'Pakistan should surrender Champions Trophy rights' - Mani

Ehsan Mani, the former ICC president, has advised the Pakistan Cricket Board to surrender its right to host the Champions Trophy, scheduled for October 2009, and ask the ICC for an event in the future as compensation.

Pakistan was supposed to host the Champions Trophy in September 2008 but the tournament was postponed after five countries said they would not send their teams because of security concerns in the country. Sri Lanka was the designated back-up option but the ICC chose to postpone the tournament, rather than shift it to another location, after the Pakistan board and the BCCI stood firm against a change in venue.

"Since it was known earlier that some teams were not comfortable about touring Pakistan for the Champions Trophy, the PCB should have taken the initiative by asking the ICC to shift it to an alternate venue, instead of postponing it, to avoid the financial loses," Mani told IANS. "If the tournament was shifted, the ICC could have earned approximately $50 million and every participating team would have had their share of $3.75 million each.

"In my view, the PCB should have withdrawn from hosting the Champions Trophy and should have demanded any future ICC event like the 2012 Champions Trophy or the Twenty20 World Cup in 2013 as compensation since ICC hasn't allocated those events."

The staging of the Champions Trophy in 2009 will be discussed during meetings between the Chief Executives Committee and the ICC board on September 10 and 11. Mani was of the view that Pakistan could still give up the hosting rights during the meeting in Dubai.

"I am of the view that even now, during the meetings underway in Dubai, the PCB should surrender the hosting rights of the Champions Trophy and ask the ICC to hold it next year in Dubai, or anywhere else they want to, in lieu of any future ICC event when things become normal in Pakistan."