While the appeal of cricket is by no means universal — it passes unnoticed by large swathes of Europe, the Americas and the Far East — in the regions where this strangest of sports matters, it really matters. The most obvious example is provided by the Indian sub-continent, but the passion for the sport there is run close by that in the island micro-states that come together (a rare enough occurrence) to form the ‘West Indies’ of cricket legend. The West Indies spent many years as the dominant force in cricket, notably through the 1970s, 1980s and the early 1990s.

Now, their cricket establishment has been rent asunder by a row between two sponsors angling for the burgeoning Caribbean cellular market: Cable & Wireless and Digicel. C&W were chief sponsors of the West Indies cricket team for more than a decade. Along the way, they set up several individual sponsorship deals with key players. These came to prominence last year when the West Indies team sponsor switched to a direct rival of C&W, Digicel of Ireland, which is attempting to establish a cellular footprint in the region.

Thanks to the conflict of sponsorship interests, seven players — including the man who is arguably the world’s best batsman and West Indies captain, Brian Lara (if you are unfamiliar with cricket, think of a combination of Babe Ruth, Michael Schumacher and Michael Jordan) — were ruled out of selection for team for the international ‘Test’ series against South Africa.

This looks surely like one of those occasions where sports sponsorship has gone awry. While nobody would suggest that mobile users will return their phones as part of the furore, it’s hard to see how this episode builds a customer relationship, either.
Jim Chalmers