Our 'Big Bro' holding the ICC for ransom?

"The postponement syndrome" struck the International Cricket Council (ICC), during the times of this pandemic, as it deferred main decisions of its key board meeting held virtually yesterday (10) for one whole month. The meeting was held with the participation of heads of all Test playing countries with Sri Lanka being represented by, reportedly, Shammi Silva. They were supposed to decide, amidst many other things, the fate of this year's T20 World Cup in Australia and the procedure to elect next Chair to the world governing body, for next two to six years. Twice in two weeks

- Now all those have to await till July when the ICC board members are to meet next. This is the second time in two weeks that this virtual ICC meeting, under outgoing Chair Shashank Manohar, deferred its main items of the agenda. The last time they met, on 28 May, a sudden discussion on leaked emails and confidentiality issues took precedence over the official agenda and the all-important meeting was postponed till 10 June (yesterday). Not enough time from July - What is ICC's hidden agenda could be, if they want to delay obviously their main agenda? "The International Cricket Council (ICC) Board today agreed to continue exploring a number of contingency plans regarding the future of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2020 and the ICC Women’s Cricket World Cup 2021 until next month whilst planning for delivery of the events in the scheduled window is ongoing," the official ICC media release said yesterday. Remember this is at a time when even Australia has reportedly informed the ICC their inability to hold the World Cup in the October-November window this year. Even not, only three and a half months will be left from this July to the scheduled start of the 16-nation World Cup. Will that be enough time? Srinivasan vs. Graves? - While the Indian board chief Sourav Ganguly remains a rank outsider for the post of next ICC Chair, it is understood that Pakistan Cricket Board chief Ehsan Mani has emerged as a contender to take on the England and Wales Cricket Board’s Colin Graves, the next in line for Manohar's seat. But 'The Morning Sports' reliably learns that India is eager to wait until their Supreme Court order on its present board and hence is the protracted decision-making at the top level. Also it is learnt that the competition this time is most likely between Narayanaswami Srinivasan, the Indian strongman who was ICC Chairman before Manohar, and Graves for the ICC hot seat. Fingers crossed until July!

(RSS)