Rod Bransgrove, who currently owns 60% of Hampshire club, is set to relinquish his chairman position. Notably, the 72-year-old helped Hampshire out of insolvency in 2000 and spent £15 million, which is more than any other individual that has invested in the game throughout the history of English cricket.
Bransgrove has been at the helm for 23 years and will now be replaced by Nick Pipe. He was appointed as the deputy chairman in 2021 and was also the managing director of Hampshire Cricket before acting as a non-executive director and vice president. Meanwhile, Bransgrove has confirmed the development, explaining the reason behind it.
“I will be standing down as chairman of Hampshire Cricket at the end of the year. There are many reasons for this but for one I am getting older. Also when we started this journey 23 years ago I promised you four things. Firstly, that we would save Hampshire cricket from insolvency and the fact we are all here is proof of that. Secondly, that we would create a team that competes with the very best in all competitions, and we are now one of the teams nobody wants to play," he was quoted as saying by ESPNcricinfo.
“The third important point was that we would create a stadium capable of housing the very best international and Test match cricket and the recent announcement is the final validation of that very long and sometimes very difficult journey. And the other was to create a business all around Hampshire cricket to make sure that the county is never again threatened with insolvency. We are a long way to doing that and the business around the site is becoming extremely valuable,” he added.
Notably, Bransgrove was the most important figure in building the Ageas Bowl in Southampton. The venue hosted the inaugural World Test Championship final between India and New Zealand and will also host an Ashes Tests in 2027. The stadium will also get a new title sponsor at the end of the ongoing season.
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