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International Cricket Council (ICC) chief executive Malcolm Speed says money is not a true barometer of cricket success.

Speaking at a news conference ahead of the ICC’s two-day executive board meeting starting in Mumbai on Friday, Mr Speed said he judged organisations on three criteria and the amount of money a cricket board had took a back seat to on-field performance.

"I judge them on how well the team performs, how they look after stake-holders in terms of facilities on the ground etc, and how well they use resources like population to produce great cricketers," he said.

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) signed a $1.3 million rights deal this year, but has been involved in a series of commercial disputes with the ICC.

The BCCI is refusing to endorse a document allowing cricket’s governing body to seal a fresh multi-million dollar sponsorship deal from 2007-2015.

The ICC meeting will discuss whether the Indian board should be allowed to bid for its global rights, usually restricted to media companies.

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Malcolm Speed, chief executive of the ICC, has blamed the ICC’s shortcomings with regard to implementing the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) Code during the Champions Trophy on the lack of drug-testing culture in India.

"The current ICC Champions Trophy is our first tournament since we became signatories to the WADA Code and it has presented us with some challenging issues,'’ Speed said in a statement on Tuesday. "These issues are logistical ones and are understandable given no infrastructure or culture of drug-testing exists currently in India, and when these issues have been raised with us we have worked hard to ensure they have been dealt with."

Speed was responding to a top WADA official’s criticism on Monday that the ICC had an unprofessional attitude towards fighting the drug menace in the sport.

"We’ve been on many doping control testing missions with lots of federations," Yousef Hasan, the WADA official said. "We’ve been dealing with them professionally and they’ve been dealing back very professionally as well. But unfortunately, I can’t say the same thing about ICC."

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Inzamam-ul-Haq leads his side back onto the field … but too late to save the Test © Getty Images

The ICC is to intervene on England’s claims for compensation from the forfeited Oval Test after Pakistan rejected their demands for £800,000 in lost revenue.

As expected, following the failure to reach an agreement between the two countries’ boards, the ECB has now requested assistance and an ICC disputes panel will decide how much compensation England are to receive following Pakistan’s forfeiture of the game.

The ECB originally asked the PCB for £800,000 after they refunded all fifth-day ticketholders and also gave a 40% reimbursement to the 23,000 in the ground on the day of the abandonment, the fourth day. But Pakistan formally rejected this claim, as they maintain that the actions of the umpires were to blame for the resulting refusal by Pakistan to resume the match, and as the employers of the officials, the ICC is responsible for the losses.

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Jacques Kallis and Andrew Flintoff: joint ICC Players of the Year in 2005 © Getty Images

Malcolm Speed, the ICC chief executive, will announce the shortlists for this year’s ICC Awards in Mumbai this Sunday.

The shortlists for the awards have been compiled by the 56-member voting academy, who were asked to vote for players nominated by a selection panel chaired by Sunil Gavaskar, the former India captain.

In addition to the individual awards and the Spirit of Cricket Award, this year’s ceremony will also feature the awarding of Test and ODI Teams of the Year. And for the first time, there is an award for Women’s Cricketer of the Year.

The ceremony - in its third year - will take place at the Taj Land’s End in Mumbai on November 3. It has previously been held in London (2004) and, last year, in Sydney.

© Cricinfo

Former Australian captain Steve Waugh has said the International Cricket Council should make Pakistan’s dope-tainted pace duo of Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif “pay heavily” if they were proven guilty of using banned drugs.

The pace duo were pulled out of the Champions Trophy in India after they tested positive for banned steroid nandrolone.

“It’s not really associated with cricket but you can’t be too naive to suggest that it wouldn’t happen. Obviously it’s here. Players know the rules and its very strict guidelines and you’ve got to work within those,” Waugh said.

“If you step outside of it then you’ve got to pay the consequences. So I think if they’ve done the wrong thing, they’ll certainly pay pretty heavily for it,” he was quoted as saying by an Australian portal ABC.

Matthew Hayden, Australian Test opener, echoed Waugh’s views. He said the ICC should get tough and send a clear message that drugs were not acceptable in cricket.

“We are very proud of having a clean sport that does its best to maintain the standards so that we pass onto the youngsters a clear message that drugs in our game aren’t acceptable,” he said.

Mark Taylor, another former Australian captain, said Akhtar and Asif had to be dealt with appropriately.

“It’s certainly disappointing for cricket and obviously disappointing for the two gentlemen involved,” he said.

“People like Shoaib Akhtar bring a lot of people to the game but they do have a role to play in the game with what we’re trying to teach our youngsters with what they should and shouldn’t do in sport.

“Obviously (drugs) aren’t a part of sport so they have to be dealt with appropriately.”

BCCI’s letter to ICC chief executive Malcolm Speed

The statement of International Cricket Council Chief Executive Malcolm Speed in Jaipur that it would be a grave mistake to “talk of Azhar’s case and that of others in the same breath” is highly disappointing, if not outrageous.

His assertion that Shane Warne and Herschelle Gibbs had already been fined and suspended by their respective cricket Boards and that their cases cannot be compared with that of Mohammed Azharuddin who had been banned for life by the Indian Board sounds bizarre.

If he is reacting to the statement of some officials of the Indian Board that Azhar had undergone enough punishment for his purported sin, then it must be clarified that there is a feeling among Indian Board members that what the Indian board did when the scandal broke out might have been correct even if it was a knee-jerk reaction, but in retrospect they feel that the Board had been too harsh on its players considering the way the other Boards went about protecting the guilty.

The general opinion is that Azhar had undergone enough punishment and that he should be allowed to lead his life like cricketers who had faced similar charges in other countries but are going about as if they had done no wrong.

Yes, Azhar should not be compared with those who got away with murder, people who continued to play after serving a token punishment even after they had admitted that they had taken cash to under perform and those who unabashedly said they accepted money from bookies. One is being persecuted and condemned for life while others strut about as paragons of virtues!

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The ICC has announced the Future Tours Program (FTP) for the next six years.

The FTP, which was unanimously approved by the ICC’s executive board at its March meeting in Dubai, provides “the foundation for a balanced schedule of international cricket for ICC Full Members,” a statement said.

“The drafting of the new FTP was an incredibly complex process involving two years of analysis and 10 drafts,” explained Malcolm Speed, the ICC’s chief executive. “But now that process has been completed and approved by our Members it provides them with certainty of scheduling right through until 2012. And by publishing that schedule on our website it means everyone can quickly discover their team’s future commitments and be able to plan accordingly.”

The new FTP is the first to cover six years instead of five. “Spreading the calendar over six years means each side can fulfill its mandatory minimum requirements of two Tests and three ODIs, home and away, against every other Full Member over that period while still scheduling rest periods for their players,” the statement continued. “At the same time it allows Members to tailor the schedule to suit their own, specific, needs while preserving time in the calendar to accommodate icon series such as The Ashes and India - Pakistan on a four-year cycle.”

Although the ICC was at pains to stress that the FTP was compiled using guidelines approved by the cricket committee, players at the captains’ meeting and player representatives, it is sure to fuel the debate over player burnout. The only concession in this area appears to be the restriction on the number of home Twenty20 matches that can be played in any year.

“We think the balance that has been struck by this new FTP is about right and we believe that in conjunction with the ICC events it will help ensure that the sport continues to remain popular with players, supporters, broadcasters and sponsors,” said Dave Richardson, the ICC’s general manager - cricket. “It is now up to our members to responsibly manage their calendar of international cricket beyond the mandatory commitments of the FTP and ICC events,” he added.

Among all teams, India will play the maximum number of ODIs, in the region of 173 - 208 matches during this period. These include the additional 25 ODIs to be played at neutral venues, for which the broadcasting rights have already been sold. As far as the Tests are concerned, India will play 74 matches, behind England, who are scheduled to play upto 76 matches.

The new six-year FTP can be found on the ICC website by clicking here (.pdf).

I read with interest on Saturday morning a story in the media reporting I had been sent a letter from stakeholders within Zimbabwe’s cricketing fraternity calling upon me to resign as CEO of the ICC over the organisation’s handling of that country’s cricketing problems.

I have not yet received the letter but even if and when I do I have no intention of walking away from my position because of the issue. On the contrary, I am determined to use my role to try and ensure the matter is resolved in as satisfactory a way as possible for all sides.

In relation to the letter, it is worth pointing out that the reports indicate it appears to emanate from a group of people currently outside the current Zimbabwe Cricket set-up. Their disenfranchisement may help to explain why they appear to have an axe to grind and I am a convenient target but their accusations against the ICC are wide of the mark.

Those accusations ignore the make-up of the organisation. The ICC is not simply Malcolm Speed or Ehsan Mani [the president]. It is made up of 96 members, all of whom are charged to run cricket in their respective countries or territories without interference from the centre. (more…)

India take on Bangladesh in their 2007 World Cup opener at Trinidad and Tobago on March 17, and will play Bermuda on March 19. All of India’s group matches will be played in Trinidad and Tobago. Their last group game against Sri Lanka is on March 23.

India will arrive in Trinidad and Tobago on March 2, play their first warm-up game against the Netherlands on March 6 and another against West Indies on March 9. They will then travel to Jamaica for the opening ceremony on March 11.

The World Cup opener between West Indies and Pakistan will be held on March 13. After all the group matches are over, the top two teams from each of the four groups will qualify for the Super Eight round that begins on March 27. The top four teams from the Super Eight round will qualify for the semi-finals to be held on April 24 and 25 in Jamaica and St Lucia. Barbados will host the World Cup final on April 28.

See also World Cup, 2007.

Cricket’s world governing body has approved technology that will help umpires adjudicate on whether a batsman has hit the ball.

The ICC - which rejected TV technology like Hawk-Eye and the Snickometer - will let umpires wear earpieces linked to the stump microphones so they can hear whether the ball has hit the bat.
ICC chief executive officer Malcolm Speed said there was no intention of trying to take decisions away from umpires - but to help them get them right.

“What we have consistently sought to do is to increase the already high numbers of correct decisions made by umpires while, at the same time, not diminishing their on-field role and authority,” Speed said Saturday after a meeting by the Cricket Committee of the ICC.

“This measure has the potential to do that, but at the same time the Committee was mindful of the possible downside with its implications to the fabric of the game and the authority of the on-field umpires.”

The committee also agreed to a trial period in which teams can appeal to television umpires if they feel decisions are incorrect.

The trial will take place at this year’s Champions Trophy in India from Oct. 7 to Nov. 5. It will then be reviewed to see whether it should be used in tests or other tournaments. (more…)

Indian cricket board said the Asian bloc had managed to win the World Cup bid ahead of Australia and New Zealand despite none of the factors being in their favour.

Although BCCI president Sharad Pawar Pawar did not say what eventually clinched the deal in Asia’s favour, he conceded that they were initially apprehensive of bagging the 2011 World Cup as the Australasian bid was ‘well prepared’ and their own compliance document had missed the ICC deadline.

“I must say our position was weak. Australia and New Zealand had submitted their bid in time and it was well prepared,” Pawar said in his first press conference after Asia won the rights to host the mega event.

“They had all the necessary guarantees from the respective governments. In fact, we learnt from them,” he said.

Pawar also said the ICC had sent letters to the Board about the Compliance Document last year but full details were not known then and the correspondence was lost during the change of regime in the BCCI.

“It was only when we met with the PCB officials in Lahore that we got to know the full details, and we immediately sent a communication to the ICC,” he said.

I S Bindra, former BCCI president, said although it was previously agreed in principle that Asia would host every third World Cup, there was confusion over from when this arrangement would come into play.

The suspense over who will host the World Cup in 2011 is set to be resolved during the International Cricket Council (ICC) meeting in Dubai on April 30. The ICC will weigh up the merits of two bids - a joint Bangladesh, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka proposal against one from Australia and New Zealand.

Malcolm Speed, ICC’s chief executive, said that it would be a difficult decision. “We put in place some very strict compliance guidelines so a lot of work has gone into both of these submissions,” he was quoted as saying by AFP. “Both have government support and have indicated their ability to comply with strict ICC criteria regarding the number of venues, the quality of facilities and the exemption from tax.”

Top notch facilities and experience at hosting big events would count in Australia and New Zealand’s favour. Australia and New Zealand jointly organised the World Cup in 1992 and feel they have the right by rotation to host the tournament in 2011. James Sutherland, chief executive of Cricket Australia, spoke of the factors that could help them clinch it. “In very recent history Australia has hosted the Olympics, hosted the Rugby World Cup and with the Commonwealth Games there’s a proven track record of performance that stands us in good stead,” he said. “The facilities, the track record of putting on these large sporting events, and also the resources that we have, the human resources we have in our country and New Zealand, are really strong factors in our favour.” (more…)

Suggestions that some of the grounds scheduled to host matches during next year’s World Cup will not be ready on time have been dismissed by Chris Dehring, the tournament’s managing director and chief executive officer.

Concerns have grown after contractors at Sabina Park admitted that there were serious delays in the ground’s rebuild, but Dehring said that it was “full steam ahead”, adding that a contingency plan had been submitted to the ICC in case there were any last-minute problems.

“Everyone is moving forward as planned,” he told reporters in Grenada. “Of course we have a back-up plan in place and it is currently being reviewed by the ICC. That plan will only be implemented if absolutely necessary. At present, there is no one country that is being earmarked to ‘take’ matches currently assigned to another host venue.

“If a decision were to be taken to relocate matches from one host venue to another, it could only be taken by the organisers. This is not a decision that can be made by anyone outside.”

Dehring explained that it was “critical to the overall success of the tournament, at this time every country is expected to meet its obligation to host matches. Each host venue is working not only on the completion of their stadia but on all the other infrastructural elements required to support the hosting of the tournament.

“We have just over 300 days to go, including weekends and public holidays, and everyone concerned is working assiduously to ensure that no time is lost.

Dehring also said that a revised plan had now been submitted for Sabina Park which would ensure it was ready on time. Warner Park in St Kitts is almost finished, and work on the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium in Antigua is ahead of schedule. Guyana’s Providence Stadium is also set to be ready ahead of the organisers’ deadline.

© Cricinfo

See also World Cup, 2007.

The battle to win the right to host the 2011 World Cup is likely to go down to the wire with Shaharyar Khan, the Pakistan Cricket Board chairman, confirming that Australia and New Zealand have refused to stand down in favour of Asia’s bid.

“Yes it’s true that Australia and New Zealand are insistent that they should get the hosting rights of the tournament as they say they last hosted it in 1992,” Shaharyar told the Daily News. “The ICC has acknowledged our bid but we face stiff competition from Australia and New Zealand who are also very keen to host the 2011 World Cup.”

Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh submitted their joint bid to the ICC on Thursday following a series of meetings between top officials over the past two weeks. A fair amount of time had been spent preparing a compliance document, a mandatory submission for the bid itself. The ICC had earlier given the Asian bloc an extension in the deadline for the submission of their bid from February.

Shaharyar said that the four South Asian countries had a very strong case as three tournaments have been held since the prestigious competition was last held in the subcontinent. “The general feeling in the ICC is that a country should only get a turn after three World Cups,” he said. “And we fulfill that requirement, specially considering the amount of interest and money for cricket in this region.”

Shaharyar added that the ICC Executive Board members would meet in Dubai on April 30 to discuss the two bids and there were chances a decision would be made on the hosts. “We’ve not decided as yet where the semifinals and final would be held because this would only be decided once the tournament is awarded to us,” he said. “But we have agreed that India will organise 22 games, we’ll stage 16 matches, Sri Lanka nine and Bangladesh six. I think we are very well prepared and there is very good coordination among the four countries on this tournament.”

© Cricinfo

Ricky Ponting and Adam Gilchrist’s hundreds against Bangladesh in Fatullah, innings that ensured a come-from-behind victory for Australia in an epic Test match, have seen the duo join a very select group of batsmen.

By reaching three figures, both Ponting and Gilchrist have now scored hundreds against all of the other nine ICC Members to have played Tests, a feat only previously achieved by Stephen Waugh, Gary Kirsten, Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, Brian Lara and Marvan Atapattu.

So, the innings are hugely significant from a statistical point of view, as well as helping to ensure victory for Australia, but they also have plenty of significance for the LG ICC Player Rankings as well.

Ponting’s 118 not out has ensured he remains well clear of South Africa’s Jacques Kallis at the top of the batting list and he is now just one rating point short of his best-ever mark, set after twin hundreds against South Africa in Durban last month.

For Gilchrist, who passed 5000 Test runs during his first innings 144, there is the satisfaction of moving back into the top 20 after scoring his first century at the highest level since March 2005 in Wellington, New Zealand. And it means that, once again, Australia have an amazing six batsmen in that top 20.

Those other players are Matthew Hayden (5th), Michael Hussey (9th, with a career-best mark of rating points), Damien Martyn (14th) and the injured Justin Langer (17th). (more…)