ICC Official Cricket News

On 15 June 1909 representativesfrom England, Australia and South Africa met at Lord's and founded the Imperial Cricket Conference. Membership was confined to the governing bodies of cricket within the British Empire where Test cricket was played. West Indies, New Zealand and India were elected as Full Members in 1926, doubling the number of Test-playing nations to six. That year it was also agreed to make a change in membership, with election being for; "governing bodies of cricket in countries within the Empire to which cricket teams are sent, or which send teams to England." However the United States did not meet these criteria and was not made a member. After the formation of Pakistan in 1947, it was given Test status in 1952, becoming the seventh Test-playing nation. In May 1961 South Africa left the Commonwealth and therefore lost membership. In 1965, the Imperial Cricket Conference was renamed the International Cricket Conference and new rules adopted to permit the election of countries from outside the Commonwealth. This led to the expansion of the Conference, with the admission of Associate Members. Associates were each entitled to one vote, while the Foundation and Full Members were entitled to two votes on ICC resolutions. Foundation Members retained a right of veto. Sri Lanka was admitted as a Full Member in 1981, returning the number of Test-playing nations to seven. In 1989, new rules were adopted and International Cricket Conference changed its name to the current name, the International Cricket Council. South Africa was re-elected as a Full Member of the ICC in 1991, after the end of apartheid; this was followed in 1992 by the admission of Zimbabwe as the ninth Test-playing nation. Then, in the year 2000 Bangladesh received test status. Ireland is due to get test status by 2020 according to the ICC. From its formation the ICC had Lord's Cricket Ground as its home, and from 1993 had its offices in the "Clock Tower" building at the nursery end of the ground. The independent ICC was funded initially by commercial exploitation of the rights to the World Cup of One Day International cricket. As not all Member countries had double-tax agreements with England, it was necessary to protect cricket's revenues by creating a company, ICC Development (International)Pty Ltd – known as IDI, outside the UK. This was established in January 1994 and was based in Monaco. For the remainder of the nineties, the administration of IDI was a modest affair. But with the negotiation of a bundle of rights to all ICC events from 2001–2008, revenues available to International cricket and the ICC member countries rose substantially. This led to a growth in the number of commercial staff employed by IDI in Monaco. It also had the disadvantage that the Council's cricket administrators,who remained at Lord's, were separated from their commercial colleagues in Monaco. The Council decided to seek ways of bringing all of their staff together in one office whilst protecting their commercial income from tax. The option of staying at Lord's was investigated and a request was made, through Sport England, to the British Government to allow the ICC to have all its personnel (including those working on commercial matters) in London – but be given special exemption from paying UK corporation tax on its commercial income. The British Government was unwilling to create a precedent and would not agree to this request. As a consequence the ICC examined other locations and eventually settled on the emirate of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. In August 2005 the ICC moved its offices to Dubai, and subsequently closed its offices at Lord's and Monaco. The move to Dubai was made after an 11–1 vote by the ICC's Executive Board in favour.Whilst the principal driver of the ICC's move to Dubai was the wish to bring its main employees together in one tax efficient location, a secondary reason was the wish to move offices closer to the increasingly important new centres of cricketing power in South Asia. Lord's had been a logical venue when the ICC had been administered by the MCC (a situation that lasted until 1993). But the growing power of India and Pakistan in world cricket had made the continued control of international cricket by a British private members club (the MCC) anachronistic and unsustainable. A direct consequence of the changes and reforms instituted in 1993 was eventually to be the move away from Lord's to a more neutral venue. The ICC appoints international umpires and Match referees who officiate at all sanctioned Test matches, One-Day Internationals and Twenty20 Internationals.The ICC operates 3 panels of umpires: namely the Elite Panel, the International Panel, and the Associates and Affiliates Panel. As of January 2009, the Elite Panel includes eleven umpires. In theory, two umpires from the Elite Panel officiate at every Test match, whilst one Elite Panel umpire stands in ODI matches together with an umpire from the International Panel. In practice, members of the International Panel stand in occasional Test matches, as this is viewed as a good opportunity to see whether they can cope at the Test level, and whether they should be elevated to the Elite Panel. The Elite Panel are full-time employees of the ICC, although do still, very occasionally umpire first-class cricket in their country of residence. The average, annual, officiating schedule for Elite Umpires is 12 Test matches and 15 ODIs, a potential on- field workload of 75 days per year. The International Panel is made up of officials nominated from each of the ten Test-playing cricket boards. The Panel Members officiate in ODI matches in their home country, and assist the Elite Panel at peak times in the cricket calendar when they can be appointed to overseas ODI and Test matches. International Panel members also undertake overseas umpiring assignments such as the ICC Under 19 Cricket World Cup in order to improve their knowledge and understanding of overseas conditions, and help them prepare for possible promotion onto the Elite Panel. Some of these umpires also officiates in the Cricket World Cup. Each of the Test cricket boards nominates a "third umpire" who can be called upon to review certain on-field decisions through instant television replays. All third umpires are first-class umpires in their own county, and the role is seen as a step onto the International Panel, and then the Elite Panel. The newest panel of umpires, set up in February 2005, is the Associates and Affiliates Umpires Panel. It was designed to offer a pathway to top level umpiring for officials from the ICC's 104 Associate and Affiliate Member countries. As of January 2009, it has 10 members from countries such as Nepal and Fiji. These umpires officiate ODIs between Associate Members, ICC Intercontinental Cup matches and other Associate and Affiliate tournaments such as the ICC World Cup Qualifier. There is also an Elite Panel of ICC Referees who act as the independent representative of the ICC at all Test and ODI matches. As of January 2009, it has 6 members, all highly experienced former international cricketers. The Referees do not have the power to report players or officials (which has to be done by the umpires), but they are responsible for conducting hearings under the ICC Code of Conduct and imposing penalties as required at matches, ranging from an official reprimand to a lifetime ban from cricket. Decisions can be appealed, but the original decision is upheld in most cases. The Council failed to achieve consensus among the cricket playing nations as of June 2012, on application of Umpire's Decision Review System universally due to opposition by BCCI .It will continue to be applied subject to mutual agreement of the playing countries.In July 2012,ICC decided to send a delegation to show the ball tracking research done by Dr Ed Rosten, an expert on computer vision and technology, to BCCI to remove the scepticism about the use of DRS technology.

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