UP306 Kumar Sangakkara

Kumar Sangakkara is one of the most important and influential voices in international cricket today and in an ideal position to offer insight in to many of the current sports business themes. The IPL has changed cricket forever, and is challenging the status quo of the traditional game, run by the national governing bodies and the ICC.As a player, he's regarded as the greatest wicket keeper batsmen of any era, he scored 28,016 runs in International cricket, the second highest total of all time. In 2019 he became President of the MCC, the first non-British person to be appointed to the position since the club was founded in 1787. His MCC Spirit of Cricket Cowdrey Lecture was a powerful and brave criticism of corruption and incompetence in Sri Lanka cricket, and a rallying call for change in the way the sport is governed. He is currently director of cricket for the Rajasthan Royals IPL franchise, and he talked to us from the road between matches. The other guest is Rowena Samarasinhe, a partner at Level law firm and managing director of GenSport, previously General Counsel at Dentsu's athlete management service and has held senior roles in squash and rugby union. Unofficial Partner is the leading podcast for the business of sport. A mix of entertaining and thought provoking conversations with a who's who of the global industry. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 500 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series and live events, you can reach us via the website.