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DDCA, SAI at loggerheads over Independence Cup

The Delhi District Cricket Association has charged the Sports Authority of India with sabotaging its bid to host the inaugural match of the Independence Cup.

DDCA sports secretary Sunil Dev, who managed the Indian national team on the recent tour of South Africa, alleged that SAI wanted to host the match on its own, but the BCCI did not agree to that. "I was shocked when BCCI secretary Jagmohan Dalmiya told me that SAI wanted to host the match bypassing the DDCA, which is the concerned authority for holding matches at the Firozeshah Kotla," Dev said.

"The DDCA has in fact tried to help SAI, which is facing a cash crunch. And that body has now double-crossed us," Dev lamented. "We had repeatedly asked SAI to give us a written undertaking that it as prepared to allow the DDCA to conduct the match. However, SAI officials deliberately stalled till it was too late."

Dev said that he had been forced to make the matter public because thousands of cricket lovers in Delhi had asked him why the national capital was not host to one of the games of a tournament aimed at celebrating 50 years of Indian Independence.

The original schedule was for the first game of the tournament, between Pakistan and New Zealand, to be played at the Kotla on May 7. As per the revised schedule, the inaugural game will now be played at Mohali on May nine.

Meanwhile in Bangalore, the Karnataka State Cricket Association denied reports in a section of the press that Pakistan had declined to play an Independence Cup fixture at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium because of unsavoury incidents during the Titan Cup tournament involving India, Australia and South Africa last year.

"This is not a fact," said KSCA secretary K Nagaraj. "The BCCI has not received any such letter from the Pakistan Cricket Board. And Pakistan captian Rameez Raja has in fact said on arrival in India that he did not attach any importance to the mini riot at the stadium during the Titan Cup fixture, calling it a mere emotional outburst."

Nagaraj pointed out that the BCCI had been especially careful to select 'safe' centres for games involving Pakistan, and used the occasion of a media briefing to urge the public in the state to refrain from questionable behaviour.

In the event, it is Sri Lanka, and not Pakistan, that will play at the stadium when, on May 20, the World Cup winners take on New Zealand.