Indian cricket authorities have terminated Indian Premier League side Deccan Chargers for "failing to comply with a deadline for overdue player fees," according to REUTERS. The Board of Control for Cricket in India said in a statement the decision was "only due to the absolute inability of the franchise to effectively run the team." The BCCI also said due to the "stated position of the Deccan franchise to refuse to rectify the various defaults including payments to players...a decision was taken to forthwith terminate the Deccan Chargers franchise." Since May, the board said it had "received repeated assurances that the overdue player fees would be paid; all of these promises have been unfulfilled." Deccan Chronicle Holdings, a media company that bought the team for $107M before the inaugural IPL season in '08, sought to sell the cash-strapped team this week, "having placed advertisements in newspapers inviting bids." It received just one proposal when bids opened on Thursday, which it rejected "on the basis of the payment terms offered by the bidder" (REUTERS, 9/15).
DOWN TO TEN: TNN's Datta & Rao reported that after terminating the Chargers' contract on Friday night, IPL's governing council decided on Saturday "to float tender for a new IPL team and short-list 10 cities" -- Ahmedabad, Visakhapatnam, Dharamsala, Indore, Jamshedpur, Nagpur, Cuttack, Kanpur (Greater Noida), Rajkot and Ranchi. The new IPL team "could be based out of any of these cities." The base price of a new team will be Rs 300 crore ($55.2M) for five years and will "get the same share from the league's central revenue pool," which the original eight teams earn (60%). The new team owners "will be given the option of picking players from the terminated Chargers team for the next edition" (TNN, 9/16).
DAMAGE CONTROL: The PTI reported that the BCCI on Saturday "denied media reports" that Deccan has a stay order against its termination from the IPL, saying that the matter would "come up in the Mumbai High Court" on Monday. The BCCI said in a statement Friday, “It has been reported in some sections of the media that the Mumbai High Court has stayed the termination of the Deccan Chargers Franchise, announced by the BCCI on Friday evening. The BCCI would like to clarify that the counsels of both sides were present in Court at 10:30am on Saturday, 15 September 2012. The Court heard both parties and did not pass any order staying the termination" (PTI, 9/15). Meanwhile, the PTI also reported that the BCCI "amended its constitution to do away with the zonal rotational policy for electing its president." That will allow "a second term to office bearers subject to re-election." The decision was seen as a "significant move, which will have far-reaching implications." At a Special General Meeting in Chennai, India, the proposals were passed by more than three-fourth majority, "virtually paving the way for some of the senior officials to occupy or retain key positions in the board" (PTI, 9/15).
