ICC worried over corruption possibilities in franchise cricket, plans stricter regulations
At the ongoing AGM at Edinburgh, the governing body is going to turn its full attention to the scourge of betting and match-fixing.
The International Cricket Council (ICC) is worried that franchise cricket all over the world is prone to being exploited by match-fixers and betting parties. The governing body at present is having its annual general meeting and executive meetings in Edinburgh, Scotland, and there it seeks to find solutions. The leagues in new destinations are particularly vulnerable. BBC Sport said on Thursday: "In documentation seen by BBC Sport, the ICC's integrity unit have reported there is ‘growing evidence’ that corrupters were ‘infiltrating leagues and players across a number of different member territories’.

“The ICC are now planning to establish a working party which will seek to harmonise franchise cricket within the international calendar and examine how corruption could be tackled more effectively.
“As part of the steps taken to mitigate the concerns, the ICC's executive committee will discuss a number of wider strategies during their ongoing annual general meeting (AGM) in Edinburgh.”
Also Read: India are losing because Jasprit Bumrah is not there, simple as you like
The ICC is also planning to be stricter when it approves a domestic league. Under current regulations, a non-full country can have a league of its own provided it features more than four cricketers from full members, and they have represented their national sides within 24 months. As one can see, it’s quite easy to launch a league with that regulation in place.
Canada and USA suspended!
Early last month, the ICC suspended Cricket Canada. Among many reasons, match manipulation was a prominent one, although it wasn’t brought up in the ICC statement. Last year, it had done the same with Cricket USA. France and Italy are also under the scanner over issues there, of one type or another. “The ICC Board resolved to suspend Cricket Canada from ICC membership with immediate effect due to serious breaches of its membership obligations. In taking this decision, the ICC Board was mindful of the importance of protecting the interests of Canadian players and ensuring they are not disadvantaged by the governance issues affecting the national governing body.
"Accordingly, Canadian national representative teams will continue to be eligible to participate in ICC events during the period of suspension. To support the continued participation and development of the national teams, Cricket Canada will be permitted to access ICC funding through a controlled funding mechanism, under the oversight of ICC management, solely for approved national team programmes.
"The ICC will also provide Cricket Canada with a set of reinstatement conditions aimed at addressing the governance and administrative issues identified by the Board. The progress against these conditions will be monitored by the ICC Normalisation Committee, supported by ICC management, with reinstatement of membership subject to the Board being satisfied that the conditions have been fully met,” the ICC said in a statement last month.
In good news for Mauritius, the East African country is set to become a new ICC member. They met all the ICC criteria, which Colombia, Poland, Latvia, Burundi and Burkina Faso didn’t.
ABOUT THE AUTHORPrateek SrivastavaPrateek Srivastava is a senior sports journalist having been in the profession for two decades now. He started his print career with the India Today Group and later also worked for the Asian Age. In 2009, sensing the wind of change, he switched to the digital media and joined Mobile ESPN. There, he covered the 2011 Cricket World Cup and 2010 Hockey World Cup as a venue reporter. He did plenty of voice-over work too, over there. After leaving Mobile ESPN, Prateek went on to work for Cricketnext, Gocricket and Cricbuzz. At Gocricket (Times Internet Limited), he covered the 2014 T20 World from Bangladesh. There he also received a team leadership award, given at the end of the month. Prateek has also covered the 2016 T20 World Cup in India, this time working for Sportz Interactive. He also worked for Chinese giants Alibaba over two years and led their ""Short News"" content team at UC Browser. While cricket is Prateek’s expertise, he has also done a lot of golf. In fact, he has covered India’s first two European Tour events back in the late noughties. He has also done extensive writing on football having been associated with the Indian Super League for three seasons. Finally, Prateek is a literature aficionado and swears by Philip Roth and Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and when he doesn’t joke, he is usually quiet and at work.Read More



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