NEW DELHI — Regional television network Sun TV Thursday won an auction to buy the Indian Premier League team based in Hyderabad after the cash-strapped Deccan Chronicle group was forced to sell. Sun TV, owned by the Chennai-based Maran group, put in the highest bid of $15.9 million a year for the rights to the franchise in the lucrative Twenty20 league that was founded in 2008. “The IPL Governing Council met earlier today in Mumbai to open the bids for a new IPL franchise,” the Board of Control for Cricket in India said in a statement. “Sun TV network have won the Hyderabad franchise for an amount of 850.50 million rupees ($15.9 million) per year.” It was not known whether Sun TV will retain the team's previous name of the Deccan Chargers. The Deccan Chronicle media group, which bought the Chargers before the inaugural IPL season, was thrown out of the league due to financial violations including failure to pay players' salaries. The Sun TV network runs 32 channels, mainly in south Indian languages, which reach 95 million households, according to its website. The network is also viewed in 27 other countries. Among the players signed up with the Hyderabad franchise are: Kumar Sangakkara of Sri Lanka, South African fast bowler Dale Steyn and Australian batsman Cameron White. Woman on CA board Banker Jacquie Hey broke more than a century of male exclusivity when she was unanimously voted onto the board of Cricket Australia (CA) Thursday. Cricket remains hugely important in Australia, both in sporting and cultural terms, and Hey will be the first woman to serve on the board of the organization which governs the game. Hey was one of three independent directors appointed to the board on the recommendation of the Crawford-Carter review into how CA governs the game, which was set up after the Ashes defeat of 2010-2011. Mendis out of squads Injured Sri Lanka spinner Ajantha Mendis has been left out of the Twenty20 and one-day squads to play New Zealand. Mendis has not fully recovered from a side strain picked up during Sri Lanka's opening world T20 match against Zimbabwe on Sept. 18, although he missed only one game and played in the rest of the tournament to finish as the top wicket-taker with 15 wickets at an average of 9.80. Also rested from the T20 side were batsman Mahela Jayawardene, who gave up the captaincy after the world final against West Indies, and fast bowler Lasith Malinga. The selectors picked uncapped spinners Tharindu Kaushal and Akila Dananjaya for the first three one-day matches. — Agencies
