The Twenty20 syndrome seems to have affected several aspects of Indian cricket. In Baroda, the five-day Irani Cup match finished in just three days and in Mumbai the Board of Control for Cricket in India’s 79th Annual General Meeting lasted a little over a couple of hours.

Announcing decisions that had been finalised way before board officials met, it turned out to be a mere formality for newly-appointed president Shashank Manohar and honourary secretary N Srinivasan to name the newly-elected members and selection committees.

As expected, Kris Srikkanth was appointed chairman of the senior national selection committee and Abey Kuruvilla the head of the junior panel. Other members in the senior committee include Yashpal Sharma, Surendra Bhave, Raja Venkat and Narendra Hirwani. Outgoing president Sharad Pawar has allowed himself to be named only in the marketing committee and women’s cricket committee.

Meanwhile, the board did not ratify the decision taken in the last working committee to consider only those individuals as senior selectors who have retired from all forms of the game at least 10 years ago. Instead, the new selection committee includes Hirwani, who last played domestic cricket in 2005-06. “He retired from international cricket ten years ago and that is the criterion. If the player has international experience, then the 10 years count from the time of his retirement from international cricket,” Srinivasan said.

Also, the board decided to bend a few rules for Srinivasan, the new secretary, who is also the owner of one of the IPL franchise teams. Manohar said that “when the board rules were framed, Twenty20 cricket was still not in the picture. This version has just arrived and we have therefore decided to amend those rules.”

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