Sri Lankan Cricket Fans

It's good the tradition of the toss stays in test cricket.

http://www.espncricinfo.com/story/_/id/23641173/icc-cricket-committee-saves-toss

ICC Cricket Committee

Chairman: Anil Kumble

Ex-Officio: Shashank Manohar (ICC Chairman) and David Richardson (ICC Chief Executive)

Past Player representatives: Andrew Strauss and Mahela Jayawardena

Current Player representatives: Rahul Dravid and Tim May

Full Member team coach representative: Mike Hesson

Associate Members representative: Kyle Coetzer

Women's Cricket representative: Belinda Clark

Full Member representative: David White (NZC chief executive)

Media representative: Shaun Pollock

Umpires' representative: Richard Kettleborough

Referees' representative: Ranjan Madugalle

MCC representative: John Stephenson (MCC's Head of Cricket)

The tradition of the toss will stay during the World Test Championship scheduled to start from July 2019. Also, there will be no points for series wins, but a draw will earn teams a third of the available points. These were the recommendations from the ICC cricket committee, which also said ball-tampering and personal abuse should carry serious penalties. The chief executives' committee will deliberate on these suggestions in June before final ratification by the ICC Board.

Here is the lowdown on the most important topics covered by the cricket committee, headed by former India captain Anil Kumble, in a meeting this week.

The toss stays

The ICC has had serious concerns about pitch-doctoring in the recent past and, in an internal paper it prepared on the playing conditions, suggested doing away with the toss to bring balance to the game.

An ICC release on Tuesday said the cricket committee "discussed whether the toss should be automatically awarded to the visiting team but felt that it was an integral part of Test cricket which forms part of the narrative of the game."

The ICC paper had recommended that the best way to discourage the preparation of unfit pitches would be to award points to the opposition should the match be abandoned. It is not yet clear whether the cricket committee supported such a radical step.

Points for matches, not series

Although the committee did not fix the exact points for wins, losses or draws in the Championship, it wanted draws to be worth a third of the points reserved for a victory.

"Based on the principle of simplicity and every match needing to count," the ICC release said, "the committee recommended that points should only be awarded for each match and not a series win. As part of this, it was proposed that there was a draw-win ratio of 0.33:1, so a draw gives each team a third of the available points."


Heavy sanctions for ball tampering and personal abuse

The "line" wasn't crossed so much as erased during Australia's tour of South Africa recently. The ICC was left embarrassed with various players flouting not only the spirt of cricket but also the code of conduct. David Warner, Quinton de Kock and Kagiso Rabada were charged for poor behaviour in an incident-filled series which culminated in Warner, Steven Smith and Cameron Bancroft receiving bans from the ICC and Cricket Australia for ball tampering.

After reviewing those events, the cricket committee voted in favour of raising the sanctions associated with ball-tampering and having penalties for "personal, insulting, offensive or orchestrated abuse". It also recommended giving the match referee the authority to "down or upgrade a level of offence or sanction".

"The group felt that excessive personal abuse and ball tampering were serious offences in the game and that should be reflected in the way in which they are dealt with," the ICC release said. "There was also strong support for giving the match officials more authority and subsequently greater support around their decision making."

The ICC's latest means to battle corruption in the game is an Integrity app that will be available to players, officials and support staff at all levels of the game and across all formats.

The app will "give anyone in the game easy access to information they need to tackle issues relating to anti-corruption and anti-doping", the ICC said on Friday. While the app will serve as an information source, it will also provide those in the game a secure platform to report any suspicious incidents or behaviour related to corruption or doping.

Players and officials were first made aware of the app at a soft launch during the Under-19 World Cup in New Zealand in January. India Under-19 coach Rahul Dravid said he found the app useful, and encouraged all those involved with the game to download it.

"It's fantastic to see that the ICC has come up with an Integrity App," Dravid said. "It's got a lot of information on anti-doping and anti-corruption. You can make a report about anything that you notice that is untoward. I think it's terrific to have easy access to this information on your fingertips. I would encourage all players, and those involved in cricket, to download the app, to use it and to read up on all the information. It's something that will keep the game clean, fair and something that we are all proud of."

Eoin Morgan, the England limited-overs captain, also felt that the app would help keep cricket clean. "It is great that the new ICC Integrity App is now available to download," he said. "So help keep the game clean by getting it today for anti-doping and anti-corruption information and educate yourself."

Haidee Tiffen, the New Zealand women's coach, drew attention to the fact that people could now have easy access to all the rules and regulations. "The ICC Integrity App provides anti-doping and anti-corruption information at our fingertips. It gives you all the data regarding the rules and regulations which is necessary for everyone to ensure a smooth career, and protect the game," she said. "It provides a safe way to report any incidents, behaviours or concerns should the need arise. I congratulate the ICC for developing this app, which I'm sure will be of great benefit to anyone involved in cricket."

http://www.espncricinfo.com/story/_/id/23941875/icc-launches-app-battle-corruption-cricket

This might curtail the chances of having our own t20 league but by and large a good decision for the international game. Whether the players through their unions will agree to this will be a matter of interest.

http://www.espncricinfo.com/story/_/id/23968379/icc-limit-players-three-t20-leagues-year

The ICC's Full Members are on the verge of clamping down on player participation in domestic T20 leagues, and may well also stop sanctioning such leagues in Associate Member countries. The mushrooming growth of T20 leagues in recent years has rattled cricket's ecosystem and to control its impact on international cricket, ESPNcricinfo understands the majority of Full Members have given an in-principle nod to capping player participation to no more than three T20 leagues a year.

Both the chief executives committee (CEC) and the ICC Board have discussed the issue at the annual conference in Dublin over the weekend and a broad consensus has emerged that if players are allowed to participate in any number of leagues it will start affecting international bilateral cricket. Although both the CEC and Board were in favour of putting a cap on as soon as manageable, a final decision is only expected at the October round of ICC meetings.

The other key decision which will also come up for approval in October is on the future of T20 Leagues hosted by Associate nations. Currently, Full Members do not require any kind of ICC approval should they want to start a T20 league in their country, whereas Associate Members do. Usually, ICC approval for an Associate league has been all but a rubber stamp but that may soon change. If the ICC eventually refuses to sanction such leagues, it could prevent them from attracting top Full Member stars, on whose participation the success of a tournament often hinges.

The driving concern among Full Members is that most leagues in Associate countries are operated by a third party with little interest in the development of the game. And some board members and chief executives feel that a few Associate boards themselves did not have real stakes in the game.

The growth spurt in such leagues is exemplified by the launch of a T20 competition by Abu Dhabi Cricket which will take place in October this year with teams from Full Member countries taking part, as well as players such as Chris Gayle. That is in addition to a bigger Emirates Cricket Board T20 league later in the season (as well as T10 league).

Canada is currently holding its inaugural GT20, as is Norway (with the participation of some Pakistani cricketers) and Nepal has its own Premier League. In addition there are a number of other lesser-known, fleeting leagues sprouting up in unlikely countries which have cricket associations.

The key response to any such moves - especially a player cap - will come from FICA (Federation of International Cricketers' Association) and various player associations. Tony Irish, FICA's executive chairman, sits on one of the ICC's working groups which has been discussing the issue. It is understood that FICA has made it amply clear putting a cap on player movement amounts to a restraint of trade.

But concern among some Full Members has been growing. In March Cricket West Indies (CWI) - one of the boards most affected by this situation - prepared a paper on the effect T20 leagues are having on the world game. Their "runaway" success, the paper argued, could put international cricket in "jeopardy", especially for boards without the financial strength to prevent their players from prioritising leagues over international cricket.

Other boards might now be coming round to that view. In May, the PCB announced a new policy whereby its players would only be allowed to play in two T20 leagues this year, with or without the PSL. Last November, the Bangladesh Cricket Board announced they would offer only two No-objection certificates a year to their contracted players. All overseas leagues demand an NOC from the host board before signing a player.

The BCCI has never allowed Indian players to participate in the overseas T20 leagues. Primarily that is to protect the IPL, but it is also to make sure players do not start choosing their own development pathways. To safeguard against the threat the BCCI recently enhanced significantly its contracts for international players as well as the pay structure for domestic cricketers. The BCCI's stance has long been to ensure its domestic game is healthy and sustainable, because that is where the talent will emerge from - they are one of the few boards with the financial power to do so.

But with a growing number of international cricketers streamlining their workloads by not just picking the format they want to focus on but also foregoing national contracts, various cricket boards have woken up to the need to protect their biggest asset - the player.

Stringent sanctions to curb ball-tampering and personal abuse were agreed upon at the ICC's annual conference that concluded in Dublin on Monday (July 2). The ICC board supported the recommendations of the Chief Executives' Committee and Cricket Committee for changes to the code of conduct, including the introduction of new offences such as Personal Abuse and Audible Obscenity while increasing the level of punishment for "changing the condition of the ball" to Level 3 from Level 2.

The maximum sanction for a Level 3 offence was also increased from 8 suspension points to 12 - translating into a 6-Test or 12-ODI ban. The same change was applied to a Level 4 offence. It was also decided that match referees will henceforth hear any charges from Level 1 to 3 while a Judicial Commissioner will only hear Level 4 charges and appeals.

Attempting to gain unfair advantage (i.e. any form of cheating other than ball tampering) and Personal Abuse were the latest offences which carried Level 2-3 charges while Audible Obscenity and Disobeying An Umpire's Instructions were the other new codes which were categorised as Level 1 offences.

The ICC also decided to change the guidelines for stump microphone, allowing for the audio to be broadcast at any time, including when the ball is dead. In addition to that, ICC also agreed to consider how the member boards could he held liable when the indiscretions by its players crosses a certain threshold. The changes will be incorporated into the Code of Conduct for adoption later this year, it was decided during the ICC meet.

"It has been a productive week of meetings here in Dublin and it has been good to have all ICC Members in attendance at our 75th Annual Conference. I and my fellow Board directors were unanimous in supporting the recommendations of the Cricket Committee and Chief Executives' Committee to drive improved behaviour across our sport," ICC Chairman Shashank Manohar said.

"It is vital that there is a strong deterrent to both players and administrators to ensure we have high standards of conduct in our game. We have more than a billion fans and we must not give any of them any reason to doubt the high levels of integrity within our sport," he added.

http://www.cricbuzz.com/cricket-news/102892/ball-tampering-will-now-invite-a-ban-for-up-to-six-tests

^ All this is good but the ICC have still been unable to go to the basics of ball tampering by not clearly defining what they call "artificial substance". Allowing match referees to hear charges from level 1 to 3 is also concerning......not that it really matters at the end of the day, judicial commissioners are also in the ICC pocket.

The International Cricket Council today released the updated version of the Duckworth-Lewis-Stern (DLS) System along with the new ICC Code of Conduct and ICC Playing Conditions.

These will come into effect from Sunday, 30 September, when the first ODI between South Africa and Zimbabwe will be played in Kimberley.

This is the third version but second update of the DLS System since its introduction into international cricket in 2014 and has been carried out following a detailed ball-by-ball analysis of scoring patterns, including in the Powerplays, in all limited overs internationals played during the previous four years.

This means the current analysis is based on information from 700 ODIs and 428 T20Is, which comprise over 240,000 outcomes of individual deliveries.

The latest analysis has revealed that teams have been able to extend their acceleration patterns for longer periods, and the average scores in ODIs have continued to increase. This means that par score calculations will assume that teams will be able to score a slightly higher proportion of their runs towards the end of an innings.

In finalizing the updated version, the scoring patterns between ODI (final 20 overs) and T20 were analyzed, as were the scoring patterns between men’s and women’s international matches. The study has confirmed that in both cases, while overall scoring rates are obviously different, wicket-adjusted resource utilisation rates are essentially identical.

As such, it has again been confirmed that a single version of the DLS System is compatible with all formats.

To read FAQs on the DLS System, please click here.

ICC Code of Conduct

Meanwhile, the following are some of the new offences and the change in level of some existing offences in the ICC Code of Conduct for Players and Player Support Personnel, which will also be introduced from Sunday, 30 September. These were approved by the ICC Board during the Dublin Annual Conference on 2 July.

Attempting to gain and unfair advantage - cheating, other than ball-tampering *
Level 2, 3

Personal abuse *
2, 3

Audible obscenity *
1

Disobeying an umpire’s instructions *
1

Changing the condition of the ball
3 (from 2)

*denotes new offence

The maximum sanction for a Level 3 offence has been increased from eight suspension points to 12 suspension points (equivalent to 6 Test matches or 12 ODIs).

Match referees will now hear Level 1, 2 and 3 charges with a Judicial Commissioner only hearing Level 4 charges and appeals.

ICC Playing Conditions

With the ICC Cricket World Cup 2019 less than a year away, the ICC has not made any major changes to the existing playing conditions. There are only a couple of minor tweaks, which are:

Clauses 11.4 (ODI), 11.7 and 12.8 (Tests) – allows a match to be concluded before a scheduled interval.

Clause 19 (Test, ODI and T20I) - Unless the boundary is the maximum 90 yards from the centre of the pitch, the boundary rope cannot be any more than 10 yards from the edge of the available playing area.

-ICC

This is good

Quote:Clause 19 (Test, ODI and T20I) - Unless the boundary is the maximum 90 yards from the centre of the pitch, the boundary rope cannot be any more than 10 yards from the edge of the available playing area.

Link for that - https://www.icc-cricket.com/media-releases/864006

Overall good improvements

(09-29-2018, 09:19 AM)Bada Wrote: [ -> ]This is good

Quote:Clause 19 (Test, ODI and T20I) - Unless the boundary is the maximum 90 yards from the centre of the pitch, the boundary rope cannot be any more than 10 yards from the edge of the available playing area.

this means massive grounds like Hamba should definitely have 90 yards from the centre of the pitch to the boundary right?

(09-30-2018, 04:05 PM)Randy Wrote: [ -> ]

(09-29-2018, 09:19 AM)Bada Wrote: [ -> ]This is good

this means massive grounds like Hamba should definitely have 90 yards from the centre of the pitch to the boundary right?

No, that means you can't drag the rope in more than 10 yards unless the playing area of the ground is 90 yards. They can drag it in more than 10 yards in grounds like Hambantota and MCG. It would be maximum 10 yards for SSC.