Umpires Threat Forced ICC to Think Shifting T20 WC

Karachi: A leaked document has revealed that the ICC had made alternate arrangements for this year's Twenty20 World Cup in England after veiled threats from the Elite Panel of umpires to not stand in the competition.

The document, ICC Chief Executive Haroon Lorgat's report presented at the annual CEC meeting in London in June this year confirmed there is a dispute between the Elite Panel of umpires and the ICC over pay hike during their annual negotiations.

Lorgat said in his report that he had raised concerns regarding the annual negotiations the ICC was engaged in with their Elite Panel of umpires in particular after they appointed a representative and were seeking large pay hikes as well as formation of an umpires administration.

"After some difficult negotiations and veiled threats from the representative on behalf of the Elite Panel of umpires, we had made alternate arrangements to replace them for the ICC World T20," Lorgat said in his report.

"Realising that we were not prepared to relent, they agreed to stand during the event on the terms we had proposed, however, we will need to pick up on outstanding issues. We will continue to adopt a reasonable but tough approach to the negotiations," he said in the report.

The report also mentioned further meetings between the Elite Panel representative and ICC but outcome of those meetings were not known.

In the same report, Lorgat stated that he and Lord Paul Condon, who heads the ICC anti-corruption and security unit, remained concerned with the high risks faced in T20 cricket, particularly, in high profile domestic events.

Besides India, Pakistan, South Africa, Australia and England are four Test playing nations where the domestic T20 events are high profile ones with live telecast and big crowds.

"We have received disconcerting information and we are trying to validate this before formally investigating or reporting any further," Lorgat said in the report.

However, the document does not spell out what specific matches or incidents did the ICC anti-corruption and security unit investigate on basis of the information they got.

Lorgat, while commenting on issues related to Pakistan Cricket Board and the 2011 World Cup, said he was "startled" by the PCB move to take legal action against the ICC for shifting of their share of the WC matches.

"I am startled by this course of action which has wasteful implications and I am also disappointed that we did not receive a sensible approach from the PCB to deal with this matter in mature fashion before resorting to legal means," Lorgat said.

The PCB has now dropped its legal proceedings against the ICC and reached an understanding with them over the World Cup matches.

The PCB's decision to pursue legal action against the ICC over shifting of matches also appears strange after glancing at the host agreement drawn up between the IDI and the hosts of the 2011 World Cup.

Because clause 23.5 clearly spells out that the IDI has full and unrestricted right without any liability to the host to relocate the event or matches from any country if it feels beyond reasonable doubt that the World Cup is threatened by civil war, hostility, lack of security or civil disobedience in a host country.