This is cricket's version of Muhammad Ali v Joe Frazier – bitter and bloody. While the Ali-Frazier classics raised the popularity stakes of boxing, the International Cricket Council-Jagmohan Dalmiya slugfest is continuing to take cricket's image to new depths. Whoever the winner, the game runs the risk of being knocked out.

Dalmiya looks on a firmer footing this time around - for several reasons. The names of Richie Benaud and Imran Khan were proposed by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), though it had enough reasons to avoid them. Benaud had unequivocally stated that Sachin Tendulkar had picked the seam at Port Elizabeth, while Imran Khan has not exactly been pro-Indian and many of his candid comments – cricketing and political - have not gone down well with the Indian public.

The names of several other men of stature were proposed by the BCCI - Justice Ahmed Ebrahim of Zimbabwe, an ICC match referee himself and a sitting judge of the Zimbabwe Supreme Court, plus Arjuna Ranatunga, Imran, Zaheer Abbas, Clive Lloyd and Garry Sobers. By rejecting them, the ICC has proved yet again that individual ego is bigger than the game. The BCCI was even comfortable with Englishmen David Gower, Geoff Boycott and Dickie Bird. In taking a rigid stand, ICC has yet again chosen the path of confrontation rather than reconciliation.

The spirit of the uneasy truce reached between ICC and the BCCI in December suggests that the three-member panel would have been a mutually agreeable one. But by refusing to consider a long list of names put forward by the BCCI, ICC seems to be sending this message: we will listen to the BCCI suggestions with closed ears and stick to our choice.

Most damning for ICC is Imran's statement that he was not contacted at all by anybody. The implication is that ICC is lying when it says that it had contacted him and that he had refused for personal reasons.

The cricket world witnesses all this with the helplessness and turmoil of children watching parents fight their way towards an ugly split. The standoff is all about personal equations - or the lack of them. It's just not cricket.

H Natarajan is senior editor with Wisden.com in India.

© Wisden CricInfo Ltd