Indian cricket fans sought divine help yesterday as the nation's favorite sport lurched from one crisis to another on and off the field ahead of next week's tour by world champions Australia.
The national team was in shambles, star batsman Sachin Tendulkar battled to get fit and a court wrangle over television rights worth US$308 million threatened to disrupt one of the most keenly-awaited Test series in recent years.
Meanwhile, the cash-rich Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) was in a state of limbo ahead of next Wednesday's elections with two political heavyweights reportedly eyeing the chair being vacated by president Jagmohan Dalmiya.
"Money can't save Indian cricket, only God can," said Shantanu Bose, a cricket fan in eastern Calcutta, the home of both the national captain Sourav Ganguly and Dalmiya.
Last season's highs when India held the mighty Australians to a 1-1 draw down under and then won a maiden Test series in Pakistan were consigned to the dustbin after Ganguly's men suffered embarrassing defeats in four consecutive limited-overs tournaments.
The Champions Trophy defeat against Pakistan on Sunday was the third successive loss to the arch-rivals since July and followed India's failure to win the Asia Cup in Sri Lanka, a tri-series in the Netherlands and a one-off series against England.
"Even my mum could bowl the Indians out," wrote former England opener Geoffery Boycott yesterday as the seasoned line-up of Rahul Dravid, Venkatsai Laxman, Virender Sehwag and Ganguly struggled to put bat to ball.
"We have to do a lot of soul-searching before the Australians come," said Ganguly. "If I knew what is going wrong I would not be asking."
Tendulkar, the most prolific contemporary batsman with 33 Test and 37 one-day centuries, remains a doubtful starter for the first Test in Bangalore from Oct. 6 after missing the last three tournaments due to a tennis elbow injury.
India, who won the last two home series against Australia in 1998 and 2001 by identical 2-1 margins, need Tendulkar to prevent the tourists from securing their first Test series on Indian soil since 1969.
The BCCI, inexplicably, denied Ganguly and company an opportunity to run into form by scheduling the three-day Aussie tour opener, at Bombay from Sept. 30, against Ranji Trophy champions Mumbai instead of a select team drawn from all over the country.
Tendulkar, who is uncertain of playing the match, and seamer Ajit Agarkar are the only likely Test contenders in the Mumbai side.
The BCCI is hoping the Bombay High Court will quickly dispose off the TV rights legal battle between two rival networks so the high-profile Test series can be telecast live.
ESPN-Star Sports, jointly owned by Disney and Rupert Murdoch, went to court after the BCCI alloted the rights for all international cricket in India for the next four years to Zee Network for a whopping US$308 million.
ESPN-Star Sports contended that Zee, India's largest listed media company, was not qualified to bid since it did not have two years experience of telecasting cricket as desired by the BCCI.
BCCI lawyers on Monday placed before the court letters from the International Cricket Council and Cricket Australia which state that live video footage was imperative for the series to go ahead.
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