'Difficult' for Modi to return - Pataudi

Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi, former India captain and currently member of the IPL governing council, has said it would be difficult for Lalit Modi, the suspended chairman of the IPL, to make a return to the tournament. Modi was suspended on several charges, including financial impropriety, upon the conclusion of the third IPL and is yet to respond to the show-cause notice issued to him by the BCCI.

"We are awaiting answers to several questions put to him and, yes, it would help if he answers them to everyone's satisfaction," Pataudi told Indian Express. "But even so, coming back would be difficult as the problem with him was his style of functioning, which a lot of people had problems with."

Pataudi added it was important for the IPL to continue and grow for the overall development of cricket in India. "I personally feel this (IPL) is a good product and must be encouraged," he said. "All cricketers and world cricket accept that Test cricket is the purest form of the game and should not be allowed to die. (But) in a country where the longer form of the game gets little or no spectator support, the ODIs and IPL will have to subsidise it. If not, you are not going to see more of Tendulkars, Dravids, Kumbles and others - and that will be a shame.

"What is happening with the IPL is exactly what happened in English cricket several decades ago. As interest in the basic form of the game, Tests and counties, was dying, the one-dayer was invented to cross-subsidise county games and Test matches."