Tri-series involving Zimbabwe and West Indies later this year
After much deliberation the FTP tour to Zimbabwe will take place in September following the Sri Lanka’s series against Australia.
The tour will see the Lankans getting involved in two Test matches and a tri-series which would also involve the West Indies.
The tour will take place between the first week of October and will go on till the second week of November.
The ICC Cricket Committee: Chairman – Anil Kumble, Ex-Officio – Shashank Manohar (ICC Chairman) and David Richardson (ICC Chief Executive), Past Player representative –Andrew Strauss (former England captain); Mahela Jayawardene (former Sri Lanka captain), Current Player representative - Rahul Dravid (former India captain); Tim May (former Australia off-spinner and ex-CEO of FICA), Full Member team coach representative – Darren Lehmann (Australia coach), Associate representative – Kevin O’Brien (Ireland all-rounder), Women’s Cricket representative – Clare Connor (former England women’s team captain), Full Member representative – David White (NZC chief executive), Media representative – Ravi Shastri (former India captain and a respected commentator), Umpires’ representative – Richard Kettleborough (member of the Emirates Elite Panel of ICC Umpires), Referees’ representative – Ranjan Madugalle (ICC chief match referee and former Sri Lanka captain), MCC representative – John Stephenson (MCC’s Head of Cricket)
Sri Lanka last played a Test series there was way back in 2004 where they beat Zimbabwe in both tests by innings — by 240 runs and 254 runs respectively. Back home, the tour opener for the Australian visitors will be a three-day match at the P. Saravanamuttu Stadium from 18 to 20 July.
The main tour would contain three Tests (July 26-30 – Pallekelle, August 4-8 at Galle and August 13-17 in Colombo) and five ODIs (On August 21, 24, 28, 31 and September 4) in Colombo (3) Dambulla (2) and Pallekelle (1). They also play two T-20s on September 6 and 9 in Pallekelle and Colombo.
It is also learned that there is not going to be a club three day under 23 tournament this year. Instead there are going to be two limited overs tournaments drawn up – fifty overs and T-20 involving all twenty-four teams in the fray.
Earlier the under 23 three-day club tournament had twenty-four teams but, they played in two tiers of 14 premier league clubs and ten emerging clubs, but, this year the authorities have amalgamated the two tiers.
The Sunday Times learns that the original idea was to have an under 21 tournament in the same lines but, changed later under protests by the stakeholders. Ironically it is also learned the players fees will not be given to the players who are involved in the two tournaments.
Meanwhile according to an ICC release former Sri Lanka captain Mahela Jayawardene had his first high profile ICC experience when he sat along some of the best brains on the subject to make some relevant contribution to make the game of cricket more positive.
The ICC Cricket Committee under the chairmanship of Anil Kumble received a presentation on ICC’s plans to bring greater structure and context to international cricket. The other matters that came under scrutiny were creating dedicated competitions in each of the game’s three formats, and there was unanimous agreement from committee members.
The quality of pitches and the undue advantage to home teams was another matter that was discussed. The ICC Cricket Committee held a long discussion about the future use of technology in international cricket, and particularly in umpiring, after receiving a presentation from engineers on their testing of the current technologies used as part of the Decision Review System (DRS).
The presentation covered the performance of edge-detection systems (both heat-based and sound-based), ball-tracking with predictive path, highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of each type of technology, and how each could contribute to increasing the number of correct decisions made across international matches.
The presentation was positively received, and the committee believed that the ICC needs to take a more prominent role in the management of the DRS technologies used in international cricket, by firstly establishing a structure and tighter processes to approve new technologies, and then to ensure a more consistent application of the technologies.