ICC postpone referees' commission meeting

The International Cricket Council on Tuesday postponed a meeting of the panel looking into the Mike Denness affair, which has threatened the unity of the game, following pressure from members of its executive board.

Match referee Mike Denness of England caused a rift between the ICC and the Board of Control of Cricket in India when India had him sacked without the permission of the world governing body after he penalised six Indian players during the India-South Africa Test series in Port Elizabeth last year.

The ICC, which saw the Indian action as a threat to its authority, responded by stripping the third match between South Africa and India of its Test status.

"The ICC has announced it is deferring the meeting of its referees' commission, scheduled for the end of this week in South Africa," the ICC said in a statement.

The ICC said the decision to postpone came after members of the ICC executive board from Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and South Africa asked for the referees' commission, originally scheduled for 23-24 February, to be put back until after the board meeting in South Africa on March 15-16.

GRAY DISAPPOINTED

But ICC president Malcolm Gray said he was unhappy with the postponement.

"It is extremely disappointing that the work of a properly constituted commission, established after extensive consultation with the BCCI, has to be halted because of pressure from within the executive board," Gray said in a statement.

The ICC agreed to set up a panel to look into the Denness affair to defuse tension, which at the time threatened to split world cricket. But the composition of the panel has itself become a controversial subject.

The ICC appointed a three-man panel composed of South African judge Albie Sachs, ex-Pakistan skipper Majid Khan and former Australian test opener Andrew Hilditch.

But the Indian board rejected the panel with BCCI president Jagmohan Dalmiya saying he had not been consulted but merely informed of the panel members.

On January 30 the ICC had said it would go ahead with the referees' commission meeting, with or without India's participation, after India proposed that either the commission should be put on hold until after the executive board meeting or the panel should be enlarged from three to 10 people.

Dalmiya had said that if these alternatives were not acceptable to the ICC, then India would not participate with the referees' commission in any way.

The situation had changed and the meeting had been postponed because India had gained the support of other members of the executive board, a spokesman for the ICC said.

"There's no indication of what they want to do at the executive meeting in March. The expectation is that they want to raise the make-up of the commission at that time," the ICC spokesman added.

Mail Cricket Editor