IMG asks BCCI to reconsider contract issue

Mumbai:

International Management Group (IMG), whose services for conducting future IPL editions have been terminated by Cricket Board citing opposition from its Working Committee, has asked the BCCI to reconsider its position.

IMG's senior vice-president Andrew Wildblood, in his reply to BCCI secretary N Srinivasan's termination notice sent a few days ago, has stated that the Board had not provided "any grounds for such termination," and "there are no such grounds," according to available information.

Wildblood, who is based in London, has also issued a veiled threat asking the BCCI to reconsider its position even as the sports management firm reserved its "rights and remedies at law under and in respect of the contract."

This letter from the IMG is expected to be taken up for discussion at the Governing Council meeting of the IPL which is expected to finalise the accounts for the 2009 edition held in South Africa.

Wildblood's letter was in response to a letter sent by Srinivasan to IMG where he had clearly spelt that the BCCI had taken a decision "not to use IMG's services any more" for the conduct of the cash-awash IPL, its property.

The Board secretary stated in his letter to IMG that the BCCI Working Committee did not approve of the terms he had negotiated with Wildblood by which IMG was paid Rs 42.92 crore for services rendered in the first edition of IPL in 2008.

Srinivasan also said in his letter to Wildblood that while the negotiations were pending, IMG's services were utilised when this year's IPL was moved out of India to South Africa because of General Elections.

The BCCI secretary said the Working Committee felt that the amount asked by the sports management firm was "disproportionate", following which further negotiations took place in London among Srinivasan, BCCI President Shashank Manohar and Wildblood in June.

Stating that Wildblood was asked to submit a new proposal before the Board's next working committee meeting which the latter failed to do, Srinivasan said in his letter that IMG's services were no longer needed.

But the Board secretary's version of the happenings have been disputed by Wildblood, who recalled that at the IPL's Governing Council meeting in Bangkok in October 2008, Srinivasan had acknowledged the validity of IMG's ten-year contract signed in September, 2007.

Wildblood pointed out that after the IMG had agreed to an annual commission proposed by the BCCI, instead of the earlier fixed fee for services rendered, the Board's Working Committee shot it down.

He said that at a meeting with Manohar and Srinivasan in July he told them the IMG was not prepared to submit a revised proposal as suggested by them in London.

Since the BCCI's Working Committee was not in favour of a fixed fee to IMG, "the original commission based system continued to apply," according to Wildblood.

Wildblood has also informed the BCCI that other than out of pocket expenses as suggested by the Board, the IMG had not yet been paid any other amount for this year's tournament in South Africa.