When India had played against England a cricket series recently, there was a new endorsement on the dress worn by Sachin. It was RBS or the Royal Bank of Scotland, a Bank based in Scotland, which was trying to gain mileage from the series, and trying to establish its base in India. It is altogether a different matter that the bank is now under serious financial trouble and a detailed probe is being undertaken to find out the state of affairs of the bank, and how it approved of endorsements being given to the sports star for a figure of 200 million pound sponsorship binge. It appears more galling as the government has recently bailed out this bank, after it reached a state of pathetic financial state. While the controversy is still simmering it may assume the proportion of Stanford, and if it happens it would again be a major dent to the reputation of England as a cricket-playing nation. It is owing to the fact that being associated with the tainted money of Stanford has led to quite of flake for its authorities.
In case of Sachin he has been signed for a contract of five years to endorse RBS and would the contract be effective in light of the bail out that has been provided to it by RBS. It is billion of pounds of tax payers’ money that has been given to the sports persons to be the brand ambassador of the bank and it is this issue that is trigger for generation of controversy.
Sports, more so cricket is emerging as an arena whose popularity is increasing so much day-by-day that more and more money is getting attracted to it, just like the flies getting attracted to honey. In the zeal to get money the authorities are also not probing the source of money, whether it has a taint associated with it, or it is clean money and when it blows into a full-fledged controversy, all those who are associated with it, unnecessarily get caught in the firing line. In the Stanford case, Kevin Pietersen is the live example. So, there needs to be a call for some kind of a rear guard action about the nature of sponsors who are getting associated with cricket these days.
Sports, more so cricket is emerging as an arena whose popularity is increasing so much day-by-day that more and more money is getting attracted to it, just like the flies getting attracted to honey. In the zeal to get money the authorities are also not probing the source of money, whether it has a taint associated with it, or it is clean money and when it blows into a full-fledged controversy, all those who are associated with it, unnecessarily get caught in the firing line. In the Stanford case, Kevin Pietersen is the live example. So, there needs to be a call for some kind of a rear guard action about the nature of sponsors who are getting associated with cricket these days.
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