India vs West Indies: No officials to sign payments, Mumbai unlikely to host fourth ODI

The Mumbai Cricket Association has indicated that it might not be able to host the fourth ODI between India and West Indies on October 29 as they don’t have any office bearer to dispense payments to various vendors. The situation has already led to a few embarrassing fallouts for MCA recently. They couldn’t pay the hotel bills for the Mumbai team during the Vijay Hazare tournament in Bangalore and had to request BCCI to bail them out. The MCA is set to meet the chief executive Offcer of BCCI Rahul Johri to explain how they don’t have a signatory to sign payments and conduct the match.

The Bombay High Court had appointed two Committee of Administrator justice VN Kanade and Hemant Gokhale to oversee the functioning of MCA but their term ended on September 15. The High Court didn’t give an extension to them, and the COA gave full charge to CEO CS Naik. With no official signatory, all payments at MCA have been halted, including salaries of staff and players’ daily allowances.

“MCA doesn’t have any signatory, so who will sign payments, who will appoint vendors. Who will conduct the entire game. In such circumstances, it will be very difficult for us to hold an international game. We will put all this case in front of BCCI let them take a call,” sources in MCA informed. This new problem has surfaced just a day after the Committee of Administrators (COA) cleared controversy for complimentary passes by reducing its share to half and gave a free hand to state associations.

When contacted on the MCA issue, BCCI COA chief Vinod Rai said, “Let’s see when the order comes. COA will wait for the order.” MCA is in no mood to hold the game until they get some clarity from the Apex Court. The BCCI had emailed MCA and other state association a few days ago about their state of readiness to host the games. On Monday, MCA joint secretary Unmesh Khanvilkar had moved Bombay High Court seeking clarity on who will run MCA after MCA’s COA didn’t get extensions. Khanvilkar said, “Hon’ble Bombay High Court has asked us to approach Supreme Court and seek clarity on it which we will do.”

The MCA is worried especially after the financial problems they faced during the Vijay Hazare tournament. Mumbai, which had India players like Shreyas Iyer, Suryakumar Yadav and Dhawal Kulkarni, were staying in a Bengaluru hotel for 21 days and the administration couldn’t pay the 16 lakh bill for the accommodation.

The MCA had to request BCCI to bail them out after the hotel authorities took up the issue with Mumbai team manager Armaan Mallik. “The first ten days went pretty well but last week the hotel guy wanted us to pay our hotel bills. The tone which was used was very harsh,” Mallik told The Indian Express.