Overhaul sports administration

Governance and management are fused, and the incentives of administrators are not aligned with India's sporting success

- LAVEESH BHANDARI

The Indian Men's Cricket team's recent performance is being analysed threadbare in drawing-room conversations. As often happens after losses, cricket becomes a game of blame. Players, umpires, grounds, and sometimes even coaches and managers become the unfortunate recipients of the drawing-room analysts' ire. Poor performance in these conversations is associated more with poor intentions and ineptitude of the same people who were extolled as superhuman a few weeks ago.

How can a brilliant captain in one domain perform so poorly in another? Or, for that matter, how can a great talent known for perseverance and focus suddenly reverse character? Ask these questions – not just in cricket, but across any Indian sport – and many interesting parallels emerge. Why do we rarely see consistency in team sport performance in India? Why are major sporting successes generally associated with an individual who invested that extra effort in training, coaching or administration? And, of course, why do we rarely see globally competitive athletes or teams emerging from India? On top of that, why do we see so many politicians helming or controlling sports bodies? Ask sportspersons such questions and they point to poor facilities, training, resources, nutrition, genes, management, bureaucracy, dependence on government funding, and more. These may be true but are merely symptoms and excuses for a deeper underlying organisational problem. And if we don't get it right, we may get a good outcome or two, across a sport or two, for a year or two, but the organisational problem will remain, and so will poor performance and inconsistency.