Board puts off decision on foreign coach
It is not often that the annual general meeting of the Board of Control for Cricket in India, scheduled for two days, is over in a day
Partab Ramchand
29-Sep-2000
It is not often that the annual general meeting of the Board of
Control for Cricket in India, scheduled for two days, is over in a
day. But as AC Muthiah, unanimously re-elected president for a second
term, told a press conference at the end of the day in Chennai on
Friday, the deliberations were ``remarkably smooth'' and there was
``unanimity in all major decisions.'' The result was that the
transactions, which started around 10 in the morning were over by 5 in
the evening. And it was a relaxed Muthiah and JY Lele, also re-elected
for a fourth term who met reporters at the end of the day.
Not unexpectedly, besides Muthiah and Lele, joint secretary Jyoti
Bajpai, treasurer KM Rungta and executive secretary Sharad Diwadkar
also kept their posts. There were two changes in the list of the vice
presidents. Narhari Amin replaced Manohar Joshi from the West Zone
while PK Mishra replaced AN Singh from the East Zone. CK Khanna (North
Zone), Kamal Morarka (Central Zone) and KM Ramprasad (South Zone)
retained their posts as vice presidents.
On the subject of elections, a lot of interest centered around the
composition of the senior selection committee. There were no surprises
here too. Madhya Pradesh's Sanjay Jagdale replaced Anil Deshpande from
the Central Zone. The others - Chandu Borde (Chairman-West Zone),
Madanlal (North), Ashok Malhotra (East) and TA Sekhar (South) -
retained their posts.
Naturally there was a lot of discussion at the meeting regarding the
appointment of the foreign coach for the national team. Surprisingly a
decision on this was put off. Muthiah acknowledged there were four
contenders for the post - Australia's Geoff Marsh, New Zealand's John
Wright, Australia's Dean Jones and West Indies' Andy Roberts. But he
said the board still had an open mind on the issue. He added that it
was decided that the board would appoint a committee to interview the
candidates and he expressed the hope that the coach would be appointed
in time for the Zimbabwe tour of India in November-December. He said
that there was a proposal to have an Indian as assistant coach so that
he could be groomed to take over in time. Under the circumstances,
Anshuman Gaekwad, already appointed as coach for the tournaments in
Nairobi and Sharjah will stay on in the post for the one off Test in
Bangladesh in early November.
On the possibility of shifting the National Cricket Academy from
Bangalore to Chennai, Muthiah said the final decision was left to the
NCA committee. He admitted that the Tamil Nadu government had offered
land for the purpose but added that the Karnataka State Cricket
Association had come up with a similar proposal and it was left to the
NCA committee to decide on which would be the better location.
Muthiah said the meeting had decided to take steps to implement the
code of conduct for players and officials. In this connection there
would be a disciplinary committee which would see that the code was
followed strictly. Another important decision taken, he said, was to
start a benevolent fund scheme for retired players and umpires. This
would provide medical help for all first class players in case of
terminal illness. He said this was in addition to the insurance scheme
already prevalent for a cricketer sustaining injury during play. Also,
the players fees and match allowances for domestic cricket have been
enhanced. He also said there would be two new domestic tournaments in
the under-14 and under-22 categories at the zonal level.
Muthiah said the meeting had awarded a benefit match for former Indian
captain S Venkatraghavan. He said that the tradition was to allot a
ODI for a player who had played in 100 Tests. But in Venkatraghavan's
case, since he had also umpired in more than 40 Tests, besides playing
in 57 Test matches, he had been allotted a ODI. He said on a formal
application from Venkatraghavan, a suitable ODI will be allotted.
On the proposed tour to Pakistan by the Indian team, Muthiah said it
was subject to the approval by the government. ``We have left the
decision to the government,'' he said.
Muthiah said that applications had been received from the proposed new
states of Jharkhand, Chattisgarh and Uttaranchal as also from the union
territories of Chandigarh and Pondicherry for affiliation. A committee
would be formed to go into the merits of the applications, he said.