Players must resist sponsors' carrots: Dave

COLOMBO: The storm that had almost threatened to sweep the Champions Trophy off its feet finally blew over a week ago with both ICC and the Indian players budging a bit from their positions. In the process, the Indian Board sacrificed its team sponsors and players their individual endorsements. Dave Richardson, former South African wicket-keeper who had represented the players' interests many a time in the past not just in his capacity as chief of the players association but as a practicing lawyer, expressed his opinion during a chat with Times News Network on Wednesday. The ambush marketing clause appeared to target mainly the Indian players. At least, so did the Indians make it appear. Your opinion? It affects all players across the world. In practice, it probably affects the Indian players most because they make a lot of money from individual endorsements from contracts which conflicted with sponsors of ICC. In other boards, there were just one or two guys who had these problems which were easily overcome. Does it mean players must sign contracts only with those companies who sponsor ICC events? It's not really a matter between the players and the ICC. The players are contracted to the boards and not with ICC. It's for the respective boards and their players to sort it out. Yes, I do believe that the ICC event sponsors who pick up events like the World Cup and Champions Trophy have to be protected whether the players feel that the protections are too big or not. That's their side of the story, and that's what we have to talk about.But then, most contracts which conflicted with ICC's official sponsors were signed much before the events? Maybe. But generally they are not the ones that are causing problems. The ones that are causing problems are companies which particularly target players, sign them up with express purpose of ambushing the official sponsors. Is ICC justified in having a say in players' individual contracts? That's not the intention. The purpose is simply that a balance has to be reached between the rights of individual sponsors and event sponsors.