And what about the advertisers, the companies that have inflated the cricketers’ egos and wallets with their generosity (at least they put their money where their mouth is)? Who were willing to pay disgustingly enormous sums to players and TV channels to peddle their wares? It got so that every headline that had anything to do with cricket was sponsored by blah-blah and blah-blah. Even the scorecard. No wonder then, news channels featured cricket not only as the top story and breaking news but devoted more shows to cricket than any other subject — even Bollywood. Shall we sack them too, alongwith the media?

Well, while we are about it, what about dismissing the Board of Cricket Control of India? The BCCI, the richest cricket board in the world, sells cricket telecast rights at outrageously high prices; the broadcaster chases advertising support to recoup that sum (and make a tidy profit), which means they need plenty of cricket coverage for sponsorship by advertisers (hence the outlandishly high levels of coverage across news channels and sports channels). And to have plenty of coverage for advertisers, news channels need plenty of viewers; in order to have plenty of viewers they have to have plenty of hot air, on air hype about Team India (why would you want to watch cricket coverage that told you India would lose?) so the media devotes all its time telling us the Boys in Blue will Hit Back even though anyone who saw Rahul Dravid’s face after the Bangladesh match, knew that he was the one who had been hit — for a six.

... contd.