MUMBAI: VN Thomas, one of the country's finest football inside-lefts of the 40s and the 50s, passed away today after a brief illness. He was 77. Thomas is survived by his wife and four daughters.

Thomas, unlucky not to have been selected for the 1948 Olympic team, hailed from Trivandrum and his first association with Mumbai football was with the Western India Automobile Association staff team. After the WIAA team folded up, most of the members of the squad made up the Trades India team.

Later he was associated with India Cultural League with it came one of his greatest moments. ICL was the first non-Calcutta team to win the IFA shield in 1953. Thomas was also the member of the Aryan Gymkhana team, which was as good as the Indian team. Thomas was completely paralysed for the last couple of days after he had suffered a fall last week.

The funeral leaves for Sewri cemetry at 11 a.m.

BCCI chief dead

AHMEDABAD: Former president of Board of Control for Cricket inIndia (BCCI), Ratilal Khushaldas Patell, passed away after a brief illness. He was 89. Patell who died on here on October 3, served as the president of BCCI from 1958 to 1960. He served as the vice-president of the All-India Hockey Federation from 1976 to 1979 and prior to that in 1975 was its honorary treasurer.

Live telecast

MUMBAI: ESPN would telecast the NKP Salve Challenger Trophy day-night cricket tournament live to be held at Ahmedabad from October 15 to 18. The schedule: Oct 15 India vs India A 1430 hrs onwards; Oct 16: India vs India B; Oct 17: India A vs India B; Oct 18: Final.

B'building team

BANGALORE: The National Amateur Bodybuilders Federation has named a team for the World Natural Cup Bodybuilding Championship to be held in Athens, Greece, from November 6 to 8 and World Amateur Bodybuilding Championship in Sicily, Italy, from November 19 to 21.

The team: Medium class: Md Ashraf, Anthony Moses, L M Karibasappa (all from Karnataka); Tall class: M V Nagesh(Kar), Vilas V Chavan (Mah); Super Tall Class: M J Shaji (MP), Santosh Panchal (Mah); Masters: Datta L Palekar (Goa), Prakash Karanth (Kar).

Boxing nationals

NEW DELHI: Visakhapatnam will host the Senior National Boxing Championship from February 2 to 7, 1999, Indian Boxing Federation (IBF) announced here on Tuesday.

The Junior Nationals will now be held from Nov 30 to Dec 5 as it had to be shifted to Dimapur from Kohima as the latter was not ready with the required infrastructure. The sub-junior championship will be held next year in Durgapur, West Bengal, from January 12 to 19.