The International Cricket Council came in for some stick at the hands of Sri Lanka’s Parliament with Sports Minister Harin Fernando and Opposition Leader Sajith Premadasa accusing the global keeper of the sport of playing foul by mollycoddling the elite teams and downgrading the stage for lesser teams at the on-going T20 World Cup in the USA and the West Indies.
The two rival politicians set aside differences and in one voice branded the ICC as an entity that pampers the “powerful” and puts down the “lowly”.
“Our team was stranded at the airport in Florida for nearly eight hours waiting to catch a flight for their match in New York.
“I see this as the ICC having different ways of treating different countries”, said Minister Fernando.
For once Fernando found an ally in Premadasa who noted that the Sri Lanka team had to travel for as long as one hour and 30 minutes to a practice venue while according to the ICC’s playing Conditions teams have to be within a distance of 45 minutes.
Premadasa also slammed the pitch at New York where Sri Lanka struggled to their lowest recorded total in T20 Internationals when the team was dismissed for 77 and South Africa reached the target for the loss of four wickets in the 17th over.
“The ICC supports the powerful nations and tramples the lesser nations. It has acknowledged the state of the pitch saying they will correct it and this shows it was not up to standard. We have to stand up to this”, said Premadasa.
The pitch at the ground in New York is not a home grown turf but what is called a drop-in piece of ground produced in Australia and shipped to the USA where it was installed into a rectangular hole cut deep in the earth.
It will be taken out after the 20-nation T20 World Cup ends on June 29.
Sri Lanka will meet Bangladesh in their second group stage in a match that the team has to win to stay in contention for a place in the Super Eight stage.
