsing Coke, allow his image to be used by a rival cola company,’’ asked a senior Indian cricketer.
The Indian Board was not satisfied with the ``final offer’’ and ultimately Dalmiya resigned from the contract committee, deciding to go for mediation and threatening to take the ICC to court.
The Board sought a non-binding mediation in South Africa as per the Participating Nations Agreement of the World Cup after its negotiations with the ICC to extract some concessions on the Player Terms failed.
Ganguly, however, was confident a solution will be found soon and the top cricketers will take part in the World cup. ``At the end of the day, something is going to happen because the game will go on __ it has always gone ahead. Something will happen for us to participate in the World cup.
``I’ve never once thought about that danger (of not participating) and obviously some adjustments have to be made,’’ he said optimistically.
According to Ganguly, both the sides will have to make some concessions to resolve the issue. ``We all feel that at the end of the day, it’s got to be an adjustment from both the sides. It can never be one-sided, whether it is the players or the ICC,’’ he said, adding that ball was in the ICC’s court now. `` We’ve made our stand clear that this is what we can do and this is what we can’t. It now depends on them (ICC) to come to a solution. It’s got to be a bit of adjustment from both sides, which we are ready to do. I hope the ICC is ready as well.’’