Cricket’s reputation is at risk, Ehsan Mani says

Dubai: The International Cricket Council (ICC) Board will meet here on Tuesday and Wednesday to discuss a proposal that may yield huge executive and financial powers to India, England and Australia, splitting the cricketing world.

Experts around the world have expressed fear that the controversial motion, which is likely to be passed in the meeting at the ICC Headquarters in the Dubai Sports City, would belittle the powers of the ICC.

Former ICC president Ehsan Mani fears that placing so much control in the hands of the “big three” nations would lead to decisions being made that weren’t beneficial for cricket on the whole.

“All the powers will be vested in the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) and Cricket Australia (CA). The reputation of the ICC and international cricket as a whole is at risk if the right standard of boardroom behaviour is not seen to be in place, both in the ICC and in each and every member board,” Mani told Gulf News.

Mani and another former president, Malcolm Gray, former ICC Chief Executive Malcolm Speed, ex-West Indies skipper and chairman of cricket committee Clive Lloyd, and past presidents of the Pakistan Cricket Board Shariyar Khan and Tauqir Zia, have written to current ICC president Alan Isaac and directors of the ICC highlighting the dangers of the proposal.

Ali Bacher, former chief of the South African Cricket board, has said: “The Position Paper put forward by BCCI, ECB and CA if accepted would lead to division and strife in world cricket as never seen before. ICC member countries should never forget the animosity that existed, particularly in the subcontinent and the Caribbean, when England and Australia had veto rights before 1993.”