June 15, 2003	Sunday	Rabi-us-Sani 14, 1424

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LONDON, June 14: The International Cricket Council will see a change of guard next week with Pakistan’s Ehsan Mani taking over as the new president during the nearly week- long annual meeting starting here Saturday which is scheduled to discuss a number of important issues.

Mani, permanent representative of Pakistan Cricket Board at ICC, will take over from Australia’s Malcolm Gray at the annual conference on June 19.

Mani, a London-based accountant who will be the third ICC president after a new constitution was put in place in 1997, will have a two-year term.

Mani’s ascendancy is likely to give a fillip to India-Pakistan bilateral cricket ties which is slowly moving towards normalisation after a three-year hiatus due to strained political relations between the two neighbours.

The Pakistani administrator is known to enjoy a close relationship with Indian cricket board president Jagmohan Dalmiya and is expected to provide momentum to the process of resumption of bilateral cricket matches between the two countries.

The meetings will also discuss the increasing number of cricket matches being played which has led to players complaining of fatigue and early burn-out.

Proposals on increased interaction between administrators and player representative bodies and applications for membership from five new countries will also come up for discussion.—PPI

Reuters adds:

“We nominated Ehsan Mani for the post of ICC President because he was best qualified to do this job,” PCB Chairman Tauqir Zia said on Saturday.

“He is a very competent person who has been with the ICC for years now. We don’t expect and would not want him to give Pakistan any preferential treatment in his tenure,” Tauqir said before leaving for London.

“Pakistan has always believed that without the ICC being more independent and having more authority it cannot deal consistently with problems of its member nations and the sport,” he added.