Mind games begin, Board games never end

The board8217;s treasurer N Srinivasan is set to take over as secretary and, if insiders are to be believed, he could have a bigger role to play in the IPL than the incumbent Niranjan Shah, perhaps even eating into some of Lalit Modi8217;s powers in the annual T20 event.

It8217;s no secret that outgoing president Sharad Pawar8217;s stature had forged some unlikely associations within the board 8212; initially to uproot Jagmohan Dalmiya. And one of the biggest challenges for the new committee will be to ensure that their personal differences don8217;t divide them once the Union Minister is no longer personally involved in running the BCCI8217;s affairs. There are too many fair-weather followers in Indian cricket politics, like any politics, for a leader to settle too comfortably. Who knows where the next rebellion will come from?

Have all the allies been satisfied by the new allotment of designations? Is there any clout behind AC Muthiah8217;s frequent court appeals? And what8217;s Jagmohan Dalmiya going to be up to in his ripe old age now that he8217;s back in the saddle in Kolkata?

But while any challenger to Manohar8217;s empire is going to take a while before becoming a serious threat, it seems a different kind of politics is being played out at Modi8217;s Rajasthan Cricket Association RCA academy, where the Australians are slowly trying to equip their inexperienced team to recapture what was once the final frontier.

With Greg Chappell at the helm of affairs, both at the academy and the Australian cricket team as assistant coach for the moment, the visitors have got a free run of custom-made facilities, perhaps a first for any travelling cricket team. While there have been enough, slightly exaggerated, reports cribbing that Chappell is passing on Indian cricket secrets to the Australians, that point is no more than a typical Aussie mind-game. It would suit them just fine if India started fretting about the exchange of valuable 8220;inside information8221; which is, in reality, more or less public property within cricket circles.

Instead of being worried, some players have been joking that Chappell8217;s frequent two-hour pep talks to the Australian team will work only to the detriment of Ponting8217;s team, considering they never really reaped rich dividends while Chappell was in charge of the Indian team, who were eliminated in the first round of the 2007 World Cup in his last, and most important, assignment.

So, more than what Chappell tells the Australians, it8217;s what he has been able to do for them because of his position as the head of the RCA academy that could prove invaluable for the visiting team, which on paper is clearly one of the weakest touring parties from Down Under after a spate of recent retirements.

Some members of the Indian board have already raised objections to the red carpet that Chappell and Modi8217;s state association have rolled out for Australia, and it8217;s likely to be a topic of discussion in the AGM as well. Significant because though there have been whispers about certain sections of the board having differences with Modi, never before has any official uttered a word against him publicly, neither during the IPL when he seemed to be making up rules as he went along, nor when he was taking the credit for all of the BCCI8217;s riches as its marketing committee chief.

So, while trends suggest that it may not be a very interesting AGM in Mumbai on Saturday, it8217;s definitely going to be an intriguing couple of years from here on as the board8217;s new equations start playing out.