Daily Times

LAHORE: Former Pakistan Test skipper Ramiz Raja has been informed by the Prime Minister’s office he is being nominated to the PCB’s Board of Governors, a move that is eventually likely to see him becoming the next chairman of the organisation. Ehsan Mani, the incumbent, has refused to accept the offer for a short-term extension at the end of his term, which ended on Wednesday, and as such has brought his three-year tenure to a close. Imran Khan, the Prime Minister of Pakistan — and the PCB’s patron-in-chief — met his former team-mate Ramiz, now a prominent broadcaster, on Monday, having identified him as the probable candidate to take over from Mani. But there was the possibility of Mani being given an extension, possibly for a year instead of the usual three years. The eventual appointment, however, is formally made by the PCB Board.Former Pakistan captain Imran had initially reached out to Ramiz, also a former PCB chief executive, for names of potential candidates, in line with his apparent preference for an ex-player to be at the helm. But, in the absence of other obvious candidate, he is believed to have told Ramiz to consider himself for the post.

As for Ramiz, his main target is to improve Pakistan’s position on the ICC ranking tables across formats, which he referred to as “Pakistan cricket’s GPS”. “I did meet with the PM and presented him with a roadmap for how Pakistan cricket can go forward,” Ramiz said. “It was a cricket-centric discussion on the problems Pakistan cricket is facing and what possible steps can be taken to improve the overall performance. I am glad he called me up and heard me out. He is concerned about the state of cricket overall and is open to discussion.Pakistan has been extremely inconsistent and, let’s be fair, that the ranking in each format reflects that Pakistan cannot make it into the final of tournaments. The only chance they have is to play the semi-final in T20 format while considering the ODI and Test format it’s hard for them to go past the pool stage. So I have updated him on things on the cricketing front. We had a productive meeting and it is now his call on how to proceed.”

An official notification of his nomination by the Prime Minister will be issued soon, following which he would contest PCB elections and become the new chairman of the Board.As for Mani, it was always understood that he wasn’t keen to continue, even for a shorter term, but was not against the idea of staying on in order to complete plans and projects that had started under his stewardship. Lead among those would be to take the long-standing negotiations with PSL franchises on a new financial model for the league to a conclusion.The PSL’s commercial and broadcast rights cycle is also due for renewal and will need careful steering through, with the added complication of an arbitration process with the previous rights holders Blitz that the board is involved in. A number of PSL franchises, however, feel that continuity is essential for the advance of the league and they worry a change at the top will disrupt the proceedings.It is pertinent to mention here that the practice of the government’s head nominating PCB chairmen is in stark contrast to PM Imran’s former position on the subject. Back in 2015, he had demanded a “democratically elected cricket board”, saying that the PCB would be powerful only if it had elected officials.