Doubts still linger about Sunny Gavaskar’s role in the Kochi franchise bid.
Was he just being helpful when he informed the Kochi consortium members about how the bidding process worked?
Should not the Kochi franchisee members have approached the BCCI for clarifications rather than a sitting member of the IPL Governing Council?
The question of propriety is yet to be answered comprehensively by the master batsman.
If the Kochi proposal is accepted by the BCCI and Sunny Gavaskar handles the newly formed team’s cricketing operations, would this not be a case of a ‘revolving door’ where Sunny has moved from a governing body to being part of a governed body?
Sunny Gavaskar hits the deadlines once more; this time it is his links with the Kochi franchise that have drawn flak from all quarters.
The Indian batting legend , the first cricketer to score 10,000 runs and surpass Don Bradman’s 29 tons, is mulling over an offer from the Gaikwads, the Rendezvous group owners, to handle all matters cricketing.
The news comes as a bit of a surprise and there exists speculation about Gavaskar’s role in the bidding process as a possible conflict of interest ; the master batsman was then on the IPL governing council.
(The fallout between Lalit Modi and Shashi Tharoor was the result of allegations that Tharoor sought Modi’s interference in the bidding process to ensure that the Kochi group’s bid would be successful.)
Gavaskar is no longer a part of the IPL set-up; he quit the re-constituted governing council citing differences with the BCCI.
Was the conflict of interest a reason for the differences? If yes, why then was just the super accumulator penalised?
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The route to IPL4 has never seemed as foggy as it is today.
And there seems to be no one sounding the fog horn either!
The three vessels SS Kings XI Punjab, SS Rajasthan Royals and SS Kochi are stranded in the stormy seas seeking a lighthouse to guide them to safety.
But their distress signals , their SOSs, have received little response from the current keepers of the beacon.
The IPL seas are still uncharted waters and the reefs are mapped as they are traversed.
Three voyages in three seasons and it was Heigh Ho! Life’s a bottle of rum!
Life’s not so rummy any more for the voyagers.
Nor quite so profitable!
The treasure hunt continues!
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Cricket South Africa (CSA) reminded us that the tentacles of the IPL mess are not restricted to just Indian and English shores.
CSA have terminated an external investigation into the bonuses paid by Lalit Modi to CSA chief executive Gerald Majola and 40 other staff during the IPL’s second season.
The IPL was moved to South Africa in 2009 following the Indian government’s refusal to provide adequate security for the event because of the clash with the general election. The security apparatus of the state could not be stretched to meet both concerns.
A payment of 4.7 million rands was made to Majola and his associates.
The South African opposition has slammed the switch to an internal investigation as ‘disappointing’.
The Enforcement Directorate(ED) is known to be investigating the payment back in India as apparently there was no tax paid on the foreign exchange transfers.
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The third one-day between India and Australia was rained off. A similar fate befell the first one-day at Kochi.
It just goes to show that cramming in a series in what’s usually the off-season requires detailed planning. Though we had a wonderful Test series, the fans and spectators were left short-changed by the washout of the two ODIs.
Rain, rain, go away, the Ozzies and Indies want to play!
The Australians are probably left a little shell-shocked by the way their curtailed tour of India turned out. A winless tour for a team of their calibre will rankle for a long time.
I don’t envy the Poms when they meet the kangaroos down under.
The Australians will be doubly motivated to move up the rankings and prove that their recent losses are just an aberration.
Jwala Gutta has always been in the news but always for the wrong reasons.
Unlike her singles counterpart, Saina Nehwal, controversy seems to court her with a vengeance.
So who is Jwala Gutta?
Jwala is a left-handed badminton player of mixed Indian and Chinese descent.
According to Wikipedia:
“Her mother’s grandfather, Tseng from Tianjin, was a disciple of Mahatma Gandhi and stayed with him at Sevagram ashram, where he translated Gandhi’s autobiography and other works into Chinese.”
With her doubles victory partnering Ashwini Ponappa at the CommonWealth Games 2010 , New Delhi, Gutta is now a household name and can count herself among the limited pantheon of Indian sports heroes.
Jwala and her partner Diju also clinched a silver at the CWG in the mixed doubles , going down in the final to the Malaysian pair Koo Kien Keat and Chin Ee Hui 14-21, 21-10, 10-21.
But the path to glory has been a thorny one.
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I must admit that the IPL going-ons have all the makings of a soap opera.
It has all the ingredients – money, glamour and sex appeal (courtesy the Bollywood biggies), a decamping honcho, exotic locations, politics and more twists and turns than a pot-boiler.
Add much needed melodrama and you have a hit formula.
A few bytes on the continuing saga:
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There have been conflicting reports in the Indian press and media about the proposal submitted by the Kochi consortium to the BCCI.
The Times Of India (TOI) reports that the Kochi franchisee have requested an additional ten days to come up with a resolution of the ongoing dispute among the consortium members.
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Pay packets in IPL4 will be much leaner than in the past three editions.
The simple reason is that supply now exceeds demand.
With the reduction in the no. of IPL teams to eight and Kochi showing no signs of having their house in order for the 6 pm deadline on Wednesday, 20th October 2010, IPL4 will be a much leaner, much meaner tournament.
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Lalit Modi intrigues us more and more.
It has been reported that the former IPL czar may be seeking residency in Iceland.
His wife, Minal is reported to be on first name terms with the Icelandic first lady, Dorrit Moussaieff.
Modi – since his exit from the country purportedly fearing for his safety – seems to be having a whale of a time.