BCCI owes £80,000 to England players and staff as living expenses says reports

The Board of Control for Cricket in India reportedly owes £80,000 to the England cricket team who are presently touring India for a five-match Test series.

England tour manager Phil Neale has been in constant touch with the BCCI to try and speed up the process of paying daily allowances for the touring officials and players, reports the Telegraph.

The tourists have been in India for 19 days now but they have not yet been given their daily £50 living expenses by the board. For the hosts, it is a protocol to pay the visitors their daily stipend and the hotel and travel costs.

However, according to the report the Indian players and the umpires have received their expenses.

The expenses now have amounted to £80,000 for the 17 England players and the 16 backroom staff who have traveled to India. Though cash flow is not much of a problem for the England cricket team it is a point of principle that the board hosting the matches pays the dues.

The memorandum of understanding for the ongoing series has not yet been signed and before the tour began the BCCI had written a letter to Neale saying that they would not be able to provide expenses for the tourists since restrictions were imposed on their finances by the country’s Supreme Court.

Now, another thing which has made the situation worse is demonetization which took place just two days before the beginning of the first Test match. The Indian government decided to scrap the 500 (£6) and 1,000 rupee notes which have caused quite a chaos.

The Indian cricketers have been paid partly in 100 rupee notes which have forced them to move around with huge wads of cash. Meanwhile, the English players and the support staff are using their debit and credit cards to pay for hotel and living expenses.

On-field too, England have had their problems. They were quite good in the first Test at Rajkot and managed to come up with a stalemate. But then in the second Test at Vizag, they struggled against the wily Indian bowling attack.

In the first innings, chasing India’s score of 455 they were bowled out for 255 and in the second they only managed a paltry 158, losing the game by 246 runs.

The third Test will be played at Mohali from November 26 followed by one at Mumbai and the last one in Chennai.