"There is nobody who fights for our cause." These were the words used by a cricketer to express his helplessness over the player-by-choice system, a mechanism that doesn't leave any room for the players to bargain with clubs of the Dhaka Premier League (DPL); a domestic competition which is still the bread and butter for a majority of the country's cricketers.

When even a footballer can sign a contract worth Tk 50 lakh, at a time when the game has hit a new low in the country, a member of the most popular sport has to remain satisfied with a maximum payment of Tk 30 lakh in the most-coveted domestic competition.

On one hand the freedom of the cricketers is increasingly getting curbed and on the other the clubs are receiving higher amounts of money from the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) as grants.  It's all happening because the club officials are calling the shots as they also run the board.

For cricketers, there is an organisation named Cricketers Welfare Association of Bangladesh (CWAB) which rarely lives up to its name. Its president (Naimur Rahman) and vice-president (Khaled Mahmud) are on the board while former national cricketer Akram Khan is also on the board. But they have hardly raised an issue.

 “I am not sure about whether all of the country's clubs are engaged in this saga. There is a core group in the board who are doing these things. The current president himself had promised that they would not employ the player-by-choice system for the second time,” lamented CWAB secretary Debabrata Paul.

“And yes, our members are in the board but are silently accepting it. The main problem is that a majority of our players depend on the income from the league and the clubs are taking advantage of this. The main threat is that they can suspend the league,” he added. 

Speaking to The Daily Star, Khaled Mahmud said that it was unfair to restrict the players' rights for bargaining. “This is not good. If someone demands more and gets it from any club, there is no right to bar him from doing that. Of course we raised our voice against this system but we are helpless,” he said.

The clubs have regularly raised problems regarding their increasing expenditure and that's why they have tried to limit the income of the players, while trying to take more money from the board.

One cannot deny the huge contribution that the clubs have had in Bangladesh's cricket but that doesn't mean that it's payback time for the board. The clubs contributed to the game in the past and they did that with pride. One wonders if that pride is missing now.

The BCB has recognised the Dhaka Premier League as its only 50-over competition. However it lacks the zeal that it had once.

It seems the clubs have no interest other than trying to gain some money from the board. It also seems that it's now all about maintaining the councillorship and the power of the board.

When it comes to the competition, the game's governing body unfortunately assumes the role of a subordinate to the mighty clubs and agrees to delays, cuts in payment, increase in grants etc.

True, once club cricket was the main attraction and due credit must be given to them for the progress of cricket but the reality is that those golden days are gone. Times have changed but unfortunately we have persisted with the old, often flawed, way of conducting a domestic tournament.

Who will put the bell on the cat's neck when club officials themselves are the big shots in the board?  The board cannot shy away from its responsibility of making sure that the 50-over competition is run in a proper way. They must stop the ridiculous state of affairs.