HYDERABAD, INDIA: Ambati Rayudu’s biggest challenge in Hyderabad cricket, as Director of Cricket Operations, is to purge it of the vested interests of its club owners. Several of these club owners, or secretaries, as they are known in local parlance, have caused major long-term damage to the system by pursuing foolhardy and self-serving means.
What makes this nexus of club owners immensely powerful is the fact that they hold voting rights and can elect the Hyderabad Cricket Association’s (HCA) office-bearers. This gives them leverage over the said elected officials, who, in turn, bow and scrape to fulfil the club owners’ demands, purely to gain electoral advantage.
The association has 217 clubs, all of which have voting rights, but some ‘bad apples’ in this bunch have wreaked havoc in the system, single-handedly damaging Hyderabad cricket’s long-term prospects. Here are some of the main ways in which corrupt club owners have hurt the state’s cricket ecosystem, and how Ambati Rayudu can solve them:
Sub-leasing of clubs and the concept of ‘league fee’
Many of these ‘bad apples’ have sub-leased their clubs out to syndicates, many of whom run cricket academies. The latter, in turn, ask players to pay a ‘league fee’ simply to be a part of their team and participate in divisional league cricket. The concept of such a ‘league fee’ is immoral, since it denies opportunities to talented cricketers, valuing financial strength over sporting merit.
These club owners usually lease their clubs out on yearly deals for huge amounts, sometimes in the range of INR 5 to 10 lakh, to syndicates, who, in turn, try to recover it from the players who are a part of their team. The club owners and the lessees both make money out of this scandalous scheme. Promising cricketers, however, are left with no option but to grudgingly bear the burden of paying.
Budding cricketers aspiring to play in the HCA’s A-Division league are expected to pay anywhere between INR 70,000 and INR 1 lakh to play for these clubs, while those in the B-Division pay between INR 30,000 and INR 70,000 for the same privilege. This unfair, biased and corrupt practice is prevalent in the C-Division, too, which acts as a nursery for Hyderabad cricket’s future.
The imposition of this ‘league fee’ prevents talented cricketers from economically disadvantaged backgrounds from pursuing a career, while their more financially prosperous colleagues continue to get opportunities at their behest. To participate in divisional or league cricket is an elementary right of every cricketer who takes this sport up, but these corrupt club owners have put an end to that.
Several elected regimes in Hyderabad cricket have vowed to root this problem out, but none have been successful. Ambati Rayudu, who has come through this system himself and knows its ills better than anyone else, must take an eagle-eyed view of this menace. This prevents Hyderabad cricket’s growth by excluding talent and rewarding financial prowess.
Ambati Rayudu must stop club owners’ lobbying during selection
These club owners do not stop at sub-leasing their clubs out to dubious syndicates; they harass, harangue and sometimes blackmail elected officials to select incompetent players in Hyderabad’s state sides. The relationship between the club owners and these players is that of quid pro quo: the latter often reward their patrons financially or otherwise after their goal is achieved.
The pressure put on officials by these club owners often becomes tough for the former to ignore, since their status depends largely on the latter’s largesse with the ballot box. Armed with such dangerous self-knowledge, these club owners wrest control and get their partisans selected. Oftentimes, as Ambati Rayudu will know, this gets reflected while appointing the coaching and support staff, too.
Quite naturally, then, Hyderabad cricket suffers when it has to accommodate undeserving players in its squad at the expense of those who have consistently performed and earned their berth. This reflects in their performance, too, and the results are clear: Hyderabad have not won a national title since 1986-87. Worse still, they have not made it to the quarterfinals of the Ranji Trophy since 2016-17.
Hyderabad cricket’s poor showing is hardly surprising to its supporters: such unworthy players, with the backing of their patrons – the vested club owners – have consistently formed the core of its squads across all age-groups. This has made the state a laughing stock at the national level, but such discomfiture barely affects these club owners, largely because they do not have a spine of their own.
Ambati Rayudu, in one of his first moves after taking over as director, has streamlined the selection process for Hyderabad’s senior and age-group sides. However, he is sure to be put under pressure by these club owners when things heat up, since it forms the basis of earning their ill-gotten livelihoods. Ambati Rayudu must stick to his guns and steer Hyderabad cricket in the right direction.
Drawing large kickbacks in Hyderabad cricket’s development projects
A big way in which these club owners have affected Hyderabad cricket’s long-term prospects is by drawing kickbacks from development and growth projects. Many of the funds released by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) do not reach their designated recipients due to the meddling of these club owners, who siphon them into their personal wallets.
Hyderabad cricket’s office-bearers, sometimes directly and oftentimes indirectly, encourage such behaviour because their position depends on winning the club owners over during elections. The tacit approval of Hyderabad cricket’s elected representatives allows these club officials to run amok and hurt the state’s already-poor infrastructure.
Hyderabad is perhaps the only Ranji Trophy-winning state body in the country that has no more than two grounds of its own. Even the two the association claims to own – the Rajiv Gandhi International Cricket Stadium and Gymkhana Ground – are leased. Without any training academies or grounds or facilities outside these two major centres, the HCA has always been in an infrastructural nightmare.
A change can come only if these club owners are prevented from misusing these funds and join hands instead to spend it on developing the state’s cricket infrastructure. That Hyderabad cricket has no training facility, let alone a ground in the eight districts that make up a major chunk of its votebank, is downright shameful, not to mention the disadvantage it puts cricketers from those regions at.
The prevention of drawing kickbacks from infrastructural projects is an uphill battle, and Ambati Rayudu cannot wage it alone. He is wise enough to recognise the nexus that these club owners, the so-called ‘bad apples’, form, and the political influence they wield. Nonetheless, a step must be taken by the former India international to prevent the misuse of Hyderabad cricket’s funds and direct them towards their rightful recipients instead.
Ambati Rayudu, known to be the last good man of Hyderabad cricket, possesses a moral compass hitherto unseen in a system which has always rewarded the fraudulent over the honest. He has gathered with him men whom he trusts deeply to reform the system, and while the battle will be far from easy, he must not lose heart and fight, even if his back is to the wall.
For after he is done, Rayudu’s endeavours will go far in reassuring budding cricketers that not all is lost in Hyderabad cricket, and that they can still afford to dream.
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