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India to play Zimbabwe
without sponsor's logo

The Indian team will take the field against Zimbabwe, in their Champions Trophy lung-opener in Colombo on Saturday, without any logo on their jerseys, top BCCI sources said in Kolkata on Friday night.

"As the ICC has not cleared the logo, the Indian team manager has been advised that the logo on the players' jerseys should be covered. It will be blank," the sources said.

BCCI president Jagmohan Dalmiya said the board is looking into the matter and is in constant touch with Sahara Pariwar, the official sponsors of the team.

"Whatever I have to say on the matter, I'll say tomorrow," he added.

On Thursday, the International Cricket Council had asked team sponsors Sahara India to remove the wings graphic from its new logo, which the Indian players would wear, since, they said, it conflicts with the interests of South African Airways, an official sponsor of the ongoing Champions Trophy.

But Sahara India, which had already revised the logo on orders from the ICC, refused to make further changes in the design, threatening to go to court to resolve the issue.

"ICC's new objections 24 hours before India's first match is beyond any reasoning or rationale," said Sahara India's spokesman Sanjay Lal in a statement.

"The wings graphic represents India's national colours. We will take all steps to protect national pride and the sponsor's own rights. By all steps, we mean taking legal action or even backing out of the deal with the Indian cricket team," the statement added.

The ICC had earlier objected to the company as the team sponsor, saying it runs a domestic airline which conflicts with the interests of South African Airways.

When the ICC turned down Sahara's plea that SAA is an international airline and cannot not be a rival to a domestic company, Sahara India changed the logo to 'Subrata', named after its chairman Subrata Roy.

The ICC approved the new brand name of 'Subrata' but said, "It is subject to the removal from the proposed design of any element that is carried over from the Sahara brand. What it [the logo] can't use is elements of the Sahara logo. We are simply seeking to ensure that the new brand is actually a new brand and not simply Sahara in a different form," an ICC statement said.

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