CCI to honour Sachin Tendulkar on Thursday

The Cricket Club of India is to honour senior batsman Sachin Tendulkar as part of celebrating its 75th anniversary at its famous Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai on Thursday.

Cricket Board president N. Srinivasan will be the chief guest as CCI honours the “First Citizen of the World of Cricket”, a media release said.

Visiting England team captain Alastair Cook, team director Andy Flower and batting coach Graham Gooch, among others, will be present on the occasion, the release added.

Tendulkar has fond memories of the club, which changed its rules to allow the then 14-year-old cricketer to use its dressing room when he featured in local cricket tournaments in the late 1980s.

CCI is one of the members affiliated to the BCCI but does not take part in the Ranji Trophy national tournament.

The Brabourne Stadium was regular Test venue in this metropolis before all the international cricket matches were shifted to the nearby Wankhede Stadium in the mid-1970s, following a long-standing seat-sharing dispute between the club and the Mumbai Cricket Association.

When Wankhede was undergoing renovation before the 2011 World Cup and was unavailable to host matches, Test cricket returned to the Brabourne, albeit for just one game, when India played against Sri Lanka in December, 2009.

© The Hindu