Venues for ODI series against England announced

Hyderabad, Chennai, Kolkata, Mohali and Mumbai will host the five one day internationals between India and England to be played in January in that order. This was stated by the secretary of the Board of Control for Cricket in India JY Lele in Chennai on Friday.

The England team is to play a Test series in December. It would then go back home for Christmas and New Year before returning to play the one day series.

Lele, who was the guest of honour at the 71st Annual Day function of the Tamil Nadu Cricket Association (TNCA) also said that the working committee meeting of the BCCI, to be held in the last week of July would take a final decision on India's participation in the Super Challenge Series to be held in Australia in September.

Lele said that the selection committee would meet on July 9 at Mumbai to select the team for the Sri Lanka tour. The Indian team is expected back from the tour of Zimbabwe on July 8. The captain Sourav Ganguly and coach John Wright are scheduled to stay back in Mumbai for the deliberations.

Lele praised the role the TNCA has played in Indian cricket and added that the association is one of the best managed and administered in India.

BCCI president AC Muthiah delivering the welcome address spoke at length about the contribution of TNCA towards Indian cricket. Apart from hosting Test matches and One Day Internationals, the TNCA hosted a charity match for the victims of the Gujarat earthquake. An amount to the tune of 15 million rupees was raised through the benefit match played between an India team and an Australian XI in March. He added that the money would be handed over to Union Sports Minister Uma Bharti, who will in turn, hand it over to the Prime Minister AB Vajpayee.

Muthiah also expressed satisfaction in the continued fight against match fixing taken up by the BCCI. He took pride in the fact that the board was the forerunner in the crusade and this had been accepted by other cricketing countries. Muthiah said that during the past one year, the board was faced with one obstacle or the other and had overcome them.

Later, speaking to the media, Muthiah said that he hoped that the government clearance would be obtained for the participation of the Indian team in the Asian Test Championship. He said that it would be out of order for India not to play Pakistan or any other country in a tournament. He added that the BCCI would have to honour its international commitments.