LONDON: Pakistan yesterday announced they will resume their legal battle against the world cricket bosses after talks to find an amicable solution to the crisis that emerged after the country's exclusion as a 2011 World Cup venue broke down here at Lord's.
Ijaz Butt, the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chief who attended yesterday's meeting, expressed his disappointment over the failure to find an agreeable settlement to the World Cup issue and made it clear that he has no other choice but to pursue with a legal battle that is threatening to snowball into a major crisis.
"I hoped and expected the support of my Asian co-hosts in resolving these organizational difficulties," said Butt after the meeting. "I am deeply disappointed that no progress was made despite the intervention of both the ICC president and vice president. This means that rather than harmony amongst the co-hosts of the 2011 World Cup we will have disagreement and legal dispute. I do hope that they will reconsider their unreasonable stance so that the legal dispute can be resolved and a hugely successful World Cup organized in 2011."
Earlier, Butt had met with the representatives of the co-hosts of ICC Cricket World Cup 2011. The purpose of the meeting was to attempt to resolve outstanding issues arising from the March 3 terrorist attack on the Sri Lankan team in Lahore, the need to ensure the security of the event and the proceedings PCB has brought against the ICC for breach of contract arising out of the handling of this matter.
Butt sought the support of its fellow Asian co-hosts for matches to be played under the aegis of the PCB in a safe neutral venue. Despite the fact that these discussions had been helpfully and constructively brokered by the ICC President David Morgan and ICC Vice President Sharad Pawar who is also Chairman of World Cup Central Organizing Committee, no progress was made.
It is a disappointing development, as till Friday it was looking quite likely that a settlement would be worked out by the concerned parties soon
The stakeholders of the 2011 World Cup seemed to be inching closer to reaching a settlement following a meeting at The Oval on Friday evening.
Butt met with Morgan and Pawar in a bid to find an amicable solution to the issue. The trio agreed on a possible means to resolve the PCB's ongoing issues in relation to the hosting of matches in the ICC Cricket World Cup 2011.
The Lord's meeting was aimed at finalizing a recommendation on where the 14 matches originally scheduled to be held in Pakistan could be played. Any such recommendation was supposed to go forward to the ICC's commercial board (chaired by Morgan) for consideration next Thursday (June 25), with that meeting taking place as part of the ICC's annual conference week.
"I am pleased we have made progress on this matter," Morgan had said after Friday's meeting at The Oval.
"Friday's meeting between myself, Pawar and Butt was never designed to be an end in itself but was, as stated on Monday, about identifying the best means to come up with a recommendation on where the matches originally scheduled to take place in Pakistan can be held.
"We believe we have come up with that means now, through the meeting of the host countries, and if they are able to produce a recommendation when they meet can be tabled for consideration by the ICC's commercial board next Thursday." The ICC Board in April decided that Pakistan could no longer host the matches it was originally allocated because of the country's internal security situation.
