16 Jan That time of the year when our jobs become less relevant

Its in our face, everyone will only talk about it next week onwards, at least till Dhoni & his boys survive in the tournament. Yes, the World Cup is here, Cricket World Cup, a sport ‘competitively’ played by eight countries, dominated by three and ruled by one. And that one who rules is what matters to all, including the governing body.

Everything during this time will take a backseat, nobody will care whether a certain Srinivasan has conflict of interest in the sport or a deserving player isn’t getting national recognition. The faith lost in the sport will be revived the moment India takes on its traditional arch rivals Pakistan on February 15.

With that our community, that of media will also care less about every other sport happening around the world. And when you have sports clients who are not from the cricketing fraternity, this moment is like experiencing turbulence. World Cup, as of today, is a good 10 days away and already out of four sports pages, two are dedicated to stories on the build up.

The moment it starts, that two will obviously become three. Beat this, one of our clients offered leading media publications a trip to New York, yes New York, for 6 nights for a sporting spectacle, and most of them declined because it was World Cup time. If this were Football World Cup or Olympics, none would have declined the offer.

That’s cricket for you in India. Therefore, until our sports clients don’t have something really ‘big’ to announce or hosting a really ‘big’ event, activity or matches to come up with, their coverage will go down to single columns or even 60 word briefs from 250 words with a picture story.

How much ever we are close to our media friends, it won’t matter. That’s why I admit, it’s that time of the year when our jobs become more challenging and maybe less relevant.