Fear of losing (money, that is) cripples the international sports bodies.

At the recent Hay Literary Festival, John Major talked about his new history of cricket, a paean not only to the game he loves but also to the days when cricket was uncomplicated by the demands of global commerce. I asked him what he thought of the International Cricket Council, which sits in tax-free offices in Dubai banning non-compliant fizzy drinks from international tournaments, while remaining silent on issues of principle, such as whether cricket teams should tour Zimbabwe.

"I don't have a high admiration for the ICC," he told me; he was saddened by the "cravenness of some of their decisions". "We live these days in an age of litigation and that is one of the things that sometimes inhibits them. But I think it would be a good thing for the ICC to take a strong lead."

The same week, Australian Prime Minister John Howard was banning his team from touring Zimbabwe and gracing "that grubby dictator" Robert Mugabe with a visit. You know something's up when you find yourself applauding a man who ships unwanted immigrants to Guantanamo Bay.

A thoroughly dispiriting element in British sport at the moment is the fear that stalks sporting headquarters like the Football Association and the England and Wales Cricket Board. Fear of litigation; fear of making an unpopular decision and losing your place on the gravy train; and the terrible fear of failing to "maximise revenue", or not making your sport as rich as it could be.

It not only cripples decisions, but discards any number of issues before the decision-making stage. The question of whether there should be salary caps for Premiership footballers is, for instance, a non-starter, not only because it might be challenged in law, but also because it requires someone to agree that there is an ethical problem with the amount of money that the game so greedily consumes. And what FA committee man would be brave enough to do that?

Sport is run by businessmen, and they will tell you decision-making is much harder now sport and business are inseparable. But they don't have to be. The mega-deals that have showered football, rugby and cricket in riches were only supposed to be a means to an end. The end is the well-being of the sport itself, and sometimes that means looking at the money - and the conditions that come with it - and saying thanks, but no thanks.

Take English cricket. As a superfluous, one-sided series against the West Indies bores us silly, and a recent report commissioned by the board recommends that we play less cricket, the board chairman David Morgan ignores the findings because, we are told, cricket needs the money. Much of that money will be passed on to the counties, who will spend it on overseas players, who everyone agrees are stunting development of English talent. But the ECB won't change that either, because it says it can't. For a so-called authority, it sure doesn't have much.

Even the misogynist, elitist old days of the MCC are starting to look rosy. We used to lament their truculence; now we'd just be happy if someone had the courage of their convictions, whatever those convictions were. Morgan, a man who prefers to let circumstance - and the biggest wallet - dictate, is now hoping to move up to the highest level of his sport's governance, and be elected president of the ICC. Sadly, he looks like a great fit.

Hunter Davies returns in the autumn

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