by Rex Clementine

The Board of Control for Cricket in Sri Lanka, the country’s richest sports body, seems to be in a financial crisis. The massive expenditure incurred in building the Dambulla International Cricket Stadium seems to be the reason for the crisis.

At a press briefing held on Tuesday, the authorities admitted that despite wanting to popularise the game in outstations, lack of finances had forced them to host the Indian A Cricket team’s tour of Sri Lanka in Colombo.

Even though a considerable amount of finance has been allocated on development of the game and on the day to day running of it, most of the funds seem to have gone to pay off the expenditures of the Dambulla Stadium.

After much debate by the men who have managed affairs of the Cricket Board recently it was revealed on Tuesday that they were ready to make the payment incurred in building the stadium.

When contacted by The Island, even those who manage the finance of the Cricket Board revealed that they needed to go into matters to find out the full cost incurred in constructing the stadium.

Although the former president of the Cricket Board, Thilanga Sumatipala publicly said the stadium will cost only 300 million rupees, the figures seem to have gone far beyond that. The construction of the stadium is still far from finished and it is speculated that by the time the stadium is brought to a usable condition, the figure will be close to or will cross the 500 million mark. This mainly has been the cause for the financial crisis the board is facing.

Money earned from selling of television rights remains the main source of income of the cricket boards the world over, but the lack of in-bound tours to Sri Lanka by international cricket teams this year doesn’t help their cause at all, according to the cricket authorities.

Even though Sri Lanka is acting as host nation of the ICC Champions trophy tournament, which probably is the biggest sporting event staged by the country, this doesn’t seem to bring in a substantial amount of finance to the board. As this is one of ICC’s own tournaments, the game’s international governing body alone can determine the owner of television rights for the tournament and in fact they have awarded it to World Sports Group Pvt Ltd .

Authorities said the Board of Control for Cricket in Sri Lanka is not paid a cent for hosting the tournament. What the Cricket Board is due to get is only 625,000 US dollars which all the participating teams of the tournament receive. However, the entire expenditure during the tournament is looked after by the ICC.

The only other series hosted by Sri Lanka during this year is the two-match Test series against Bangladesh. This series too is not going to bring in a substantial amount of revenue for the Board as the series has less significance and only caters to a smaller capacity of television viewers.

Administrators of the Cricket Board, at a press conference held on Tuesday admitted they are on a negative budget during the year. Things will surely get worse if the administrators fail in their persuasion with the ICC to continue the Dilmah deal.