N Srinivasan likely to lose ICC chairman’s post

Chennai: With the AGM coming up in a week’s time, it seems ICC chairman N. Srinivasan is likely to lose his top position to the newly-elected BCCI president, Shashank Manohar. 

According to reports, a consensus among board members, who are in favour of Manohar’s taking over as ICC chief, will be arrived at the AGM on November 9.

“After Dalmiya’s death and the change at the top, equations within the BCCI have changed. Of late, the secretary and president haven’t been happy with the way Srinivasan has been representing BCCI at the ICC.

Srinivasan’s inability to promote cricket has prompted members within the ICC and BCCI to make a collective decision to bring about a change,” a BCCI official was quoted as saying in the report. 

It is learnt that there was a difference of opinion between Srinivasan and BCCI’s top brass in choosing the venues for the World T20 Championship in India next year.

Apart from the major overhaul within the sport’s international governing body, also in the AGM agenda is the termination of the BCCI contracts of team director Ravi Shastri and commentators Sunil Gavaskar and L. Sivaramakrishnan.

A decision on scrapping the commentary contracts, which made it mandatory for the official broadcaster to hire Gavaskar, Shastri and Sivaramakrishnan, is also likely to be taken at the Mumbai meeting.

The Board is mulling the idea of going back to its old policy of giving the broadcasters the option of deciding its commentary team.

The source said the IPL governing council, which is expected to meet on November 8, is expected to look into the tender process to invite two new teams for the next two years to replace the two suspended franchises, Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals.