Two rounds of voting were not enough to break the deadlock between ex-USACA president Atul Rai and former USA captain Sushil Nadkarni for the right to serve a three-year term as league director on the new USA Cricket board of directors. So the men decided to shake on it.
In an unprecedented move, the two candidates have agreed to a split term according to a USA Cricket press release. In the main election voting that concluded on July 29, Rai and Nadkarni each received 12 votes from the eligible voting leagues. A special runoff vote that ended on August 12 produced the same result. A stipulation was announced that the winner would then be decided by a coin toss with the winner serving the full three-year term.
However, both men agreed beforehand to serve half of the term each, an agreement that was unanimously approved by USA Cricket's four-person nominating and governance committee, which includes ICC chief executive David Richardson. Rai wound up winning the coin toss, meaning he will serve the initial 18 months in the position. Nadkarni will then take over for the final 18 months before a fresh election is held for the league director position in 2021.
Now that the seven-person constituent board has been finalised, the final three independent directors will be selected by the nominating and governance committee. The committee is meeting this weekend in Florida to finish their evaluations before putting their three candidates forward to complete the 10-member board of directors.